Interactive Neopixel Skigoogle, RGB Is Life

Hello Makers,

Now that 2017 is over, some volks hope that the hype about RGB ends, but I think 2018 will need a lot more of those little pixiedust emitters. ;)

And because of that and the fact that this year it's the last my friends and I can join our school ski camp in Austria. I thought why not build the sickest Skigoogle ever, of course with Bluetooth, everything is better with Bluetooth and a Smartphone App to control it.

It is a simple but very tedious projekt, if you want to build your own you will need at least a day for building the mask, I will later explain why.

Sadly when I build this, I forgot to take some photos of the building process.

If you want to join the RGB ski club... please go on and follow my instruction,

else{ please enjoy the videos, the are very satisfying, at least some of them ;) }

Btw. it's my first tutorial... :)

Step 1: What You Will Need

Before you start buying all of this stuff I want to remind you looking around your home or asking friends for parts like I did to save some money, for example you don't need the 100Ohm resistor neither the capacitor... but they will add a lot of protection for your stuff (believe me, when the complete strip stays black after a short... you wont be the person that needs to unglue everything and buy a new one...they are soooo expensive)

Main parts:

-Ski googles

They are relatively cheap, but boy are they amazing...

-1m 144LEDs/m WS2812B "Neopixel" strip from Amazon

30€ are a lot, but compared to 60...

-1x Arduino Uno R3

With cabel and protective housing ;)

-some kind of voltage regulator for the Led's and the UNO

The one I had lying around

-1x Hollow plug socket

The one I used

-1x Joystick

The same one but without broken thumb nob

-some wood to secure it

-1x 10K Resistor

-1x 100Ohm Resistor

A kit I realy can recommend

-1x 10v 1000µF Capacitor

(found mine in an old PSU)

Better ask your friends

-1x PCB board / Breadboard

Also a kit I recommend a lot

-1x Bluetooth module (HC-05)

Everything is better with Bluetooth

-some kind of box to protect the electronics on the slopes

Yeah... you are buying a paper box.. in a paper box...

-2x Male Chinch cabel

Use the other end instead of the scart adapter I used

-a lot of cabel(for the remote control)

For soldering and internals I used

For the joystick I used

you could also use jumper cables if you want.

and an protective sleeve for them

The sleeve I used

And of course... Ductape, Soldering Iron, Solder, Screwdriver(flat, phillips), Wire Stripper, Hot Glue, Superglue Sandpaper, zipties, backpack, Power Bank, Computer

For Powering this Monster I used an self build Powerbank for my Echo that is capable of 100W and has a Voltage range from 5 to 50 V and has about 30000mah, that's an topic for an other day.

But you could easily use any kind of battery that fits in your backpack while skiing and is capable of around 40W.

Step 2: Building

Well you come this far, so let's start building!

1. If you use the same mask like me you need about 60cm of the strip ~83 Leds, better measure twice.

2. Decide on wich side you want to rout the cables back to your backpack.

3. Glue the Led's to the goggles(be aware of not to glue over the venting holes like i did)

(In order to make the strip stick to the googles I tried a lot.... after a dozen things that doesn't worked and the fact we don't have 2K glue I sanded the glass, where the Led's will sit, very intense all around and cleaned it with some nail polisher. Then applied some superglue on the first 5cm and firmly pressed the Leds on it. Then wait around 10min until the glue is dry (blowing helps) If everything is dry continue with the next 5 cm, when you reach a corner it gets a little complicated. Better ask some friends to help you holding everything in place. On the nose cave be aware of where your nose is to prevent pressure points from the Led's. )

4.ok, now you are all around, I put the end of the strip right under the beginning and cut the rest of the strip off

to make it look like a complete circle(needs some finetuning in the software)

5. Let everything dry

6. Next round of glue: Hot glue and others... Think about falling while Skiing, better to have some more layers

7. wiring: Connect the 3 pins to a cable with the Chinch plugs on the end(I sewed the cable to the headband in order to bring it safely to the back of the helmet) (I also used some acrylic to make the connection of the cable and the Led strip more stable)

8. Building the main controller:

As long as the link works.. :(

-please see the photo above- dont forget to secure everything with some glue so that nothing breaks when you are skiing

9. Upload the code after making sure everything is connected correctly!

The Arduino files

you need to install the Neopixel libary and adjust variable of how much led's you used

10.Downloading my Android App if you want

Using the googles to get blind... no joke, look at them directly they are extremely bright