IoT LED Cheering Stick

by 陳亮

10K12310

Intro: IoT LED Cheering Stick

This instructables show how to use ESP8266 to make a mobile configurable IoT LED cheering stick.

STEP 1: Preparation

Cheering Stick

Any LED cheering stick that can put LED strip in should be ok, I have an old cheering stick bought 10 years ago when I go to concert

ESP Board

ESP-07 or ESP-12(E) should be ok, ESP-12E can simply flash NodeMCU WebIDE full image (can be more lazy)

LED Strip

NeoPixel, WS2812 or SK6812 should be ok, I have a 144 uint / meter SK6812 in hand, I only need 28 unit to fit in my cheering stick

Mercury Switch

For detecting cheering stick waving motion

Ressitors

3 x 10 k Ohms resistors

Other tools

screw driver, soldering iron, USB serial cable...

STEP 2: Flash NodeMCU WebIDE

Please follow my previous instructables to flash the latest NodeMCU WebIDE, it is already included the LED stick sample code.

Ref.:

https://www.instructables.com/id/NodeMCU-WebIDE/

https://www.instructables.com/id/ESP8266-Bread-Boar...

STEP 3: De-Assembly Cheering Stick

Use screw driver de-assembly the cheering stick, remove the blinking circuit board, LEDs and color plate.

This cheering stick have 2 switches and a 3 AAA batteries battery holder, it can be reuse in this project.

STEP 4: Soldering Work

Here is the connection summary:

ESP Board

GPIO05 -> 10 k Ohm resistor -> Gnd
       -> Mercury Switch -> Vcc
GPIO02 -> LED Strip Data Pin
GPIO15 -> 10 k Ohm resistor -> Gnd
Gnd    -> Battery Holder Negative Pin
EN     -> 10 k Ohm resistor -> Vcc
Vcc    -> Power Switch -> Battery Holder positive Pin

LED Strip

Vcc  -> LED Switch -> Battery Holder Positive Pin
Data -> ESP GPIO02
And  -> Battery Holder Negative Pin

STEP 5: Re-Assembly Cheering Stick

Squeeze all components in the cheering stick and use screw driver re-assembly it. If you found the LED strip cannot stay straight, you may use card board, wood stick or PET plate stick to the LED strip back for supporting.

STEP 6: Design Display Message

  1. Use your mobile connect to the ESP board. (if you direct connected to the ESP WiFi SoftAP, browse to http://192.168.4.1/ or if you already configured the ESP and your mobile connected to same AP, try browse to http://nodemcu-webide.local./)
  2. Select led-stick.html
  3. Press preview button (the eye button)
  4. Type the text you want to display, if you are using iPhone or iPad, you can type emoji too
  5. Press set button
  6. ESP is very limited in resource for receiving large image data, please be patient to wait for sending the message image data

STEP 7: Happy Cheering & Light Painting!

Its time play it at night!

If you are going concert, you may type the message in your mobile and show it by waving the cheering stick.

You may also use it for light painting, the above sample photos are take by S mode with 1 to 2 seconds shutter speed.

P.S. If you have already saved the image but powered off the stick, you may start the led-stick program by power on the stick and browse to http://192.168.4.1/les-stick.lc?

STEP 8: Customizable Factors

Number of LED unit

It means the displaying image height, it can be configured at:

led-stick.html line 10

... height="28" ...

led-stick.html line 15

var h = 28;

led-stick.lua line 2

local pin, w, h, offset = 1, 140, 28, 0
Displaying image width

led-stick.html line 10

... width="140" ...

led-stick.html line 14

var w = 140;

led-stick.lua line 2

local pin, w, h, offset = 1, 140, 28, 0
Auto start at power on

init.lua last line (uncomment)

dofile('led-stick.lc')()

NodeMCU WebIDE

You may refer my previous instructables step 7 for further NodeMCU WebIDE configuration

10 Comments

mtongnz 7 years ago

Do you have a link to the code you're running? I use Arduino IDE, not lua. I'd love to see how your code works and port it to Android IDE.

Thanks

陳亮 7 years ago

https://github.com/moononournation/nodemcu-webide/blob/master/bin/led-stick.lua

abachmann 6 years ago

Hello Sir!
I'm very excited about a cheering stick, i got Dotstars and Neopixels and a NodeMcu, almost everything phisical, to get sarted. But I don't really understand, what code to upload with arduinoIDE to my NodeMcu, to start playing. Can You help me PLZ?

陳亮 6 years ago

hi abachmann, this project does not require ArduinoIDE, just follow the link at step 2.

DmitriyK10 7 years ago

If to Add more Columns of LED then you can down speed of mooving with equals visual effect ))

陳亮 7 years ago

Yes, it should be. But it need time to write correct logic and trial, because multiple column makes display logic more complicated.

DmitriyK10 7 years ago

Is It looks like that just on camera or in real it looks like both?

Wery Nice project! ))

陳亮 7 years ago

In eyesight, the image only stay not more than half an second, but you can see the image more clear if you wave many times consistently.