Hiya, this is incredibly useful stuff thankyou.
I think the pre-wired LEDs you mention: http://www.bliptronics.com/item.aspx?ItemID=98 or the LED strips RGB LED Strip - 32 LED/m Addressable - 1m - COM-10312 - SparkFun Electronics are definitely going to be the neatest solution, your video is v impressive!
Also found this link that has lots of detailed description of this hardware and code libraries that may be useful to others: RGB LED digital pixels tutorial (LPD6803)
The area I'm going to cover is 3mx2m so I'm thinking of having 6 sets of 32 strips which is 192 strips in total. This is going to be very bright for a small area though I am not sure if there is an alternative or if I can just send less current to the LEDs.
If you could advise what hardware would be required to drive this many I'd be really grateful. As far as I can gather I would need to get:
-
pre-wired RGB LED strips or pre-wired 'naked' bulbs containing chips (thinking of getting these from UK supplier, I'm in London: http://www.coolcomponents.co.uk/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=706 )
-
5v power supply with sufficient current to power the number of LEDs
-
Arduino mega (would one mega be able to handle this many LEDs?)
Are there any additional connectors/hardware I would need? I plan to control the display from live data so won't have any physical controllers connected initially.
So, my next task is to order some strips and start doing some prototyping.
Thanks,
Alistair