Arduino Lightsaber

Kdot:
, but wondering if that could be cleaned up in the audio side for slightly smoother transition like you mentioned before.

if you don't want to marry sounds in the the WT playlist,..
one way to cheat seamless playback (this is old school) with arduino commands is fades to near silence. (but i think if you use the WT-28pin-U and a 16mhz arduino, the gaps for commands to the WT are ... 2ms? I think i read that back on like page 7 or 9. Back there somewhere. Jake and Illuis were talking about it. Jake? 2ms? do you actually trigger hum? or do you marry it too in your MKIII+ versions? What ever happened to Illuis? He is the 1 Line Serial Mode Guy! He must be a coder and not a saber builder.
anyway...
have all sounds fade DOWN to almost silence at the end, make your own hum cycle in audigy, (maybe a 6 second total file) then a fade to near silence at the end. export. when the sound loops,. or really plays after your ON, SWING, OR CLASH,.. it will have little to no "taps" tween sound files. Just make sure your ON, SWING, and CLASH, all fade down at the end of the clip. a 10-15 frame fade is all that is needed. if need be i can post an audacity tute on how to do this. or if anyone has adobe premier, or elements, or sony vegas, imove, final cut,.. PM me, i will talk u thru it. if you sound edit in pro software, you will have to master in Audigy, for the 22khz audio. in the audio world there really is only 22,050 Hz sample rate. but the WT can't use that rate. It needs 22,000 hz exactly. the 50 throws it off. That set me back a week actually. I was like,. "i don't need BS hackware Audacity. I'll just use my $4,000 Adobe Suite." Nope. All my pro audio packages won't let me make audio to that sample rate. Because it is a junk rate- 22,050 is 1/2 CD PWM audio sample. 44.1khz. 20,000hz is,.. well.. nothing. it's just an arbitrary rate the WT accepts. Most likely a goof up in the firmware code. it should be taking 20,050hz.
Also, all this sound triggering that we do with the WT from what i am learning this is the difference tween "sound fonts" and "sound files". A sound font is one file with all the sounds in it. The MCU just tells the player module WHERE to play and end (like a vinyl record). where as in the WT which plays files not fonts,... just triggers the uploaded file or playlists to play (like a CD). You can't in the WT tell it to play clip 1 ( a 20 second clip) from second 3-7 and loop it. If you download a sound font file, you have to chop it up in Audacity. make sure you slice where it loops :slight_smile:

Jake did you buy your audio?

I for one buy my audio, if you mean the sound fonts. BTW, sound font is the "saber world" seems to be the term used for all the sound files associated with saber sounds (swings, clahes, pon, poff etc.), but each of these sounds is in a different file.

http://www.saberfont.com/

Some of the sound fonts I bought from this site, some of them I inherited from my non-DIY saber electronics.

Protonerd:
I for one buy my audio, if you mean the sound fonts. BTW, sound font is the "saber world" seems to be the term used for all the sound files associated with saber sounds (swings, clahes, pon, poff etc.), but each of these sounds is in a different file.

http://www.saberfont.com/

Some of the sound fonts I bought from this site, some of them I inherited from my non-DIY saber electronics.

Also checkout fan film sites. They often provide sound effects for free. I composed a sound font from several unlicenced, free-to-use sources. For example: TheForce.Net - Fan Films - TFN FanFilms | Postproduction | Lightsaber Sound F/X.

I found a decent set of lightsaber sound fonts here: Freesound - pack: Star Wars by joe93barlow

Need to edit them to the right sampling rate in Audacity, but they work ok. I'm still playing w/ them to get rid of the tap sound though.

jshaw:
I found a decent set of lightsaber sound fonts here: Freesound - pack: Star Wars by joe93barlow

Need to edit them to the right sampling rate in Audacity, but they work ok. I'm still playing w/ them to get rid of the tap sound though.

I found these while searching once a while back. They seem good, but I don't want to create an account just to download something that is supposed to be free. I hate it when sites do that.

As someone who is totally new to arduino, would you be willing to share some of your code to help me with making the sounds, I don't think I will have any problems with the LED's but it would be nice to get some more info on the sound code.

marconchr:
As someone who is totally new to arduino, would you be willing to share some of your code to help me with making the sounds, I don't think I will have any problems with the LED's but it would be nice to get some more info on the sound code.

I just spent the last week or so on the code. Its all in the forum thanks to some great people on here. This is not a copy paste kind of project, the code typically has why you doing something and what it is for. But it always depends on what you are using hard ware wise.

marconchr:
As someone who is totally new to arduino, would you be willing to share some of your code to help me with making the sounds, I don't think I will have any problems with the LED's but it would be nice to get some more info on the sound code.

read pages 1-13. it's covered. if you want to synth your own sounds,... grab a mic, get some samples,. download Audacity and play. ah crud, i been saying audigy all this time. wonderful. Audacity! why did that just come to me?

@billpealer and JakeSoft

Managed to work out out the very noticeable click sound. I ended up purchasing sound fonts from saberfonts last night as the other fonts from ultrasaber where 1 not what i was wanting and 2 not clean sounding to me. Still ended up having a click, but found it was in the font itself so just removed it and much smoother.

Personal tip: Dont forget to re compile the BIN file in the WT program LOL

Also changed the code a little bit to reduce delay time. Right now it is right around 1.7 of delay before it will accept any new trigger, but im ok with that for now as i want to always make it through the power on sound before power off. I used the do...while code, so i can start the delay for the hum upon saber_is_on

Only thing im still trying to get through but may just add a swing sound on power up, but you can hear a noticable pause before the startup and hum triggers. Adjust the delay gets it closer so might have to spend an hour just adjusting it by 0001 ms lol. Although i think what you mentioned before billpealer about tail end will need to be adjusted

Arduino lightsaber V2 - YouTubeNew Setup

JakeSoft:
I found these while searching once a while back. They seem good, but I don't want to create an account just to download something that is supposed to be free. I hate it when sites do that.

amen,

Kdot:
@billpealer and JakeSoft

Managed to work out out the very noticeable click sound. I ended up purchasing sound fonts from saberfonts last night as the other fonts from ultrasaber where 1 not what i was wanting and 2 not clean sounding to me. Still ended up having a click, but found it was in the font itself so just removed it and much smoother.

Arduino lightsaber V2 - YouTubeNew Setup

I LIKE IT!!!!

billpealer:
I LIKE IT!!!!

Thanks!

This is just spit balling here, but my plan is to be able to use the some other command TBD lol for clash and swing, and then be able to just continue with the hum and if it repeat, that way it will always repeat hum, unless it picks up the other sensors.

Kdot:
Thanks!

This is just spit balling here, but my plan is to be able to use the some other command TBD lol for clash and swing, and then be able to just continue with the hum and if it repeat, that way it will always repeat hum, unless it picks up the other sensors.

fuggin- A. try it!

Kdot:
@billpealer and JakeSoft

Arduino lightsaber V2 - YouTubeNew Setup

Nice! It looks like you've worked out the basics. And thank you for sharing video! I wish more would take video of their progress. It's satisfying to watch how the process plays out for others.

JakeSoft:
Nice! It looks like you've worked out the basics. And thank you for sharing video! I wish more would take video of their progress. It's satisfying to watch how the process plays out for others.

Wel thank you guys again for paving the way!

Final video will be better quality but I figure just something for referenced. Hopefully it motivates someone else to get started. Knew nothing about programming although had some prior knowledge of LEDs and resistors.

I got the rest of the parts in last week for swing and clash. Also bought an Axcelerametor to play with

Hello everyone, ive been following the adventures of Jakesoft and the inexpensive lightsaber for a year now, and have also been attempting to construct my own based on this forum. I am generally just a lurker and dont usually participate in the conversation, but this forum is very educational for me, and I wanted to thank everybody for their input.

Here is the saber I have been working on.

I am using a chinese Arduino Pro Micro, a WT588D, and an MPU6050 accelerometer mounted to a piece of solderable perfboard. The Pro Micro and WT are mounted to headers for easy removal and so the connections can run under them. I have a Luxeon TriRebel and 3 flashlight style constant current LED drivers. I got a small piece of copperclad and using my dremel i cut the traces for the surface mount mosfets i had. It will be powered by 2 18650s that i scrounged from an old laptop battery.



I am currently still trying to get the code sorted out but its working to some degree. I am an artist by trade and its been quite a challenge to teach myself how to code, even with the supposed simplicity of the arduino language.

I came across this intersting variant of the WT588D-16p while sourcing more stable and direct suppies for my boards:

The details page link was broken so dont know mem size but I did send a query about it and now waiting for the reply.

I've not seen a match from any other vendor so it must be manufacturers own take on it.

I like the pin labelling, would make them easy to work with for the absolute novice and would be handy for prototyping purposes. However, not sure why it deserves an $11 price tag though.

grey3Dx:
Hello everyone, ive been following the adventures of Jakesoft and the inexpensive lightsaber for a year now, and have also been attempting to construct my own based on this forum.
I am currently still trying to get the code sorted out but its working to some degree. I am an artist by trade and its been quite a challenge to teach myself how to code, even with the supposed simplicity of the arduino language.

Looks rad. let me know how you make out pwm color mixing with MOSFET and the drivers. that jammed me up.

grey3Dx:
Hello everyone, ive been following the adventures of Jakesoft and the inexpensive lightsaber for a year now, and have also been attempting to construct my own based on this forum. I am generally just a lurker and dont usually participate in the conversation, but this forum is very educational for me, and I wanted to thank everybody for their input.
...

Welcome and thanks for sharing! Intentional or not, your design looks like a unique blend of my design and that of Protonerd. Keep us posted on your progress. It looks like you are well on your way.

Canobi:
I came across this intersting variant of the WT588D-16p while sourcing more stable and direct suppies for my boards:

The details page link was broken so dont know mem size but I did send a query about it and now waiting for the reply.

I've not seen a match from any other vendor so it must be manufacturers own take on it.

I like the pin labelling, would make them easy to work with for the absolute novice and would be handy for prototyping purposes. However, not sure why it deserves an $11 price tag though.

Hey, that is nice. Probably the price tag is because it's a custom PCB or something and only they sell it that way.

I actually e-mailed Waytronic (the China-based OEM of the WT588D chips) about a year ago to ask some questions and much to my surprise they actually responded. Throughout our discourse, they made it known that they are willing to sell direct. I didn't pursue that avenue, as I can find them dirt cheap on Ebay already, but if you had a sizable order I wonder if they would be willing to ship some modules without the pins. I also don't know what kind of payment they except or any of those logistical details.