Hi there,
Ive been roped into helping my flatmate make a Daft Punk style/replica coffee table. For those that havent heard of this before its essentially a table with a 5x5 grid of red illuminated panels underneath a glass top. Each square can be turned on or off and they dance around forming predefined patterns.
There is video of it on youtube here: Daft Punk Coffee Table - YouTube
For the construction of the table itself my flatmate is going to be following this instructables guide: http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-build-a-Daft-Punk-Table-Replica/
However the guide makes no real mention of how the microcontroller works. My background is in computer programming and ive got some basic electronics experience so the Arduino Diecimila seems like a perfect choice to control the lights.
I was planning on mounting 8 red LEDs in each square. Each square would then be attached to a digital output on the arduino (possibly needing some transistors inbetween, can the arduino power 8 leds from one of its outputs?). However the Diecimila only has 14 digital outputs, and I need 25 (5x5 squares) for the table.
What is going to be the easiest way to do this, remembering that im not that hot with electronics. I was thinking about strobing the LEDs or some sort of binary output but then it all got a bit too much for me :-?
Cheers,
James.