I'm working on creating a costume of Cyclops from X-men(see picture), and need some help/advice when it comes to sound and lights.
My plan at the moment is to have a very dim red led slowly pulsing inside the visor while it is in standby, then a very bright set of red LED's when i fire. The activators for "Fire" mode would be a push button on the visor and a touch sensor in 1 or both gloves when i make a fist. At the same time I would like a sound file playing of the beams initial fire sound and then a looped sounds while the "fire" button is being held. a mini speaker is going to be in place on either the belt or bandoleer.
What are the things that I would need in order to make this project a success? This is also my first venture into programming/electronics as well
All of it is perfectly and reasonably possible. I would recommend the lilyPad stuff, except I'm not seeing something like the MP3 Shield for the LilyPad stuff. Otherwise you would need a button for the visor, as well as some red LEDs (You could probably pulse with 1, and then light up 3-5 for your "blast", and use some optical tricks to hide/diffuse it.) Maybe there is a more subtle MP3 shield type device online somewhere that you can just mount to your belt.
As for gloves, you can add other switches there, or use some form of flex sensor for your glove: https://www.sparkfun.com/products/10264 Or you can just add another small switch into each glove since you really just need a digital signal.
I'd assume they would be dangerous in a public place where there is a chance of hitting people in the eye. And even if you got non-dangerous ones, walking around with lasers at eye level is really annoying for everyone else. Also, they wouldn't be a cool visual effect.
I'm also going to be wearing the Visor so any light source for it would be up close to my eyes. When I fire the bright red led's I'm going to need to close my eyes as to not blind myself. Which partially is why I'm rethinking the glove button which would be bad if I accidently hit it when I wasn't ready. Same with the pulsing red and being able to see with the Visor on. Thanks for the ideas...I'll look into them.any other thoughts and suggestions please add them
This is a matter of physical isolation. You want to have the LEDs arranged surrounding the visor opening and an inner septum ring in contact with the visor face creating a whole separate compartment for the LEDs while you see through the central part of that slot.
Tiny milliwatt lasers 6 mm in diameter are available quite cheap in bulk , only a little larger than 5mm LEDs.
WarDarkFox:
I'm also going to be wearing the Visor so any light source for it would be up close to my eyes. When I fire the bright red led's I'm going to need to close my eyes as to not blind myself. Which partially is why I'm rethinking the glove button which would be bad if I accidently hit it when I wasn't ready. Same with the pulsing red and being able to see with the Visor on. Thanks for the ideas...I'll look into them.any other thoughts and suggestions please add them
You might also see if you can use light-piping techniques with acrylic to diffuse the light through the visor without blinding yourself. Sine the effect is to make the whole thing to glow red for a moment, that could help with not blinding you, though I'm not 100% sure how you'd do that.
