How to get started? (A total beginner asking)

[system]

Hello everyone, I hope somebody could give some advise what to start studying and how.

So first, the target: I'm starting in a design school this autumn. I will study industrial design. In this industrial design programme there is at least a couple of model workshop courses, in which students learn how to make models out of wood, metal, plastic etc. I would like to do some Arduino enhanced projects in these workshops. The first model workshop will probably start after Christmas, so I have something like a half a year to study these things. The target would be to do something like this Arduino LED table demo and pict. - YouTube , only embedded into some nice looking table or shelve. The tetris -part of that led system is not important for me. If some extra features would be added for the operation of leds that would be e.g. the lights following the rhythm of music ( if it doesn't take huge amount of programming).

Then, the premisis:

• I haven't done any hobby electronics stuff ever
• In highschool I did only a couple of courses of physics, and only a lighter course of mathematics, though I got an A from that lighter course (I don't know how this is comparable for example to the american highschool, but in my country we have an option in highschool, it's either the deep course or the light course on mathematics)
• It's already years since even those courses on math and physics...
• There is no Makerspace/ Hackerspace/ Fab Lab in the town I'm moving to study design
• In junior high school we had a couple of courses on wood and metal work, and there we did some extremely simple electronics stuff (and it was years ago)
• I have half a year, or max 1 year to learn the stuff needed
• I don't have enough money to hire somebody to teach "me and only me" privately these things
• The wood-, metal- and plastic work part of the table project are not the problem. I need advise for the Arduino part.

The questions:

• What things are essential for me to learn, if I want to be able to carry out my ideas?
• What kind of books would be the easiest and the most understandable way to learn the theoretical things I need to learn? (examples would be nice)
• What electronics skills would be essential to learn and what would be the easiest way to practice them? (for example good videos or practice kits)
• What kind of programming skills would be needed for the Arduino led projects, and the easiest way to study them? (book recommendations or something...)

Thank you for help already in advance!

[JimboZA]

You may find these websites useful:

The Electronics Club

Adafruit's Tutorials

and of course the tutorial here at Arduino.

Other than that, there's always Google! In anycase, what usually happens is that you end up following a few random links and end up on sites that work for you.

Why not go to your local library and pick up a couple of physics and maths books at a level lower than where you finished, and build back to where you were?

[CrossRoads]

What you want is fairly straight forward electrically.
Wire up an Uno to a couple of MAX7219 or MAX7221 to control an 8x16 LED table.
If you want multicolor, wire up 3 in parallel, with each controlling one color, or group them as wish.
Use high brightness LEDs for max effect.
Wire up each one just like the datasheet shows, and control them in No Decode mode so you have max control of each 1x8 'digit'.
To use more than 1, can either wire Dout of 1st device to Din of the next, etc. Or give each one its own chip select line and control each individually.

Then the harder part is the programming.

I would make an 8x8 array for each device, send out the data in the array to the chips on a schedule or when something happens that made the data change.
If you need more memory, then consider a '1284 chip. 16K of SRAM to hold lots of arrays. Looks very much like the '328 when wired up, but with more outputs.

Another option is control the array with individual shift registers, such as this board with 12 8bit shift registers. These chips can control 12V parts, vs the single LEDs that are powered from the MAX7221's 5v source.

[Osgeld]

there's no reason to hold predefined arrays in RAM, the space left over in the flash after bootloader and program will be larger than 16k no problem, and using a 8x16 matrix you will still have plenty of ram for a dynamic buffer in ram for real time events, such as a game, even in pelleted color.