Hi Everyone!
Just after some guidance/feasibility if anyone has ever attempted this before.
I am planning converting composite video to ITU-R BT.656 8 bit using an ADV7180, after that, i want to input that data into an Arduino or other processor (preferably Arduino) and output to a single led (colour intensity etc), (i will have 1000 wireless Arduinos with this setup, to make a large distributed led screen for an art project) but i'm unsure on whether or not this project is feasible?
If anyone else has any ideas on how to approach this task, that would be awesome!
Thanks in Advance!
If you want to show life video, consider the pixel rate of the signal (LLC). It will be the video frame rate times the number of pixels on the screen. Even for VGA resolution this will be much faster than can be communicated to an Arduino. Wireless transmission will fail due to too few available distinct channels, much less than 1000, may be 10.
Eventually every row of digital video pixels can be clocked into a fast serial-in-parallel-out shift register, with one such register for every row. This will mean up to 16 registers for the 16 RGB pixels of every row, times the number of rows. Whenever a register has been loaded, the HS pulse tells the connected Arduinos to take the RGB value of their pixel, and output it to their LEDs.
Most probably every Arduino can handle more than one pixel at the row rate. This can be used to cut down the hardware requirements to a fraction, maybe 8 or 16 multiplexed rows instead of >200. But then the dimension of your "screen" may introduce problems in the distribution of the signals to all the distant LED rows.
A simpler solution could be based on LED strips, which can be programmed in a serial manner. Then some hardware is required for every strip, which converts the fast parallel RGB video data for every row (strip) into a slower serial signal and clock.
In either case you'll need assistance in the design and production of the required high speed hardware, apart from the Arduino boards or LED strips.