I'll start with the four videos I finally got uploaded last night.
Tonight I'll start breaking down the components and hardware.
Elvis - Blue Christmas
https://vimeo.com/84740700The House on Christmas Street
https://vimeo.com/84739450Wizards
https://vimeo.com/84738693Dreams of Fireflies
https://vimeo.com/84737286Now, here comes the extensive write-up. I'm tired of typing.
On the roof:
27 snowflakes with white incandescent lights. Garden Ridge still sells them (27 AC channels)
250 square, metal backed pixels. TM1804, 12v, 3-wire. They have double-stick on the back and are attached to a 4inch wide strip of black coro. The coro is stapled to the shingles with 1/2" staples. (750 RGB channels attached to 4 DLA SSC V3s, with Falcon SSC firmware, connected to a DLA Smart String Hub)
On the gutters and eaves: (2 AC channels)
9 strings of warm white LED icicle lights
9 strings of blue LED icicle lights.
They are connected end to end.
Window frames:
These are wooden frames that loosely hang from two nails at the top.
The lights are Dumb RGB flex strips, held down by Zip ties. The corners have 4 soldered wires to make the connection. Liberally covered with liquid electrical tape.
At 30 pixels/meter, thats about 80 pixels per window and connected to a 16 channel D-Light Open DMX DC controller.
Spiral Tree on left side, back.
This is a 9ft 2inch PVC tube with 8 hooks at the top. I tied 16 cords directly to stakes in the ground, 40 inches out. Then walked 16 strings of 100 count LED Multis around the framework. Went around twice. 16 channels, connected to a Lynx Express.
Mini-trees:
There are 10 minis. 26 inches tall. A tripod of PVC wrapped in 100 Green and 100 Warm White LEDs.
2 AC channels per tree, so 20 channels on two D-Light Open AC-16 controllers
Five Arches:
3 arches behind 2 arches. Sort of an Olympic flavor. The PVC is plain 10ft 3/4" PVC.
There are 16 Pixels per arch. These are D-Light FireFli pixels. Two D-Light Open Firefli controllers, one with 3 strands, the other with 2 strands.
120 total channels of RGB. These were my first venture in anything RGB Pixel related. While they worked OK with LOR Protocol, they are so much better with DMX firmware.
10 wireframe Reindeer. Rudolph, then the Eight, and then Olive. ("All of" the other reindeer...)
They have 150 incandescents except that Rudolph has and extra 100 plus a Red nose. AC controllers.
Candy Canes down the left side of the yard.
15 Red/white and 15 White/red. A custom SPT2 power cord connects them quickly into two AC channels. Wal-Mart candy canes. Buy them after Christmas.
7 ft tall white Christmas trees.
3 near the road, 2 back near the back. These are from Garden Ridge and come apart into 8 pieces when you take off the lights. Easy to store.
Each tree has 300 warm white LEDs going up and down and up and down...
The Nativity scene.
Mary and Joseph and Jesus in a manger. Joseph is 28" tall. Made from thick resin, they are starting to show some UV and weather damage. 12 years of winter exposure.
They are lit by a pair of Big Clive RGB floods, driven by a D-Light DC controller over 25ft CAT5 cables. Home Depot flood cases, painted flat black.
The Porch Choir.
A boy and girl and a lamp post. They are also lit by a pair of Big Clive RGB Floods from the same controller as the Nativity.
The 17 foot standard Mega-tree. Old School. 8 ft diameter PVC ring. Aluminum flagpole.
16 strings each of 100ct Red, Green, Blue and Warm White LEDs. Uses four DMX AC controllers on the ground inside the ring.
Total of 18 Xenon Strobes hanging inside the tree on two AC channels.
The Star on top was a big disappointment this year. It is a 4-layer star but the layers came loose so it would close up. It was not reachable to fix so I just lived with it. Around each star was 50 dumb RGB lights (12mm bullet type) so a total of 200 lights. Very colorful when working, but one string died, killing its DC controller channel. I'll be re-lamping this year.
The Marty Fan over the garage is 23 strands of 50ct LED Multi-color strings.
The frame is metal conduit in two 90 degree arches. (easy to store in 2 pieces). The center strand gets removed and attached each year. The others are fixed.
All 23 channels are D-Light Open AC controllers (in that little box on the ground).
There are Four large Candy Canes on the house. These are Red and White LEDs, pushed through holes drilled in a heavy signboard foam. They take 2 AC channels each. The foam is attached to my brick exterior using expanding Molly bolts and wooden blocks. Very solid.
Now, the Pixels -
The Garage Matrix is 3/4" PVC, painted black. It is a horizontal matrix with 120 count TM1804 pixels. 40 over, 40 back, 40 over.
This Matrix uses 10 channels on a Falcon 16 controller. 1200 pixels. 3600 channels. One 350Watt Ray Wu special power supply runs it all. (I don't leave it all on, all white). Pixel spacing is 2 inches horizontal and vertical. I recently added two more strings (6 rows) to make it a 40x30 size. A 4:3 ratio is common in video. I thought it might look better. It did.
Over on the left was a temporary Pixel Tree. Temporary because I probably won't have it there next year but I had the "stuff" to make it.
I used 16 1/2 inch PVC pipes, painted black and cut to 8 feet. Then I attached 2 meters (~7 feet) of TM1809 Flex Strips using Zip ties. I made 16 of these because I had a Falcon 16 handy. Because these are 30 LEDs per meter, each pipe was 60 pixels, so 960 pixels and 2880 channels. Single 350W power supply.
I drove the whole setup from a Falcon Pi Player (FPP) connected to the Falcon Pi Dongle (FPD). I kept them inside and ran two CAT5 cables out the window. Both had only Pixelnet on them. All the DMX used for other things came from the 5-port Falcon Pixelnet to DMX board.
Jon
