Looking for (bloody) beginner infos

[PhoenixHawk]

Hello,

my name is Sebastian and I am from Germany.

The last years our house was one of the very few in our town that had some lights in the front yard,
but when I say lights, then I'm talking about some cheap white LED nets over some plants. We have,
however, a 8-9m (26 to 29 feet) fir there, and put some white LEDs in there as well.
This year I put a wooden sled with a 20cm / 8" snowman and a little Christmas tree there.
And we notice, that some people come from the other end of the town to our street to watch that static thing.

This time around I watched a lot of videos on christmas shows, and since I'm a software developer by trade and also a bit into tinkering with small electronics, raspberry pi's, arduinos etc. I thought maybe I could give that a try too.

So, after christmas is before christmas: I've got a year to put something together for a beginner. Not a big thing, I think about a small animated tree and maybe some arches. I also don't want to spend too much on that first year of starting, as I also need to earn approval of my significant otter

So, this is my idea:

I have some stuff lying around in the house from my tinkering hobby. The main stuff I think I can safely dedicate to this here are 10m / 32 foot of WS2812B 5V IP67 LED strips (60 LED/m), some Raspberry Pi's 3, one Zero and some ESP8266MOD boards. Perhaps I can also but a string or two (but not more than four) of 12V pixels.

This should be enough, I think, to put together a small tree out of my strips (since the people can walk along our front yard I was thinking 270? or even 360?). Not sure yet how many sides and how many LEDs per side that should have, though. Can you give any suggestions here, also regarding programmability?
And then maybe buy some pixel strings for three of four small arches along our fence. Or even attach the pixels directly to the fence, not sure yet.

Since I am in Germany, and we have extremely strict regulations on radio frequency usage, I can't set up a FM transmitter for a music show. So instead, I want the tree and the arches / fence to mostly show some slow, not too fancy patterns (slow fadings, a little slow sparkling etc.) when its starting getting dark to lets say 10pm and then in the morning again until it dawns. And when it's on, like every full hour or so I want a short "show" with some faster-paced animations, for the people that happen to be there at that time. And by show I mean some animations spanning the different elements which I can build throughout the year, without music etc., to learn how to program.

So, now that you have my story, I'd be happy to learn from you.

Do you think that is a good approach for starting with that?
I don't want to buy a hundreds of euros expensive controller just to start with that. Is it possible to do that with the material I have at hand? Because, if I see that I am absolutely not talented for it, I don't want to sit on expensive equipment I can't really use for other stuff. If that becomes a success, and I have fun with it, then I'd be happy to invest more next year to become even more semi-pro

[ozaz]

If you do not want to spend money - get out of this hobby now. 

If you have Pi 3 you could get a Pi cape/hat like this one http://www.hansonelectronics.com.au/product/rpi-28dplus/  (not sure if Alan posts to Europe, just ask him) or this one https://buildalightshow.com/pixel-controllers/6-falcon-picap.html from the UK company Build A Light Show.

The Hanson board can control up to 1600 pixels per port (with power injection of course).

For a small tree and if you only have a small number of pixels I'd consider a 180 or 270 degree tree. There's a calculator to help work out tree size and number of pixels etc here: https://www.lightshowhub.com/tools/mega-tree-calculator

As for programming, download xLights and start programming on it, you don't need to have any controllers to be able to set up some sample models and do some sequencing.

If using a Pi then you can do all the scheduling you like in FPP - any number of different sequences running at whatever times you require.

I think it's a good approach to start small the first year. If you decide to go bigger next year, you can then buy a bigger controller, more pixels, build more props; and still use the Pi and Pi Hat on your current props or use it on another one.

[jnealand]

Here is an 8ft tree running off two ports of a PiCap on a PiZeroW.  480 pixels (16 x 30 3" spacing using Boscoyo mounting strips 180 deg) on 1 port and a 50 pixel star on the other port.  This was my very first tree and I moved it to my back deck rather than trash it.  It actually runs effects in sync with my main show in the front yard.  I have it hanging off the outside of the deck railing.  Works great.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/8t925UspVjLZrpqHA

[PhoenixHawk]

Hi. Thanks so far. Then my approach doesn't seem to be totally off at least

My strips are WS2812B and no 2811, so is that a problem?