“The event that inspired me to start this project was the time when my daughter asked for my help to make some special photos. She isn’t a professional photographer but she is quite passionate about this art form and was looking forward to making some interesting photography.
So we mixed my interest in leds with her inclination for taking pictures and created the project you are about to see described.
There are already devices that incorporate colorful led lights (pocket rgb led lights) that are available on amazon, for example:
AtomCUBE RX1 RGBCW Pocket Light
Falcon Eyes F7 12W RGB Led Light
Aputure MC Aputure RGB Led Video Light
to enumerate just a few.
The most useful thing that comes with using this kind of device in my opinion is the fact that you can change through colors slowly or at whatever speed you would like. It’s also amazing that you can control the hue and the saturation of the colors, so you can have an array of styles to choose from. Each of the devices had a few options I liked, others had different options that were useful but I did not find all of the options I would have wanted into one single device. What I thought I could do was install a software on a microcontroller that would direct the LEDs so that I could achieve the lighting effects I desired. In this way I could experiment and find out pretty fast what sort of colors suit my subjects.
You have to keep in mind that nothing compares to doing something with your own hands, so that it will work exactly the way you want it to. Am I right? Thus, I can create this device exactly as I want. The construction is not complicated at all, the electronics are cheap (as usual for me 😊) the only requirement could be the possession of a 3D printer, although this is not really necessary because there are companies that can print the components of the led panel. The effects this tool gives create an amazing look to pictures, as you will see in the last step of the project. And it can be used not only for photos, but also for video filming, so that you can capture the way the lights are changing.
This can be pe perfectly exemplified in the technique presented in this video for example but there are also many other tutorials on the internet that describe the way to use these pocket led lights, these tutorials apply to our device because it works in the same way as other devices of this type and it offers many options (if not more).
So let’s start!”