Wednesday, June 25, 2014

Controlling an RGB LED Matrix with Shift Registers


The goal of this project is to control an 8x8 matrix of RGB LEDs. Each dot in the matrix houses a red, green, and blue LED behind a semi-opaque lens. To produce colors we need to dim the LEDs different amounts. For instance to make sky blue we need a lot of blue, some green, and a little red. Unfortunately LEDs don't dim, they are either on or off, but we can produce a similar effect by blinking them very rapidly, controlling the amount of time they are on and off to create different intensities. To do this we need a fast way to control all 192 LEDs in the matrix. The matrix provides 32 pins on it for controlling the LEDs. Eight of the pins control which row is being controlled, and the other 24 control the RGB LEDs in each column (8 columns with 3 LEDs in each). Controlling 32 IOs is a daunting task for an embedded processor which typically have only a handful of GPIOs (General Purpose IOs). The PIC32 family has the needed IOs but using 32 leaves little else for other purposes. To get around this problem I used a serial-load parallel-out shift register. Read after the break to see how it all works.

Thursday, May 22, 2014

Cape Cod Mini-Maker Faire

http://capecodmakerfaire.com/
I was recently given the privilege to present one of my Embedded Projects at the Cape Cod Mini-Maker Faire. The faire was organized by the Cape Cod Makers, a group I have now happily joined. The project displayed is called SenseMesh, a ZigBee based network of sensor nodes feeding real-time data to a Windows PC.

Wednesday, March 5, 2014

MicroView Kickstarter Project

I supported another excellent KickStarter project called MicroView. The project plans to build an Arduino with a small OLED display in a ridiculously small form-factor. I can imagine using this in wearable computing, where a small form-factor would be a real boon. After the KickStarter campaign completes the MicroView will be available for purchase over at SparkFun.