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Well, in my mind, its still a wave, although a very complex wave.
A similar device to the one you’ve brought up is this amazing clock that was at Brickfair this summer:
Back to the original idea, when Tom was talking about having a bank of lights that were individually activated, I was envisioning a device that you could program to display a rolling message, like a ticker tape of stock values:
Ah yes! That thing hahaha is that a good or a bad sign when one afol doesn’t recall projects they’ve done? ?
Yea I guess that was a clock in its simplest form but I’m liking Tom’s idea. Pair it with the technique I did for my hand (q2 like 2016 build challenge..? See pic) and it could effectively be like an old piano that read punch cards. Only instead of music, it’d be a light show!
a device that you could program to display a rolling message, like a ticker tape of stock values:
Exactly what I was thinking also!
like an old piano that read punch cards.
This made me think of a model in the old 8888 “Expert Builder” idea book. (Picture Included below!!) It was a multi-function crane that could be “programmed” punch-card style. The cards are built from 6×16 plates with 1×4 gear racks arranges on them. By feeding the cards into the crane, different functions would be activated. It was basically Mindstorms 0.0.
The problem with this solution it that the cards were hand-fed into the device. If we use this principle, but build it on a technic tread conveyor, we could have a scrolling, repeating pattern (or message). Build an array of light bricks 5 tall by ?? and use slopes or pins attached to the tread to activate the lights as they pass.
Build an array of light bricks 5 tall by ?? and use slopes or pins attached to the tread to activate the lights as they pass.
Very cool idea! A wind-up jewelry box operates on a similar principle.
Do you think the lights could be placed close enough together to appear to spell something? Would there need to be some kind of diffuser to make the light less intense and spread out over the entire space between the individual light beams?
Do you think the lights could be placed close enough together to appear to spell something? Would there need to be some kind of diffuser to make the light less intense and spread out over the entire space between the individual light beams?
Yes, I was thinking space the lights as close together as possible, with a 1×2 trans brick in front of each one.
the LUG has a ridiculous supply of red light bricks
This statement recently spawned discussion about a mechanized ticker-tape type message board which uses the red light bricks. To continue those good ideas further, would anyone suggest a grid size that would generate letters?
My first thought is that the minimum size would use a grid that is 5 pixels high. In the following example, the WIDTHS of the letters are restricted to 3 pixels, and several of the letters, including M are hard to decipher.
https://render.fontstruct.com/renderer/render?id=716744&v=5a409695&w=800&h=400&sz=100&wr=1&pds=all
Of course, with moving letters, one is not necessarily limited to a certain width for each letter, so this problem could be fixed.
A grid of 8 by 8 makes more easily distinguishable characters and allows for a spacing of two pixels wide between letters,
https://thumbs.dreamstime.com/z/pixel-font-vector-set-pixel-letters-english-alphabet-67779148.jpg
but that means using 64 light bricks per character! Then, because the light bricks are each two studs wide, the width of a standard baseplate could only hold two characters. So, just spelling out the word LEGO would take two baseplates and require about 256 individual light bricks!
Of course if we only use light bricks to illuminate a static word made with transparent parts, that could be an interesting addition to our displays. The LUG could use light bricks to show off an iconic Pittsburgh sign, (like the one below,) in a building facade. Any thoughts?
I like the idea of a setup that alternates between day (white light) and night (black light) with the red lights being used as a countdown timer.
a countdown timer
Interesting. Do you have a proposal on how that timer would be mechanized?
These come to mind:
1. a jewelry box type mechanism / a conveyor belt of cheese slopes that slide past an array of light bricks to power them on individually
2. a wheel of transparent numbers that spins in front of the light(s)
I looked at these bricks today. They might go up for auction at Q4 if there’s no leader identified for a project with these. We do have an NXT to play with, if that makes anyone’s appetite stronger.
a jewelry box
I think “music box” better explains this. I’ll talk to Sanjay about this opportunity.
With that magic counting scale you have, do you have an estimate of the number of pieces?
I looked at these bricks today. They might go up for auction at Q4 if there’s no leader identified for a project with these
Could they just be redeemable instead? I would like a few of them, not eleventy-hundred
@pnbrenem is the new brick czar, so as long as he’s fine with it, We’ll make them available for redemption saturday.
Also looking to get rid of the ninjago backdrop that @arcadiumsol brought over, unless he just wants to take it back. Not sure if we have any die hard ninjago fans that would love it in their room or not…
Hey @sanjay, can you please jump into this thread before we lose an opportunity to do something cool with eleventy hundred light bricks?
Hello all,
Arvind and I are currently in New York for an event with LEGO.
We are currently brainstorming and one thought we have is to make a 32×32 screen that can display icons, letters, qr code, etc.
An ev3 would drive by and activate the lights.
Sanjay
I am fine with hanging on to them for now to see if a project materializes. Overall, I don’t think the LUG should be in the business of stockpiling materials just for the sake of doing so. If a project doesn’t materialize over the next few months, I think it would make sense to have them redeemable.
Patience you must have. It took me three years to complete the Pittsburgh bridge. I worked on North Pole buildings for at least that long before I had a display and it will probably take a couple of years to get a 6 foot Christmas tree that can be moved without falling apart.
I understand why the LUG would distribute 500 yellow car hoods, but I don’t see an advantage to dispersing a relatively small box of high value parts of a potentially unique project. If its storage space that is the concern, there are boxed sets which are wasting a lot more space.
@greg speaks wisdom. This could potentially be something big; why miss that opportunity?
They might go up for auction at Q4 if there’s no leader identified for a project with these.
I am fine with hanging on to them for now to see if a project materializes. Overall, I don’t think the LUG should be in the business of stockpiling materials just for the sake of doing so. If a project doesn’t materialize over the next few months, I think it would make sense to have them redeemable.
What if we flip that script? “If someone has a specific personal project for which they could use red light bricks, they may petition the Brick Czar to redeem X red light bricks; otherwise, we hang onto them for use in a collaborative project.” There’s plenty of random parts lying around that have less potential to be part of an eye-catching display, if we want to auction / redeem something to clear shelf space…
The heart of the matter is not about clearing shelf space, it’s that members want to redeem them. We shouldn’t be in the habit of denying members parts because “maybe someday someone will build something amazing.” We don’t want to be a warehouse for dream projects. That might end up working against the idea of motivating people to build and inspiring new ideas.
There is certainly room for compromise – it does not have to be keep them all or give them all away. I am not a fan of the idea of distributing valuable parts to have them be idle somewhere else.
The heart of the matter is not about clearing shelf space, it’s that members want to redeem them.
Fair. Who wants to redeem them, besides Frost?
I would like a few of them, not eleventy-hundred
There is certainly room for compromise – it does not have to be keep them all or give them all away.
Maybe that’s it – don’t “auction” the entire lot, but open them up for responsible redemption. (I.E. not to someone like me, who has an idea but will never carry it out. 😉 )
Thank you for sparing some time to read all of this and generate some deeper thought. Here goes:
From one viewpoint, I am a big, big fan of the broad use of programmable lighting for LUG collaborative displays. This would also be a fine learning experience, since few of us have this expertise. Light, motion and sound attracts people to our table so that the quality of the builds can keep them there, rendering our table a focus point at shows. We know from SWR II that one single light (in the case of @arcadiumsol’s Clay maxifig) can draw immediate attention.
However, just as valid, it is very possible that we can use these in every kind of build and elegantly, whether in tiny, well placed numbers for an individual builder, AND in large scale for the LUG.
Just off the top of my head, I ran with a number of ideas that might apply nicely to builders both collaborative and individual:
* Adding more pizzazz to the Glow Zone environment.
* Programmable train lights for a large display as signals for the trains.
* Train crossings.
* Strips of lights that follow along under a Monorail track, matching the engine’s movement above.
* A rolling frame of lights around a central modular building’s signage.
* Full traffic lights at intersections (changing the LEDs’ colors to suit).
* An old school working pinball machine.
* Scrolling runway lights.
* Landing pad lights for the Spacer builders.
* Flickering LEDs behind or under transparent “fire” elements for the Castle builders.
* Lighting some of the carnival rides.Some of these things can be accomplished with a small number of light bricks, a mere handful, or even only one! As an example, I want to further propose a rolling marquee for our large displays. This is the LUG project I would suggest, much like the scrolling LED badges that convention goers sometimes buy and wear, but in much larger scale. This is also a proposal of how this LUGBRICK stock can be parsed for both LUG and individual:
If we want 5 x 5 letters with a 1 column strip between them, with say 12 letters scrolling by, this is 5 lights per column, 5 columns per letter, plus 11 spacer columns that are not lit. This is 5*((5*12)+11) = 5*71 = 355, only about half of the light bricks we have. A 12 letter scrolling marquee, without framing, would also be 2*((5*12)+11) studs long, or 2*71, which would be 144 studs long without the framing.
Not too bad, and we’d *still* have a goodly amount left over for projects both LUGwide and individual, some of which could be done by individual LUGgers with a smaller number of light bricks.However, some of us have rather large displays of our own that might warrant complete conversion to lighting using these bricks:
With the large Space displays I plan, I could use 8-12 light bricks per 48×48 plate, which, since I have 8 total planned, means I’d be looking to redeem 64-100 of these light bricks for full Space base lighting for both factions if I wanted to redeem, and also necessitate the programming modules to go with that. Yeah, it would be all red, but I can replace the LEDs’ colors fairly easily if needed. That’s a pret-ty big chunk of LED lights out of the 709, and that’s just me. With a reasonable amount of thought, any individual builder can think big so we can, together, display big.Also worth considering is that I imagine that this would be A LOT of cups all told. Light bricks aren’t cheap, and nor are the programming elements. As such, redeeming these bricks as a lighting system based on their price in bulk may be problematic for any casual LUG member, functionally limiting this to a small cluster of members or only LUG collaborative projects because of the bricks’ value. This may be similar to long term set redemption problems, and may not be.
A third complication is that these light bricks are all pushbutton activated, so we’d need to motorize every display using them, requiring even more parts and knowledge to support that. This added structure may quickly render some ideas too bulky using these bricks as a lighting system.
Even so, ideas abound, so I say let the creativity FLOW! I believe that there are enough ideas that these bricks can serve both LUG and individual simultaneously, so why NOT facilitate both?
Finally, it is also my feeling that Light, Sound, Programming and Motion should be together a separate section in the forums for discussion threads, as this LUG does not have a lot of experience all across the board with these techniques, methods, and plans.
Some thoughts:
Greg, it is good to point out the need to be patient on these matters and I appreciate that a project could take a while to materialize and much longer to finalize. My main concern is basically what Josh posted – if someone is ready to put them to good use now, I don’t want to hold on to them for a dream project that never materializes.
Probably a compromise like what Matt suggests and several folks seem to be endorsing would be workable. I am not sure what the details would look like. One thing I don’t like is the idea of someone (presumably me at this point) personally approving the redemption on a case basis. I prefer something like a personal redemption cap, making only a limited number available for redemption, and/or making them more expensive than average brick to redeem. Maybe we can devote some time on the 25th to a discussion on the matter.
One thing I think we can all agree on for now is that they should not be auctioned.
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