Gemma Neo 16 led ring project help

EL Wire/Tape/Panels, LEDs, pixels and strips, LCDs and TFTs, etc products from Adafruit

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CNKay
 
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Joined: Mon Dec 16, 2013 4:16 pm

Gemma Neo 16 led ring project help

Post by CNKay »

Please anyone feel free to answer some newbie questions.

1. New to the whole Arduino, Gemma, Neo pixel scene. I am just guessing that the programming language would be C+ ? Is this correct?

Have not looked yet but want to build a project with my 10year old son and want it to go fairly smooth. I have been reading up on this site and trying to get my peas in a row. It doesn't look that hard to load in the example sketch "Goggle program". I guess changing a few numbers or deleting a few lines won't hurt anything. So son can experiment a bit.
But my end desire is a bit different.

The project in mind would be two pixels lit 180 out with a nice comet like tail and chasing fairly slow :D That would be the base program and i would like to configure for a switch so that any time the momentary switch is made a random effect is executed. of maybe twinkles, half random on bright to a fade etc.. as many as effects that we think are cool and of course memory will allow. Then jump back to the base mode.
Color wise I really just need all the effects (base and random subs) to just focus on blue and / or white colors. And down the road would like to expand to 5 more rings doing the same thing. Chase/random effect with momentary switch for each ring. Not knowing if you have to plan in advance for this type of future add on.

2a. So, is this type of programming very hard or special for the neo pixels?
2b. Is there a good book you can think of that would cover these topics well? Both for my son and for me. Arduino for dummy's or the like?
2c. Is there a good site to help teach? I was trying to follow the sketch "goggle" program and yeah it is greek to me.
2d. Are there any experts that would be willing to help me with this? Please, excuse my ignorance i am not sure if this is a 10min thing or a 10 day thing.

3. Would the adafruit folks help with something like this? :D
4. First time customer as well so not sure if datasheets or anything comes with product.

Thanks for any feedback!
Chris

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adafruit_support_rick
 
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Joined: Tue Mar 15, 2011 11:42 am

Re: Gemma Neo 16 led ring project help

Post by adafruit_support_rick »

Well, a lot of good questions there.
The arduino programming language is C++, but most people use the C-language subset.
The project you have in mind is not very difficult, but you are correct - it would help to get a good grounding in C programming first. We have a lot of good books in our Books section:
http://www.adafruit.com/category/40
You and your son might also have fun with one of the starter kits which contain parts and tutorials for lots of projects, which will help you get up to speed on programming.
http://www.adafruit.com/products/170
http://www.adafruit.com/products/1078

We also have a nice tutorial series on arduino on our Learning System
http://learn.adafruit.com/category/learn-arduino

The forums are here to help with specific problems you may have - we won't design your project or write your code for you, but we can help you over the bumps!

Good luck! :D

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