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I just want to say really.

I’m burnt out. Physically, not mentally. Tomorrow though. Though I know how I’m wiring it. Just have to graph it out after measuring how many bottles…

I just can’t figure out how I could be wiring this up. While the Wif studied, I stated just going to town with pen and paper. Nothing. Everything is just middling my eyes cross. I want to maximize the top-end brightness, so no POV. I want to dim and brighten slowly, so no digital only. I want to not have to buy more stuff, so no external boards.
My current idea is go all Charlie-plexing. Kinda. So I need to check to make sure my guesstimate is right. With the behind Charlie-plexing being that we’re talking doses and therefore are able to choose which diode if a matched pair by using the direction of current flow..  well what if I used a digital pin, set it to HIGH,  and then had the analog pin go from all on to all off? That should give me a gradient?
Either way, I started writing this this morning and bite I’m on the way home, bit I have my sketch book…
It’s drawing time.

I was going to do stuff,
But then I got (lazy),
Then I got (lazy).

I at least pulsed an LED using PWM with the other end connected to a pin set to low. Should I be capitalizing low? Low in this case does mean both low as well as a definitive concept of LOW. It’s kinda the difference between true and TRUE.
I digress; tonight I need to try multiplexing my LEDs. I also need to look at the specs and figure out for resistors I should be using for my LEDs. Also, if I remember correctly, LEDs brighten exponentially, that being the case, need to look at how to slow that growth a bit…

I finally read that bit in my Arduino Cookbook, and I think I understand what I need to do. I’m not actually sure how well it will work, but it’s definitely worth a try. I’m pretty sure this way I’ll be able to still use the analog pins to control the pulsing, and then use the analog pins for a ground.
Or I could just get a controller, but that doesn’t seem too fun…

Tried using a simple capacitor circuit to get the coming going on. Really not feeling it. I’d not a smooth transition, and me being a punk, it was backwards as well, add in it started bright and faded out…
I might revisit that idea, but it was far enough from what I was hoping to see that I’ll probably just look elsewhere. Even if I did it right, it works involve using a few components per pin just to have individual bottle control for more than six bottles. That sounds like a lot of work.
Tonight will probably be the great transistor attempt. Turn on a transistor with PWM on the arduino, to drive multiple LEDs at once. If that works too my liking, then I’ll just need to look at whether I want a more static look or a more crazed look. Knowing me, it will be more crazed. To do this I’ll have something like two out three LEDs per bottle, with each pin driving multiple LEDs. The overlap will men that individual bottles will pulse in and out, and possibly back in again before going down to out all the way. I’m not sure what that effect will be like. I’m considering trying to model that with Processing.

I for realsy food everything I had on my to-do from yesterday last night. I even almost bailed at the two of three mark, but realized I still had another task. I’m sure a lot of people would be wondering about why that’s so amazing, but for me it is. I am a very lazy individual. I anchor doing work that doesn’t need doing.
Back to work. The variable LED glowing was easy, with a caveat. On the Arduino Uno there are only (six?) PWM-able pins. This means I’m either limited to six bottles, or I need to look for other options. I’ve now stated to look at multiplexing the LEDs, as six bottles doesn’t feel cool enough. I want a whole bundle. Multiplexing itself isn’t an issue, but I think I’ll get back into an issue of how to have multiple bottles, each with their own level of brightness. Probably the best way off doing that would be a giant while loop, just flicking on and off the individual pins as fast as it’s like logic could, having the variations in brightness being the function of the number of occurrences for an individual bottle.
Gonna have to look at this, try doing some multiplexing…

So I keep on thinking of making an umbrella that
– has no pointy parts
– has sensors that trigger LEDs for where rain drops hit. It didn’t have to be precise, just pretty.

But I just not thought, what if I double down on the idea.
If I made an artificial tree, all mini make it something, added in some piezo elements and what not, and turned it into a glowing weather report. It’d be kinda cool to look outside and, rather than having to look for the telltale splashes of water drops, just see soft little flashes where the drops hit the tree. And a flexing motion causing a flow on part of the trunk, to show the force of the wind. Of course, adding on some networking would be dope.
I think this might be happening after I’m happy with LightBeer.

This was the first actual work I’ve done, beyond cleaning labels off of beer bottles, in forever. Found breadboard, some good test LEDs, arduino, resistors and number wires. And by found I mean I dig through boxes scattered all over the Den of Inequity. Slapped some stuff together, and following  ladyada’s old tutorial, plus or minus, made the different LEDs light up in sequence. Tonight the goals are to use pwm as a gradual lighting and dimming, test the ultrabright LEDs in beer bottles, and add a randomization factor to which one is lit.

Of course I haven’t built LightBeer v1, but hell. We all know the sophomore album is always better. The ordinal idea was bites with the LEDs dropped in. Note I’m thinking single LEDs, with multiple bottles stacked pyramid style. Each “Bottle cap” will be provided protoboard with a transistor and LED mounted to it. Using the arduino to drive individual LEDs is kinda a waste but it’s not that many to begin with and a later time I can always make it better.
Still working on the doing, bit this current iteration makes me happy. I still need to see hour bright my LEDs really are…