Blade style to control blade length

ProffieOS Blade Styles
1

Hi guys. I just got into the lightsaber community in September but I have made programming strides with the help of a few programmers and fetts website.

I just had a question to see if I should pursue and idea down the rabbit hole. Can you make a blade style that limits the number of pixels that are used? If I have a blade config of 132 but I only want to light 16 (the remainder drawing no power), is there an easy solution.

I understand that this can be set in the blade array, but I was seeing if it could be done within the bladestyle itself.

If this can be achieved, my idea is to use special functions to produce emitter accent lighting on sabers that are not previously wired for it, using special functions on the config.

Thanks

2

Neopixels always draw power when they are provided power, and an amount that’s not negligible at that.

The whole blade is turned on and off together, so off pixels will still draw power, fwiw. (Obviously less than if they were on, but still)

May I ask why you wouldn’t just use a SubBlade?

3

So I purchased a saber that was not wired for sub blade. I also have a saber installed with sub blade and I like the accent lighting feature from the emitter. My idea was to try to get similar results on the saber without sub blade wiring through programming. I learned how to use special features and alt fonts to basically switch blade styles within the on and off state. I thought that it would be an interesting idea to have one state for emitter accent lighting, and one when you are using the saber. My concern is the timing of the bladestyle will be way off if it’s trying to run on a 132 pixels not to mention the energy draw.

Like I said, it could very possibly be a fools errand, but I wanted to see if it was worth a shot.

4

Perhaps you misunderstand what a sublade is.

It’s a software-based mechanism to do exactly what you’re describing, it doesn’t require special hardware.

I would recommend taking a quick read through that documentation page Iinked, it explains how to set it up and might help explain how it all works.

Essentially though it splits up the physical blade into 2 (or more) “virtual” blades to assign separate bladestyles to.

5

Yeah sure, you can use Smoothstep<>, or LinearSectionF<>.
It’s not set by pixel number, but by a value between 1 and 32768 (being the emitter and tip respectively), so you’d probably need to try a few times to get it where you want it on the blade.
Easiest to play with it in the Style Editor and get close.

Here’s a basic example.

StylePtr<Layers<
  Black,
  AlphaL<DeepSkyBlue,SmoothStep<Int<8000>,Int<-1>>>,
  InOutTrL<TrWipe<300>,TrWipeIn<500>>>>()

You can view it here
“ProffieOS Style Editor”

6

Perfect! I appreciate it. I did identify this in the style editor and I will play with it.

I sub bladed the non wired saber and I am getting good effect on the emitter, but the issue was that with a blade off, it will light up the 16 pixels on the main blade in the off state if a blade was attached.

I am trying to think of a way basically turn the emitter effect on and off through gestures, so it won’t effect the performance of the main blade on or off, since it still controls the first 16 pixels of the main blade.

7

You could use Blade detect or blade ID and just have it automatically switch to the appropriate blade array when you insert and remove the blade…

1 Like
8

Thanks. Since the pins would be live, is it OK to insert a blade? My main idea was to be able to turn that off so I would have no issues with inserting a blade onto live pins.

I am familiar with blade ID and I know how to have the proffie switch arrays depending on the resistance. Can you also have dual arrays with blade detect?

Thanks!

9

Yes, “hot plugging” a blade in is normal and fine.
Yes, blade detect will toggle between 2 preset arrays, one of them being set by a blade definition using NO_BLADE for it’s resistance value argument .
Blade ID can use more than one, but certainly can toggle bwtween just 2 as well.

10

You guys are the best. Thanks, I have a working config that I am going to try now.

11

So I attempted blade detect, but my serial monitor is not detecting a blade.

I have added this define to the config:
#define BLADE_DETECT_PIN blade4Pin

Here is my main blade array:
{ NO_BLADE,
WS281XBladePtr<139, bladePin, Color8::GRB, PowerPINS<bladePowerPin2, bladePowerPin3> >() ,

This is what I am getting in serial monitor with blade in:
BLADE ID: 37850440.00
NO Blade Detected
blade = 1
WS2811 Blade with 139 leds…

With blade out scan:
BLADE ID: 37850440.00
NO Blade Detected
blade = 1
WS2811 Blade with 139 leds.

I have tried blade detect bladePowerPin2, blade4Pin, and blade1Pin

No changes in behavior or serial monitor data.

any help would be appreciated

Happy thanksgiving!

12

Blade detect requires a wire between data4 on the board and a floating pin on the pogo pin pcb. Do you have such a wire?

This is a very large number for blade ID.
How is your blade ID configured?

13

It sounds like you might be conflating Blade Detect and Blade ID .

The documentation pages discussing these are here:

14

Thanks guys. I purchased the saber already installed. I am just taking on the challenge to try to find solutions that will allow me to get the emitter effect without changing any hardware if possible. It has very nice emitter shine with the saber on with the blade out, but I just want to try to think of a solution to have it behave like a saber that I have that was wired and programmed for emitter effects in the off state. The emitter is a shox eco v4, with the crystal sub bladed, so from what I read, bladeID won’t work. Sounds like blade ID wont work either since it obviously wasn’t wired for it. I just think it’s fun to try to find solutions like this. I appreciate everyone who has tried to help out. Thanks!

15

pssst. Do Blade ID switching with just a button press.

16

Thanks man. I want to say I am truly thankful for this resource and I appreciate your very generous help.

I am sorry for the noob questions. Ive learned a from crucible over the past few days. I have managed to get bladeid on one of my sabers. Ive added bladein and bladeout.wav to the common and fonts with no effect. The way I setup my config was to simply use the bladeid values in the blade array. Is there an easy way I can use bladein/out or similar sounds and pair them with the array when it switches?

I love and use fett’s button prop, so I was unable to get switching the array with the button working, since it is well beyond my abilities at this time

Thanks

1 Like
17

That sounds right. Where did you get the blade ID values to use?

The only real tricky part about that would be to find an available button control. If there’s one you never use you could replace that but otherwise it’s simply pasting those two functions pasted in the thread into the prop file next to some other functions.

18

I was using the values that I was reading from the serial monitor. Luckily they were very consistent with a blade in and out.

As far as switching the array, I would love to switch the array with a long press of either the aux or power buttons. I think it’s currently set up with an audio player for the power button, and I’m not sure exactly what the long press aux does. I get a voice prompt to select preset, which I can simply use a short click to scroll through. As far as the audio player goes, I would be content to only use the player on with the blade on.

19

I would use something obscure, “hard” to do so it’s not triggered accidentally, and something not already assigned.
Like
case EVENTID(BUTTON_POWER, EVENT_FOURTH_HELD_MEDIUM, MODE_OFF)

20

You guys are the best. I got this working on one of my sabers. I hope I can duplicate the results. I thought that I read that you need to have the same number of blades if you have multiple arrays. I just want to confirm this. I want to sub blade one array and not the other. I know that I can just use black for an additional blade if needed on the second array, but can anyone confirm that if I sub blade one array, I need to mirror the sub blade, even if the pixel count differs. Thanks