Pcb1

Lux

A wireless LED performance prop system from the Department of Engineering Science, NCKU. As the props spin, they use Persistence of Vision (POV) to draw 2D images in the air, synchronized over Wi-Fi to music. They are mainly performed at freshman orientation camps.

Full design write-up (electronics, mechanical, firmware, editor): LightPOV project page

Devices

Device	Photo	Description	Code
Light Stick		ESP32 + WS2812 LED strip in a transparent PC tube, powered by an 18650 Li-ion battery	LightPOV/
Light Snake		Shares the Stick's ESP32 core board and firmware, swung on a rope	LightPOV/
Light Ball		ESP-12F (ESP8266) + RGB LEDs in a semi-transparent PE container	LightBall/

🎬 Performances

Click a thumbnail to watch on YouTube.

117th Freshman Orientation Camp

Stick	Ball	Snake

27th ESCamp (Stick, Ball, Snake)	118th Freshman Orientation Camp (Stick)

Repository Layout

LightPOV/legacy/ holds previous control panels and past performance files. It is kept for reference only, so please don't develop in it.

Usage

Requirements

• Node.js 20+
• Arduino IDE with the ESP32 board package and the FastLED, cppQueue and MPU6050 libraries

1. Effect editor (ControlPanel_v3)

cd LightPOV/ControlPanel_v3
npm install
npm run dev        # open http://localhost:3000
npm run test       # run unit tests

2. Hardware server

The props fetch effects and sync time from the server over Wi-Fi. Each server serves a different prop:

3. Flashing the firmware (LightPOV)

1. Open LightPOV/ESP32/ESP32.ino in Arduino IDE
2. Set the Wi-Fi SSID/password and LUX_ID_DEFAULT (each prop's ID) in config.h
3. Select the ESP32 board and upload; later updates can be pushed over Wi-Fi (OTA)

4. Performance workflow

TBD (edit effects → push to server → props connect → play music to start)

LightBall

cd LightBall/controller
npm install
node server.js     # open http://localhost:3000

The firmware is in LightBall/Code/LightBall_v2/.

Developer docs

• ControlPanel_v3 developer quick start (Chinese)
• Architecture
• Hardware protocol

For questions, please open an Issue.

What's Next

Hardware

• Bring up the core PCB v2.0 (chip-down ESP32, 14500 battery, JST connectors) and verify it works end to end
• Measure whether the LED strip draws more than 2 A from the independent power supply
• Magnetic charging with a 3D-printed enclosure
• Next-generation device: replace modules with mounted electronics to shrink the core radius

Software

• Document the end-to-end performance workflow (the TBD items above)

Acknowledgements

This project is forked from sciyen/ES-Lux (NCKU ES Makers Program). Thanks to the original authors @sciyen and @BensonYang1999. The Lux-starter kit from the original project is not included in this repo; see the upstream repo if you need it.

Licensed under the BSD 3-Clause License.