I need to buil my own RGB LED arrays for a project I have in mind. I will power the LEDs with my brand new Arduino that I am quickly falling in love with. I have found plenty of satisfactory tutorials that explain exactly how to do this, but I cant find any that do much explaining why they built it the way the did. I am new to this, but I am not easily intimidated. Do you all know of some good resources that could walk me through the basics while explaining why so that I could apply my new knowledge elsewhere?
Eventually I want to be able to build my own RGB LED arrays in whatever arrangement I want, and animate them with my Arduino.
What are your favorite resources for this kind of thing?
Hey there,
Couple of things. If you find that people don’t respond to your posts, it’s often times because you’re not asking specific enough questions or questions that people think you can find answers to by a quick googling. Trust me - I’ve been there and found out the hard way. So instead of asking about “the basics” think about and explain the precise application of your project. You’ll find that talking through it often leads to :idea: moments. Also, don’t be afraid to just dive in, play around, and make mistakes. It’s the best way to learn, IMHO.
Check out the forums on the Arduino main site [here.
Also check out the Arduino playground [here.
Good luck!](Arduino Playground - HomePage)](http://www.arduino.cc/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl)
As far as making your own arrays, unless they are small, I recommend looking on ebay etc for prebuilt arrays. As well as saving time and money, they often greatly simplify driving the LEDs.
Thanks a bunch for your responses! You both have been helpful.
I really need to build my own arrays for the project I have in mind. Basically I want to specifically control many LEDs throughout a costume. I am very crafty and actually building the array will not be a problem. In the spirit of being very specific, here is a good question. What is a good way to calculate the resistors I will need for an array? Considering I will be turning on a different number of LEDs at different time it seems difficult to know what the proper resistance should be. Am I thinking about this in the wrong way? How would you calculate the proper resistors you need when building an array?