You must be the best teacher ever. The way you explain stuff is really clear and understandable.

@T-a-b-b-s

6 ай бұрын

Said no one ever

This really helped tie all the bits together I've learned so far. Thank you!!!!

After watching the video I decided to throw a couple of led strips on my roof, plug them in and call it a day.

@Tom-In-Ga

3 жыл бұрын

I'm with you. If this is a beginners guide, I'd hate to see an advanced version.

@ramhemi75

3 жыл бұрын

Ya fuck this lol

@javi1373

3 жыл бұрын

Before this video I was like "how hard this shit be" now I'm like "fuck this"

@ramhemi75

3 жыл бұрын

@@javi1373 check this one out. kzread.info/dash/bejne/poyq1tqwe5bQgs4.html this dude explains it very well!

@Kevinw4040

3 жыл бұрын

This is why people pay professionals to do it. To hell with this bs.

out of everybody producing content on this subject, you are the most straightforward and informative. thank you! i will consider patreon.

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

Thanks!

That xLights guide was really all that I needed. Thanks for keeping me busy doing projects Rob!

I've been thinking of upgrading the outside lights for sometime and this is probably the best instructional video I've seen. Great job Rob and thank you!

Phenomenal video ! Thank you for bringing us closer to our dreams ! And Your LED obsession is well understood !

Omg! I’ll stick to string lights; props to all of you who do this! Impressive

You’re the man. Love your channel and what you do! #respect

Thanks Rob. Love your succinct explanations, no nonsense , get to the point presentations. I love having you guys 2.5 yrs ahead of my budget. You save me so much time and $. ;-) (Oh, and let me mention the link you have to the WS2812B IP65s was dead last I checked.) Thanks for all you do!

Oh my gosh! Thank you SO MUCH for this! NOBODY explains any of this as well as you, truly appreciated!

Thanks for such a thorough video, you answered like 20 of my 10 questions

Love your presenting style. Refreshing and straight to the point

Importing the sequence is definitely one of the most confusing parts to do on your own. Thank you for explaining this so well!

Another great video Rob, really informative!! Good to see at 09:00 you had plenty of supervisors helping!!!

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

Haha, had some friends come over for dinner that night but I was SO close to finishing when they got there that I had to keep going. They kept me company, good friends and unwitting participants in my youtube video.

I highly recommend this video if you are into making your display from static lights to sequenced lights. Love the informative video as this is a pretty good intro to the hobby of the Christmas lights. It also turns into many other holiday lights too, i.e 4th of July, Halloween. I also recommend XLights KZread classes as well as the forums from Xlights and Light O Rama. The only complaint I have with the video is your comment of it takes a week for a novice to do an impressive show in a week. Only if you have deep pockets (purchasing a ready made display and sequenced or having some else do it) or you are a anywhere from a intermediate to complete nerd in electronics. And still not a week to do it all. Not trying to scare anyone away but it takes a lot longer to wade thru what you want to do versus all of the different electronic items to do it as well as the programming aspects. If you have a music background, that helps too when sequencing your lights to music. Your advice to start small is the best solution for a novice as it can easily get overwhelming. It has taken me almost 10 years to get my display where I want it to be. Last year was the very first year to setup, sequenced and happy with the display. It is not big or small but it fits the area I have and it took over a month to setup. That does not include selecting the songs to sequence, going thru checking each light (ws2811s, rgb spotlights, static led lights) and checking for anomalies. Can't wait till I retire so I can really do it spectacularly!!

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

Thanks for the kind words! The "under a week" part was definitely referring to kit stuff. You can get really creative in this hobby (which is I think why most of us like it), but you can also buy the kits to get up and running quickly if that's what you're after.

This really helped me make the decision to skip the lights this year

Wow this is extraordinary clear! Thank you.

Dude, you are an absolute magician!

Nice movie! And nice tree. Now a movie of the total house

I'm super excited. I've been wanting something to do since retirement. Knowing me, if I start today I might be able to have my "mega strand" of lights programmed in time for Christmas next year.

@TheHookUp

3 жыл бұрын

January is a great time to start planning for next December.

He would have been my favorite teacher in school. Very cool projects!

@berner57

3 жыл бұрын

Thanks to KZread, he still can be your favorite teacher! I know he is mine, and I am 52.

Fantastic videos. You are doing a great job breaking down the topics you cover. Keep it up!

The part about the universe was really helpful. Thanks!

Thanks for the time stamps!

Thank you so much for sharing for point lights.

Great info. Good subject would be how to expand a single effect across all channels and universes as I saw this season. It was spread over someone's entire house ever so often to match intensity of music. Very cool effect.

this was a great video thank you

Thanks for posting this. Wow when I drove by a house with this type of led tree I had no clue what's involved. I always wanted to do this but I feel now I need a degree in IT to do it. When you were going back and forth on the pc my brain went into over load. Lol

Wow sick! This is that next level lights I install commercial holiday lights and if I start offering things like this there is way more money in it!

Love the video and love the channel, too! Your channel is now on the top of my list! I even printed out the input / output diagram from your "which pins to choose" video on the ESP8266. By the way you look like a young Michael Keaton in the thumbnail for this video ha ha!

You’re the best. Seriously.

9:08 - Glad to see the union supervisors on the job.

Greatly appreciated the Timestamps

I'm lights KraZee! But I'm not participating anymore. I've got a new perspective and much more appreciative of folks who do these GREAT displays. Thnx

Наконец-то нормальное описание! Спасибо👍

You are a legend

AMAZING 💡💡💡💡💡🎄, THANK YOU!

I'm hooked! Subscribed...

Nice Project !!!👍👍

Awesome channel!

Great video!!!

SUPER ...100% BEST... Thank you...

Thank you you have been a big help.

Love your wife's shirt. "I don't need Google, my husband knows everything" Ha! XD

@lordgarth1

4 жыл бұрын

Musicman247 is it missing “thinks he” ?

@talesmaschio

4 жыл бұрын

Gotta buy one of those to my wife.

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

@@lordgarth1 I try to learn more and more each day, but sadly I'll never know everything... not until the FDA green-lights direct brain implants.

A novice can put together an amazing show in about a week...Ha! I'd love to see that

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

Kits only of course...

First, love your vids. You're literally the reason I even ended up in this hobby. Starting with your holiday lights vids and now into the full show. That said, "less than a week to a full show" is fairly misleading. I suppose with a Ready to Run kit for the mega tree, that element's doable in that time frame, but a whole show is not. It's my first year, I've been at it since August/September and I'm only at about 65% complete. Wiring, soldering, attaching pigtails, power injecting, building props for window outlines, and trouble shooting is all very time consuming. And that's before the dozens of hours you'll spend sequencing. This is still a great tutorial and your xlights section will definitely save me some time!

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

Yeah, that time frame is for kits of course. I know I’m not exactly a beginner, but I completed my tree +sequencing in one Saturday.

@HolidayCoro

4 жыл бұрын

It's possible if you have general IT skills (installing software, IP addressing) and you use out of the box sequences along with a ready to run controller. Going Ready2Run assembled alone will save you many, many hours since the controllers are shipped 100% assembled and tested and you don't have to make a bunch of mistakes not purchasing or purchasing the wrong items to complete the project. Power injection is a "level 4" skill that even we don't support for customers due to the likely-hood for damage to hardware and thus we generally have customers using Long Range instead of power injection which is cleaner and easier and just about the same cost.

Nice one. I got idea for our christmas decoration competition at work.

I really wanna make my own light shows for Christmas and Halloween for my future house. I’m sure this video can help me.

Great intro, Rob...I'm an IoT hw/sw developer and just getting into xLights and animated shows. Yours is the first video that has actually brought all of the pieces together in an understandable, cohesive manner that, thanks to you, I know understand! Kudos. You mentioned in the vid that you permanently mounted pixel strips to outline your house. Could you share what products/tools you did to do that? Has that been installed for awhile, and if so has it withstood weather/sunlight/snow/rain etc.? I also loved the discussion around PVC pre-fab mounting for your doors and windows. Let's see how you did that!? Thanks again!

@TheHookUp

2 жыл бұрын

kzread.info/dash/bejne/gGmA0MFsicrcaaw.html

Great Video. Thinking this is a 2021 project.

Good presentation.

Thank you! I’m making the move so.

Thank you !!

great video

That's cool

Now I know why I’ve never saw a light show in my town. As simple as a trig problem.

Thanks for a great overview. Helped me accelerate my setup. I’m not clear why you have the same e1.31 controller listed multiple times in the controller setup. My understanding is Xlights supports multiple universes under a single entry.

Nice presentation

That's REALLY impressive... a bit out of my budget.. didn't realize the big controllers were that expensive. I look forward to more of this series and I'll be ingesting more of your original LED outline to build my own.

@grimninja2004

4 жыл бұрын

you can use nodemcu lolin boards (espixelstick firmware) that cost 4$ each to control up to 250+ pixels per controller. you can waterproof them in cheap pvc pipe. you can diy a 18 strand pixel tree for about 250ish dollars and that includes 18 strands of cheap pixels,6 controllers, and a powersupply. how you mount the pixels dictates the rest of your cost. mounting strips are nice, but slicing 1/2 inch pvc pipe in half lenthwise on a tablesaw and drilling 50 1/2 inch holes every 2.4 inches will only cost you 2$ per 20 feet! thats 20$ to mount all the strands. to support it you can create a frame from emt piping, or use conventional megatree methods.

@alexelliott9733

3 жыл бұрын

The DIY route is definitely the way to go in my opinion. You learn more this way, so that you can add more in the future, AND you save a LOT of money. I use ESP8266 boards controlled via E1.31 with Vixen Lights software. The ESP8266 boards control my LEDs, and I have a separate power supply. It really isn't too hard to build if you do your research.

@ein57ein

3 жыл бұрын

@@alexelliott9733 Thanks Alex. I now have lights along my soffits and one other element running on D1 Minis with Dig-Unos. Planning a 7-8' Mega Tree for next year and I won't lie, I'm intimidated by Xlights (for now), but I realize how much it adds to it all. Fortunately, I got a bit of time to learn. The tree will be where I more to nodes and may be where I step up to 12v from my current 5v lights.

@alexelliott9733

3 жыл бұрын

​@@ein57ein That's awesome! I've also been thinking about building a full-fledged mega tree, but it didn't happen this year, so hopefully I'll get around to it for next year as well. Hope yours goes well!

@ein57ein

3 жыл бұрын

@@grimninja2004 man! I've got a lot to learn lol... I didn't see your comment before, but now (specially that I'm plotting for next year). I'm thinking about a 180 degree 8' with ~13 strings on a D1Mini or ESP32 with WLED. I know WLED can listen for e1.31, I just gotta figure that part out before next year.

First I want to say that I have subscribed to you page. I have been sequencing a light show for a few years now. While I have considered going with Pixel lights I have too much invested in regular LED lights, (about 25,000), to change my set up. I also wrote my own program to run my lights. I use Digital I/O boards in my display and build all my own circuit boards. I still do the flashy blinky type of display, (no dimming). Even with what I know this set up seems like it would take a lot of study to get a grasp of everything. I have even tried to contact DIY web sites but no ones seems willing to help me out with questions and problems that I encounter. You at least are willing to show how some of these things go together. I did at one time try and purchase systems from people, but no one would explain how to diagnose problems with the systems I bought. It would be nice to see something like this broken down into easy to understand steps to do a display as complex as this. All of the terms you are using need to be defined in every day language for the average person. Thank you for you effort to explain your system.

Just subscribed today and watched a few videos so far. My brain is smoking because I haven't even reached novice level. I'm a "I'm new, I don't know what to do" beginner, beginner level. I'll watch them a few dozen times again and maybe I'll start to understand. I do love the videos and do want to learn.

@mikeerbe8784

4 жыл бұрын

J check out videos on the video section of xlights.org, or Canispater Christmas and Listen to Our Lights all here on youtube. You'll probably get a better idea from those guys.

Thank you, I'm 12 and I begged my parents for years to get me a controller and lights and they did. I got the programming and it didn't work out. Like it was supposed to. It was off beat. I guess that's not to bad considering I did it by myself but u really helped

I have no idea what u were talking about (setup). It’s a nice outcome

Can you do a video on how to physically mount the wiring/lights to your house. I’m pretty lost on injecting power. If you want a house to do you can come over. Haha

Great videos. Did you ever do the one on FM transmitters as you spoke about in the 101 RGZ video? Would love to see that. Thanks.

I would love for you to do an in-depth show on power injection. I don't really understand when or how to do that.

Do you have a video on how you made the PVC frames for your doors and windows and attached them? Thanks

100% sure that I never want to do this now. Jeez Rob!

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

Ha! That's just as useful as being inspired to do it. Sometimes it's good to know what you don't want to do.

@Roxy-no5wv

2 жыл бұрын

Lmao me to

this is really cool! hey, is there a method for syncing music with the display of lights you're aware of? for example: pitch corresponds to color, and volume corresponds to brightness and a sequence corresponds to patterns in a song. something like that?

Waiting for next Video

Ha I’ve been watching your channel for over a year now, just realized you are in Tampa. Funny local coincidence.

@danieldavis8446

4 жыл бұрын

I thought he was somewhere in Fl when I saw him decorating in shorts

Great video. I'm starting with pixels and currently have a falcon pi cap

I haven't slept in 7 weeks but thanks to your video I'm now ZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

I love all the videos and thanks for them. I don't have a Raspberry Pi to setup Home Assistant and I want more functionality than wled for programming the leds. Could you help with other options for MQTT setup? Or do you think it is possible to use the buttons on the nodemcu to toggle through the different "light shows" once it is programed, no wifi needed? Thanks

Interested what all you had for your first setup you showed for the whole house. In a similar situation starting about thinking about moving to something similar. Thanks.

Very helpful video! Here's the one question I have that you actually didn't cover lol. Where is your main controllers mounted and how does one typically run the pixels cables to it without having awful cables covering your house? Go through the attic? And can the pixel strands be daisy chained or each 50 have to run back to the controller?

Can you do a video specifically on power injection? Methods, techniques and tools required? Great videos cheers!!

@HolidayCoro

4 жыл бұрын

Power injection should be well understood before implementing. It's a bit like installing a turbo kit on your stock car - all good if you get everything 100% right and really bad if not done correctly. Here are some diagrams that show the basics: www.holidaycoro.com/kb_results.asp?ID=173 Given the number of cheap long range expansion systems (www.holidaycoro.com/Ready2Run-AlphaPix-Flex-Long-Range-Receivers-p/935.htm), the move has been more towards long range and away from power injection due to the complexity.

Very clear explanation ! Thank you !!. One question (I am a beginner with RGB). I just bought the Pixie 16 LOR controller. How many stands can I attach to each of the 16 outputs (cables that comes from the controller). Sorry about this silly question but I am a newbie. My understanding is that I can only control 16 stands of lights. is that correct? Thank you for your help and time answering.

Great mega tree! I have 14 stings just arrived, I was going to do 2 in spacing but seeing yours I believ 3 in looks nice also. Other note, didn’t you have a video on how to build that wreath? I couldn’t find it. Scanned through your other holiday vids but may have missed it.

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

That will be in the next video I do on this subject.

@DannyMullen

4 жыл бұрын

The Hook Up awesome! Thinking it might be similar to what I am trying with my pex. Love to see other solutions to a similar problem. Thanks!!

Thank you sir i want to lern about this

Great video! Thanks. I'm new at this and have a few questions. Doesn't using the HolidayCoro Ready2Run setup require you to use the HolidayCoro pixels also due to the connections they use? Or can you buy a the Ready2Run and buy pixels from another source? (aliexpress, amazon, etc.)

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

The connectors are readily available on the holidaycoro site or even on aliexpress.

Hello Sir, Thanks for your videos, really helpful to know about the latest trends. One question - Is there any way to control SONOFF devices using the app without an Internet connection. I mean to use the app and control devices through LAN. Kindly share about it really useful for solving this problem at home.

“Don’t attempt to make a show that’s visible from space your very first year”. Ok 👍🏻 got it 😂😂😂

@grimninja2004

4 жыл бұрын

and... my first year i have a 16 foot high tree with 1000 pixels... gocttha

@commiccannon592

3 жыл бұрын

Ohh why not

@GaryEveritt

3 жыл бұрын

@@commiccannon592 They will crash the International Space Station

Have you ever thought about changing the light program, for off-season fun ? Like Synergy welcoming you home, for example (Jem)

I use SuperStar from Light-O-Rama to sequence all my pixels, and use almost all Holiday Coro controllers and pixels. But, X-Lights also is a very good sequencer. You gave a great overview of the main steps. Just a heads-up: Sequencing RGB lights to a song, the real "wow" of using RGB lights, takes an enormous amount of time. I take approximately 8-10 hours per one minute of a song that I sequence to my lights, and I only have about 17,000 pixels. I say "only" because many of those addicted to this hobby (like me) have multiples of that (e.g., John Storms). So, besides the work required to build props (like a mega tree), plan on spending quite a bit of time sequencing lights to a song. Now, will your next video be how to power wash a driveway? Ok, my poor attempt at humor. I love all your videos!!

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

Haha, when I took that picture my first thought was "wow, the driveway looks gross". I think it was a side effect of the HDR applied by the iphone camera. I promise it doesn't actually look that bad.

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

Totally agree about the time it takes to sequence by the way. The only song I've ever sequenced from scratch was "you make it feel like christmas" by Gwen Stefani because it's my wife's favorite xmas song and it took me around 20 hours, and as I said, I'm not even fully satisfied with the result.

HI Rob, perfect timing on tis video! I just received my Falcon controllers 2xF48 and 2xF16V3 with the smart receivers. For the network on your unifi did you create a separate VLAN or an entire new network on a different controller (USG). Thanks!

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

Hey Dave, I haven’t done it yet because I need to change some rules for my porch and carriage lights to be in the show, but it’s on my short list of things to do.

More like this.

My favorite hobby, This year will be my 5th year running a light show. One thing I noticed that will cause issues is using DHCP. You just can't do this. I don't use xlights but on Vixen it asks for controller IP, if you're using DHCP this is liable to change after a day or a week depending on router settings. Using a manual IP should be the only option. Also never used Falcon boards because they're quite pricey. I've stuck with SanDevices, they also sell their boards fully assembled which is the option I took. My first SanDevices I got 4 years ago (an E682 ) and it's still running like a champ. Now they have a $99 board that assembled with 4 outputs. Perfect for placement on a display element.

@HolidayCoro

4 жыл бұрын

While the E682 was one of the first crop of pixel controllers back in 2010, it has not kept up with all the modern innovations common to newer controllers like - multi-line OLED screens, network switch for daisy chaining, Wi-Fi interface, modular construction allowing 2 times or more outputs per controller, no long range support, no temperature / voltage monitoring and shutdown (for safety), blown fuse monitoring, sequence playback from controller, FM transmitting and other improvements. When factoring in these huge improvements since the release of the E682 years ago, the difference in cost makes sense.

@jendib

4 жыл бұрын

Most modern routers keep matching the same IP to a MAC address, so the IP given by the DHCP shouldn't change.

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

I think it's easier to let it take DHCP, then reserve the IP on your router.

@halsaresnowpaw522

4 жыл бұрын

You should be able to make DHCP static leases on your router. This will ensure the controllers get the same IP address every time.

Hey I didn't see anything in the comments about the sandevices controllers but they come fully assembled as well.

@The Hook Up Thanks this video is very informative, you used PVC around your doors and windows.. Are you using strips or pixels in them?

@TheHookUp

3 жыл бұрын

Pixels around the doors and windows

Nice video, I would add a disclaimer about that fence post though those bend and break easy in heavy winds. I would use stronger metal poles for the build. Also would let people know that this is only one option like you broke down the controllers so they understand that there are multiple ways to make the same sort of prop. Also don't recall seeing guide wires added for extra support on the tree? That's also a good point to highlight so people don't get frustrated when things start falling over.

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

I did mention the guy wires (both buying the string and when to attach them), but I didn't show a close up. There are certainly tons of options for making every kind of prop, I'll be covering that in my next video on the subject (also PVC/PEX/Coro/3d Printing). This video could have easily been 30-40 minutes long, but I was REALLY trying to keep it short since there's already a ton of good information about the subject if you're willing to sit down and watch hours of videos. I wanted this to be the fast-paced first video you'd would watch to get an overview and then dive in deeper to any particular subject you needed more info on. You think the top rail will buckle in heavy winds? I know it's pretty thin walled, but there's just not that much surface area for the wind to grab a hold of.

@HolidayCoro

4 жыл бұрын

The number of factors involved with mounting a megatree and vary quite a bit. We have customers that build MegaTrees on roofs, sand, on flag poles, on the side of a house, on asphalt and concrete and other varied surfaces. As such, there are many factors that come into play on how to balance safety, cost and materials that a customer is able to work with.

Hey dude. Congrats for the nice video. Can we see your first show somehow? :D

Loved the video, thank you very must. Just wondering if you went with WS2812B strings or WS2811 Strings, I can't seem to find it in the video?

@TheHookUp

4 жыл бұрын

The LED strips on my house are WS2812B, the LEDs on the megatree are WS2811 pixel strings.

Rob, am getting a early start on the x-mass show for this year. (I have to show the wife that progress is being made with all the stuff I purchased..). My tree is going to be about 70" tall, so Im not totally sure of how to connect the lights, Im going to have 16 strands (up and down). So if I start on the bottom left and go to the right, I shoudl start at the bottom, then on the second strand start at the top, go to the bottom, then start at the bottom of the 3rd strand, go up and down and up and down until I get all the strands connected in one huge line? Or do I need to cut each strand and start at the bottom or top of all.. thanks..

I think i will now need a mega tree and to watch the xlights import section in 4X slo-motion to get all the steps.

New to this venture, but your video has given me the kick in the butt I needed to get started. Thanks for your recommended controllers and pixels, I will be purchasing them soon. I have a pressing question though, How can I incorporate some of my current yard lights (deer, snowman, sleigh, etc) into the light show, since its all 120V. What type of controller would you recommend that could tie those things into x lights?

@TheHookUp

3 жыл бұрын

Those are done with AC light controllers: www.holidaycoro.com/16-Output-AC-Animated-Lighting-Controller-AlphaPix-p/942-2.htm?Click=12722 xLights can still send the data.

WOW, Thanks a lot for these tutorials, they are soooo easy to understand, BTW, do you know by any chance why there is a restriction of max 512 per universe?

@jonbetts8473

3 жыл бұрын

Probably has to do with bitrate and the fact that that's 64 Bytes per Universe - a nice round amount in 'computer-ese'

Hola, como podria conseguir todas las instrucciones en español? Me gusta mucho tu trabajo y quisiera empezar a aprender a hacerlo y decorar mi casa asi como la tuya. Espero y puedas ayudarme. Saludos...

DrZzs: Today I'm gonna show you how to build your own LED shows. That's all for now, Adios! The Hook Up: Nahhh DrZzs!!Hold my beer! This is how you show your LED shows from space.