Some of the information below may be out of date, please visit our Reddit Page for the latest information on using and getting started with LightShow Pi!
Looking to create your own light show using LightShow Pi? Here is a list of steps to help you get started:
Download and Install LightShow Pi
Configuring and Testing your Hardware
Playing your first Song and Playlist
Hardware Design Guides
Once you’ve completed the above, you can move on to some more advanced setups:
Using SMS (text messaging) to control your show
USB Audio-In Support
Below are links to more excellent tutorials other users in our community have written:
Create a Fully Automated Light and Music Show for the Holidays – by Swapnil Bhartiya
Last (but not least), here are some great video tutorials as well provided by community member Ken B to help you get started:
Thanks for posting this awesome project. I love it.
Glad you’re enjoying it!
Hey, I’m looking at doing something like this, but I’d prefer to use the new Raspberry Pi Zero. Would this be possible?
I’m waiting to get my hands on my own Pi Zero – so can’t say for certain if any modifications are required, but I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t work with one! Report back with your experience!
I am running a Pizero and is working great. Shoutcast is running smoothly as well for streaming.
Can you please explain how you’re outputting sound? The zero doesn’t have an audio jack, but it does have bluetooth.
Hello, I have having some issues with the webui fork. I can’t seem to get it to work properly. I can access the webpage but none of the functions work. I haven’t reinstalled lightshowpi but i need to get this working my Monday.
The webui branch hasn’t been updated in over a year – I’d suggest taking a look at Stephen Burning’s webui:
https://plus.google.com/+StephenBurning/posts/6EiZWkv8FwE
Good luck!
Hi am new to all this and have downlaoded the lightshowpi but what i a worried about as a newbie is getting the wiring wrong and blowing my pi, any ideas where i can get a scematic drawing from or some pics to show me what i need to use thank you
Have you looked through the various posts here:
https://plus.google.com/communities/101789596301454731630/stream/7d6a0034-2026-4d9b-a2ad-47cbf90065ed
There are many different schematics / photos as there are many ways to setup your hardware solution. Good luck! Also, feel free to post on the above community with your questions and there are many more people out there who will give you help and advice.
Hello Todd,
This work is really awesome !!
What I’m looking for is Light changing RGB led strips according to audio input from a mobile phone(using an aux/3.5mm cable) !!
Is is possible to do this using this ?
I
Parth,
Depends on the RGB strips – if you are talking about analog RGB strips such as the 5050 (i.e. not individually addressable) – then sure, this project would work great for changing the RGB strip color / brightness to the music output via an audio cable to your RPi via a USB Audio card.
Take a look here for audio-input help:
http://52.89.57.254/usb-audio-in-support/
And here for some details on using the RGB strips:
https://plus.google.com/+TomEnos/posts/3heoPAzdwzi
Good luck!
Why does only pin 7 GPIO work as an output for the lightshowpi on my RPi 2B?
Hey Michael … I’ve been slow to respond directly on this site – please resend questions to the community page: https://plus.google.com/communities/101789596301454731630
Is there any way to use this to control WS2811 LEDs?
Not with the software as it exists today. You could however drive an RGB led light / lights using 3 GPIO pins from the RaspberryPi that will change the colors of the RGB lights based on the music playing w/out the WS2811.
That’s unfortunate
what you are looking for is something like the falcon picap
http://pixelcontroller.com/store/index.php?id_product=47&controller=product
google Falcon Picap, that maybe what you are looking for.
hello Todd, how can i build my on music? or what do i need?
thanks
Not clear what you are asking Jose, what do you mean by “build my on music”?
I am running the Raspberry Pi 3 and connecting all the LED’s up using the GPIO.
I thought I might be connecting up the LED’s wrong so I have run a short program to check each connection, one at a time. This program shows that I did connect up the LED’s correctly and each one lights.
When I run the “sudo python py/hardware_controller.py —state=flash” all I get is:
Channel 1 : GPIO pin number 0
Channel 2 : GPIO pin number 1
etc to Channel 7 when the same thing repeats. None of the LED’s light or flash.
I am not a Python Pro, but it appears that the problem is in this program.
Can you PLEASE HELP. Would like to connect this up for a Halloween Light show.
Gary
Sorry for the slow response Gary, if you still need help, please visit our community page here:
https://plus.google.com/communities/101789596301454731630
Is it be possible to have Lightshow Pi produce video visualizations over HDMI? I’m looking for something like the old Milkdrop and other audio dynamic video outputs like Winamp used to do.
Possible, with enough time and effort most anything is possible 😉 However, there are no plans to add such support to LightShowPi.
Hey, Todd! Are you still helping strangers on the internet?
I can’t get any audio lightshowpi. Leds are working as they should and I’m hearing raspberry’s audio from bluetooth to my computer’s speakers. I can hear audio from other programas (like Chrome – Youtube), but can’t hear anything when playing the lightshow file
I try, but am often slow to respond, try visiting the community page for much more helpers to help you out:
https://plus.google.com/communities/101789596301454731630
I have a few questions:
1) How to check the song that’s playing, and its timestamp, from the command line?
2) How to play audio through bluetooth speakers?
3) How to make all lights on or off using a command in the terminal?
4) How does the Text and twitter work?
For quick support, try posting your questions on reddit: https://reddit.com/r/lightshowpi
I have a few of questions:
1) How do I stop my FM Modulator from powering my pi (and everything other devices) off (or on) in the case of other devices, such as lights and television.
2) How do I reinstall microweb, my microweb stoped working on the web_control.cgi page only, in the terminal it gives an error saying that there is a hooks file missing. This started happening after I tried setting up airplay. Which brings me to my next question:
3) How do I set up airplay? Pandora? Is Spotify supported?
4)How to set up twitter support? Twitter requires an approval to make an app. (I got declined). So I tried to set it up using one of my old API Keys, and Access Keys (from another app I created a while back), adding them into the placeholders in tweet.py, but no luck. Is there another way?
5) What is the recommended format. does LightShow Pi support flac files? What audio formats does it support? And what quality works best (kbps)? I have 320kbps files but that is way to low, that the background static makes the lights not flash close to the song.
6) The lights flash way fast, although not 100% necessary, or high priority: Is it possible to slow the flash a little bit? I have light_delay set to 0.69, in overrides.cfg, as recommended in one of Ken B’s videos, but it has hardly helped.
7) Is it possible to add new sms commands in the commands.py file, for the following functions: Play next song, play previous song, change playlist, stop flashing( Lights always on), resume flashing (Lights back on tune), Lights off (no flash, no light), start_music_and_lights, and stop_music_and_lights. I understand that some may not be possible, And that the sms only runs when start_music_and_lights is, so it would not be able to start them, but is it possible for sms to always be running?
8) Last question/issue: Is it possible to add 2 Relays? I have two 8 channels mechanical relays, pluged into pi via the 5 volt, and ground pins, however only one comes on, could this have to do with active_low_mode in overrides.cfg?
I understand if not all can be answered immediately, but hopefully can eventually, my priorities are numbers (1, 2, 3, 5, and 8). Thank you in advance.
Please visit https://www.reddit.com/r/LightShowPi/ for support.
Great software!. I have lot of fun with it.
But I have question – trivial I suppose.
How can I output music to bluetooth speaker? I have paired and working JBL – it works ok with browser etc but with Lightshowpi I have my audio outpun only on jack.
Please visit https://www.reddit.com/r/LightShowPi/ for support.
My 2+ running V1.2 of L/S died, so went to install V1.4 on a 3B+ following the directions on the web site. Running 9.11 Stretch with config of 20190423. Running hardware_controller and error of :
File “py/hardware_controller.py”, line 66 in
import wiringpipy as wiringpi
Import error:: lib/arm-linux-gnueabihf/libc.so.6: version ‘GLIBC_2.28’ not found
(required by /usr/lib/libwiringPi.so)
Did the installation miss a file?
Thanks
David
Please visit https://www.reddit.com/r/LightShowPi/ for support.
I am hoping to project a video on a window with the music. Are there any video files supported that lspi will detect and play as well as sync lights to music?
Please visit https://www.reddit.com/r/LightShowPi/ for support.
Loving this project but as a noob, I’d really appreciate some updated links now Google+ is dead. Is there a document describing the various programs, tools etc.?
Please visit https://www.reddit.com/r/LightShowPi/ for support.
I’m using a RPI 4 and when I install lightshowpi, it gives me this error code “Command “python setup.py egg_info” failed with error code 1 in /tmp/pip-install-dBLBAE/twython/.” Any help would greatly be appreciated . Thanks in advance!!!
please visit https://www.reddit.com/r/LightShowPi/ for support
Did you ever get this resolved?
The links at the beginning of this page use a numbical IP address instead of a domain name.
http://52.89.57.254/download-and-install/
http://52.89.57.254/configuring-and-testing-your-hardware/
etc.
So sorry about the broken links … and my email notifications had broken with them … all fixed now! Thanks for reporting the issue!
The link to download is:
http://52.89.57.254/download-and-install/
but it does not connect. Where can I get a copy of the latest version?
Sorry about the broken links – glad you found the Reddit page! I’ve since fixed the links and will also direct people to reddit as it is the most active now: https://www.reddit.com/r/LightShowPi
Never mind my last post. Instructions to download are on the reddit page under the “Latest Developments” sticky post.
You appear to have a configuration error as the url’s are pointing directly to the servers IP, rather then to the domain name causing by browser to time out wine following it.
Sorry about that – thanks for letting me know, fixed!
It appears that you have a configuration error as the links on this page are pointing to the server IP rather then to the domain name causing timeouts in my browser.
Thanks for pointing this out… fixed now!
hello, the download link is not working
hola, el enlace de descarga del programa no funciona
My apologies – many of the links had broken, finally got around to fix them. Check out the reddit page for the most active support/community! https://www.reddit.com/r/LightShowPi