DIY Aperture MC MINI

Aperture MC Mini is a really tiny, portable and useful piece of RGB light that can be really handy during filming/photography or product shoots, but it costs more than my budget could permit, so here I will show you how I made the light and it is soo awesome and cool!

Let's get started.

Step 1: Ingredients

1.) NodeMCU

2.)Micro USB cable

3.)Wires for connection

4.)Logic Level Shifter

5.)(Optional)3D pointed enclosures for the neopixel matrix and NodeMCU

6.)8x8 Neopixel Matrix.

7.)Soldering iron and soldering wire.

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Step 2: Connections

The connections are pretty easy and straightforward, follow the picture.

And one tip, the neopixels from china are clones of original WS2812B, but we wouldn't even notice because they work exactly the same, or even better sometimes!

So, according to the type of clone you have you might not need to use the logic level converter, that is, the neopixels you have could accept 3.3v logic level, mine did not so I had to use logic level converter.

Step 3: Enclosures

As mentioned before, these are optional, but because I had a 3D printer, I thought why not print some enclosures to look cool!

Following are the links where you can find the things:

3D Printed Enclosure of NodeMCU : https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2850128 3D Printed Enclosure of NeoPixel Matrix: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4575554

3D Printed Matrix: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:655425

Step 4: Arduino IDE Setup

Open the Arduino IDE, go to file and then preferences, there you will see "Additional Board Manager URL" there you should paste this link : http://arduino.esp8266.com/stable/package_esp8266c...

Then, open the boards manager, search, ESP8266, install the board.

Now in Tools->Boards select NodeMCU 1.0

Step 5: Blynk

Install the Blynk app in your phone, Sign UP, create a new project, name it, and then you will receive an Authentication Token on your email, copy it.

Download the final code from this GitHub repo:https://github.com/10ishq/DIY-Arpature-MC-Mini

Now inside the sketch, you will see a place to put Authentication token, SSID, and Password of your Wifi in one line.

Fill up the information and then upload the code.

Inside the project in the Blynk app, click on the "+" button on top, you will see various options, on of them will be a colorful Zeebra, select it, tap on it, the settings will open, slide the slider to "Merge" and select the virtual pin to "2".

That is it! Click on the play button and you can now change the color of your matrix wirelessly with your phone.

Now, you can add Diffuser if you want, that is a blank white paper works well.

Thanks for reading.