If you made it this far, you have all the tools necessary to start exploring the creative possibilities of programmable LED lighting.

There's more documentation on the Fadecandy project available in its GitHub repository:

• Introduction
• Processing OPC client
• Server configuration
• Open Pixel Control protocol
• WebSocket protocol

Where else is there to go from here?

• Try more examples.
• Modify examples designed for other LED configurations so they work with yours.
• Design interesting shapes and find new materials for the light to interact with.
• Try using more lights. One Fadecandy board can control up to 512 pixels, and you can connect many Fadecandy boards to one computer using USB hubs.
• Make your art portable with a Raspberry Pi or other single-board computer.
• And of course, writing more visual effects.

There are also many different strategies for writing effects. This example covered using Processing and mapping each LED to a pixel on the screen, but there are plenty of other options. The Fadecandy project already has examples for browser-based effects, Node.js, and Python, and it's easy to add support for new languages.

What about pixel mapping? It works for some kinds of art, but other kinds of art may be easier with a 3-dimensional mapping or something custom. Work is in progress to make more kinds of LED mappings easy, and to support automatic mapping using computer vision.

If you're interested in contributing to the Fadecandy project, check out these resources:

• Discussion group
• GitHub page
• Introduction blog post

Thanks for participating!