cosmicspace
09-16-2011, 01:50 PM
Hey all. I'm not sure if this is the right place for this post and this may be been discussed here previously but, my search skills didn't find anything. However, there's a LOT of stuff on this board, much to my glee! :) Also, if you don't want to read through the thought process for how I got to asking this question, just skip to the CONCLUSION part below. (I can be a little wordy at times.)
I was pondering a post by a new MHS builder on how he decided not to put sound, motion effects, etc. into a MHS build he did since he wasn't confident in his soldering skills, the extra electronics would drain the battery faster, the sound wasn't necessary for his usage and that the swing sensor was too sensitive.
All of these are very valid reasons for his build and show he was doing a great deal of thinking in his design. However, the last reason stuck with me. Sleeping on it, I got to thinking about the motion and clash sensor and how if there was an accelerometer in the hilt, that maybe the sensitivity could be adjusted. (After more research, I learned that the swing sensor is, in essence, an accelerometer, albeit one that is used rather digitally.)
But then I thought it could be customized to raise in pitch with the speed of the swing dynamically. This, of course, would necessitate a change in how sound fonts are stored and played since static sounds for swings wouldn't be appropriate any more; they would need to be more algorithmic in nature with a modifier for swing speed would need to be incorporated.
This led to a thought train of acceleromoters and how they are used which the items that came to mind are smartphones such as Motorola's various Droids (coincidentally, the name is licensed from LucasFilms) and Wii Remotes.
CONCLUSION: Wii remotes have an accelerometer, a soundboard, a speaker, a battery pack, an led emitter (well, infrared)...wait, that IS a LED lightsaber! This can't be a new idea. Has anyone considered or tried gutting a Wii remote and sticking the electronics into a lightsaber hilt? Some modifications would be required of course since I doubt the Wii remote is giving enough power to light up a full lightsaber blade even with the LED replaced.
Bear in mind that a great deal of this post is me thinking through the keyboard so some, or even many or all of these ideas might not be feasible, desirable or even possible.
I was pondering a post by a new MHS builder on how he decided not to put sound, motion effects, etc. into a MHS build he did since he wasn't confident in his soldering skills, the extra electronics would drain the battery faster, the sound wasn't necessary for his usage and that the swing sensor was too sensitive.
All of these are very valid reasons for his build and show he was doing a great deal of thinking in his design. However, the last reason stuck with me. Sleeping on it, I got to thinking about the motion and clash sensor and how if there was an accelerometer in the hilt, that maybe the sensitivity could be adjusted. (After more research, I learned that the swing sensor is, in essence, an accelerometer, albeit one that is used rather digitally.)
But then I thought it could be customized to raise in pitch with the speed of the swing dynamically. This, of course, would necessitate a change in how sound fonts are stored and played since static sounds for swings wouldn't be appropriate any more; they would need to be more algorithmic in nature with a modifier for swing speed would need to be incorporated.
This led to a thought train of acceleromoters and how they are used which the items that came to mind are smartphones such as Motorola's various Droids (coincidentally, the name is licensed from LucasFilms) and Wii Remotes.
CONCLUSION: Wii remotes have an accelerometer, a soundboard, a speaker, a battery pack, an led emitter (well, infrared)...wait, that IS a LED lightsaber! This can't be a new idea. Has anyone considered or tried gutting a Wii remote and sticking the electronics into a lightsaber hilt? Some modifications would be required of course since I doubt the Wii remote is giving enough power to light up a full lightsaber blade even with the LED replaced.
Bear in mind that a great deal of this post is me thinking through the keyboard so some, or even many or all of these ideas might not be feasible, desirable or even possible.