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[GregWS]

FINAL EDIT: NO!!!  It's not what it seems, it's a hoax!

OK, this is just incredible!    EDIT: those animations aren't just in the video, the product actual makes them.  That is why it is awesome.





I'm not going to explain it, just watch the video.  It gets way better after a certain point.

I'm not sure if you can program your own animations yet; that would be the deal breaker for me.  This would be such a great thing to have in your living room!

Regrettably, it's only available in Japan right now, though someone's selling them for a very reasonable price on eBay.

EDIT AGAIN:

original article I'd found about it: http://gizmodo.com/5049940/bandais-luminodot-lite+brite-hd-for-big-kids
Japanese website (in Japanese, of course): http://www.luminodot.jp/

[Annabelle Kennedy]

just an upraded marketing campaign for..





this.

it doesnt animate like that its just a fancy commercial.

EDIT: i guess it uses a smaller 'grid' area, and its layed out in a true grid instead of a hexi-grid. pattern.  still.

[cyber95]

LITE BRITE RIPOFF!

I used to love Lite Brite.

The advantage I can see to this, though, is the fact that the pegs aren't diagonal from each other, but horizontal and vertical.

[Tobasco Panda]

Yeah Anna got what I was going to say first, but cheers to cyber95 for noticing that essential difference.

[Annabelle Kennedy]

lite bright hd turbo remix

http://gizmodo.com/5049940/bandais-luminodot-lite+brite-hd-for-big-kids

EDIT: it does say it has a 'programmable backlight animation function' but what does that mean?? theyre colored pegs.

[cyber95]

MUST IMPORT!

[GregWS]

From what I can gather the backlights are coloured too (in some way) so that you don't need the pegs to make the animations.  I'd heard about it myself from that article you'd just linked, and I should have linked to it myself.  I'll update the first post with it.

[Farbs]

I couldn't find any animation controls on the flash simulator:
http://www.luminodot.jp/simulator/simulator.html

The big horizontal buttons seem to start the simulator in landscape or portrait.

[GregWS]

Yeah, I'm not sure if those are just the pre-created animations, and you're only able to create your own patterns to show (but not animations).  If that is the case, then I would be disappointed.

Now that said, if this thing becomes popular I'm sure someone will hack it, and then maybe games could be played on it!  Some of those Gamma 256 entries would look pretty sweet on this thing!

[neon]

maybe games could be played on it!

holy fuck.  yes.

[Annabelle Kennedy]

ahh i figured it out.. the lights arent individually colored...

any screenshots showing the lights colored, is a trick.. because.. just look at this link

http://www.luminodot.jp/howto/

you print out your 'pattern' off of the website and then you put it into the luminodot thing, and then you trace it, because you can see the colors because paper is translucent when you put it over a light.. ):

which basically means games hacked to use this thing.. would have to be monochromatic. really. ):

still a fun looking thing though

[GregWS]

Damn!  That's what I was worried about!

Ah well, now I think someone (who knows more about electronics than me) must create a super low-res game screen.  Is it even possible to create lights that change colours quickly?  Maybe it would even have a couple of buttons on it.  For games.

Well, at least I was inspired by this product...

[Ivan]

When If I ever I start a religion, my cathedral walls will be Luminodots with pixels commissioned from Annabelle.

[Farbs]

I think the paper is just a reference guide. Check out the top movie here:
http://www.luminodot.jp/movie/index.html#movieExplain

At ~42s you see a big pile of coloured pegs
At ~52s it looks like the person actually perforates the paper to stick the peg in place

I still have NFI how it's supposed to animate.

[Annabelle Kennedy]

its been solved.. the paper is a reference.. the 'animations' are pre defined and are just sort of like different 'screen wipes'  there are no user created animations ):

[neon]

yeah, i had high hopes initially but now ANNABELLE had to dash them all.   :D

[GregWS]

Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure I could create a sweet game in the "graphical style" of this.

It might be a much cooler way to have a low resolution game (though I guess it technically wouldn't be low resolution anymore) than the traditional giant square pixel approach.

EDIT: if anyone else wants to try this, they can too; mockups would be cool as well

[Türbo Bröther]

Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure I could create a sweet game in the "graphical style" of this.

This should be the next TIGCompo.

[agj]

Ah well, fellows. On the brighter side, I found this from that other video:





Infinite bubblewrap!

But seriously. For those who want an actually programmable super low-res 'dot matrix', I remember this small wooden box covered by square buttons, each of which was pressable and could lit up. I can't remember the name of this thing, though...

[deadeye]

If anybody is really interested in making their own LED animation boards, you can pick up kits online.  I read somewhere about someone making their own board that loaded animated .gif images, but I can't seem to find the site now.