Lumen's Development
Feel free to skip around if it sounds like I'm yapping :)
A Word about WLED
We’ve used WLED since 2020, and fell in love with the library, started by Christian Schwinne and developed further by the open source community.
Being used to the shitty infrared controllers with remotes, it felt like Christmas had come early when we now had the freedom to control individual pixels, and WLED allowed our imagination to run wild.
100+ effects in whatever colors you like, segments, timed presets, and an HTTP API. This meant huge potential for a nerd like me.
With just a bit of additional programming, I even used WLED as a base to create this gift for a pilot buddy of mine which displays weather data from the airports closest to him.
Little Showcase
With the ability for segments containing different effects on the same strip, and timed presets, all it took was a little creativity, and this little ESP32 chip automatically drove our 1000+ LEDs, automatically switching on at sunset and switching off at midnight, with whatever holiday preset we had created beforehand.
WLED vs. Grandma
With this newfound love for WLED, we thought it would make for a great gift for our family. Grandma got a little kitchen makeover, but it was instantly clear she didn’t want to do any fiddling with apps or webpages.
Unfortunately we didn’t have a soldering iron at grandma’s, so she is stuck plugging in and unplugging the USB cable into the wall. Not ideal.
WLED's Weaknesses
Despite how in love I was with WLED, this interaction with grandma made me realize just how much technical knowledge is required to capitalize on WLED’s extraordinary features.
After some deliberation, my brother and I had come up with major pain points and ideas to expand on WLED and its ecosystem.
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Setup requires technical knowledge - flashing via webpage, assembling and soldering is all great, and even fun for those of us who are electronic hobbyists and engineers, but most likely not possible for the layman, who may still want to use WLED’s creative capabilities.
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The web interface is slow - Some chips, particularly one ESP8266 with a few walls between the nearest router satellite, would load the webpage after 20 seconds or more, which made quickly switching presets a pain. Potential fix: There is a free app called WLED+ on the iOS App Store which interfaces directly using API commands, without loading the WLED webpage, so it is much faster. An app using API calls is also our solution, touched more on later.
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Preset creation has too much friction - Presets are exciting when on display, but the segment setup feels clunky, and it’s hard to know what effects could look good at a glance. I have found myself procrastinating on my holiday presets before, and my family doesn’t even know where to begin to express creativity through WLED.
Our ideas led to a solution for something which could expand WLED’s exciting features to a new audience of less technically-adept people.
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Pre-assembled ESP32-S3 controllers
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Pre-assembly means people don’t require a soldering iron or manual flashing.
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The ESP32-S3 has powerful hardware, fast enough for 60 FPS on 1000+ LEDs.
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Bluetooth Low Energy and ESP-NOW provides a more robust connection and simplifies WiFi setup (No need to connect to WLED-AP)
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Hardware accelerated encryption for HTTPS requests - more on that later
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Community Effects Database - Browse and view good-looking effects created by others easily at a glance.
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Online Features - HTTPS opens up the doors to the internet- we can now connect to APIs including LIVE football goals, syncing across different WiFi networks, and automating holiday presets for grandma.
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Physical Remote - The phone is handy, but having a physical remote to control lights is much less friction. Most houses have light switches on the wall, and this remote can be stuck to a magnetic surface. An ESP-NOW remote is a cost-effective and low power draw solution to make WLED easier to control.
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App - The Lumen app is being developed with simplicity in mind, keeping the most powerful WLED features as accessible as possible
Concept art for extending access to a friend
Business Model
Lumen is intended to be a profitable business, therefore the price of the controllers would be around $40 USD, plus $5 for an ESP-NOW remote, and we plan to resell WS2812B LED strips which we buy in bulk at a fair price (as of now around $25 for a roll of 5m, 60 LED/m, IP65) in order to reduce shipping costs/ environmental impact and have everything available in one place.
We have an emphasis on making this enjoyable and introducing a social aspect. Syncing your own LEDs with friends, messing about with each other’s effects, sharing custom presets, and giving access to your device via a sharable unique link. Our goal is to grow due to the pleasure people express to their friends about our product over traditional advertising, because organic growth is more robust and ads are annoying.
* Since none of this is possible without the WLED project, 10% of profits are donated directly to Aircookie via the donate page on the WLED GitHub as thanks.
Share your Thoughts
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WLED feels too complicated, too much friction.
I feel a better user experience is valuable.
The presets Database would be valuable to offer to the WLED community via a publicly facing website.
This is something I'd consider buying as a gift for someone less tech savvy.
Any other thoughts/ concerns? Feedback is more valuable to us than sales right now!