LightStick V2 (Raspberry Pi Pico)

Abstract

As digital camera technology advances, more and more people are interested in photography. Light painting is an of the example of one of the most common photography techniques nowadays. Light painting is a photographic technique that uses moving portable light source to create a light effect image when taking a long exposure photograph in a dark environment with a Digital Single-Lens Reflex Camera (DSLR) or even a mobile phone’s camera. It can be achieved by adjusting the camera setting such as the shuttle speed, iso, and aperture. There are many light sources to create a light painting photograph such as flashlight, light painting brushes or any tools that can display light.

The common way of light painting is to use a portable light source to draw the pattern when taking a long exposure photograph. However, this conventional way of light painting is very tedious as the photographer must follow a certain way of drawing with the light source to create the ideal image, one wrong movement will produce the unwanted outcome.

In this FYP, the author will explore ways on building a lightweight, portable, and affordable light painting tool, LightStickV2, to provide photographers with more convenient way to light painting photography. This project integrates different components such as Raspberry Pi Pico, programmable light-emitting diode (LED) strip, microSD card reader, buzzer and accelerometer and gyroscope sensor to develop LightStickV2.