I don't think the self-running-program feature of the BlinkM's would help you here. Each BlinkM runs by itself. To get your synchronized fade effect, you would have to program a different profile into each LED, then start them all at the same time. It would be very difficult to get the effect just right.
You could control the BlinkMs individually, but at that point you're doing the same thing the ShiftBrite does, where each LED color setting is controlled by the main controller.
To be honest, if I were doing the same project I would probably not use ShiftBrites, since you only need red. But if you plan to have other color options, ShiftBrites would work well. Otherwise I would look at the TLC5940 or TLC5947 chips to control all the red LEDs.
If you decide to use ShiftBrites, let me know, and I can help you get your code running.
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I don't think the
I don't think the self-running-program feature of the BlinkM's would help you here. Each BlinkM runs by itself. To get your synchronized fade effect, you would have to program a different profile into each LED, then start them all at the same time. It would be very difficult to get the effect just right.
You could control the BlinkMs individually, but at that point you're doing the same thing the ShiftBrite does, where each LED color setting is controlled by the main controller.
To be honest, if I were doing the same project I would probably not use ShiftBrites, since you only need red. But if you plan to have other color options, ShiftBrites would work well. Otherwise I would look at the TLC5940 or TLC5947 chips to control all the red LEDs.
If you decide to use ShiftBrites, let me know, and I can help you get your code running.