COUNTDOWN TO PROFFIEOS7 (2024)

Since ProffieOS adds new features, styles and capabilities on an almost daily basis it can be hard even for the most seasoned user to keep up. Whether you're a longtime user, new user, or someone just researching or looking casually - ProffieOS7 is going to make Proffieboard unlike any other lightsaber sound board out there. If you aren't sure which board features the most advanced, cutting edge capabilities read through everything on this page and put a checklist together of the options you want and go ask if other boards can offer anything like it, then choose the board that is best for you and enjoy!

NOTE: ProffieOS7 will run on Teensy V3, Proffieboard v1.5, Proffieboard v2.2 or Proffieboard v3.7

Any questions should be posted to theCrucible so they are documented for all users.

Huge "Thank You" to Fredrik for his continued support and genius in bringing our sabers to a level never seen before! My crazy ideas would never translate to features without his OS and openness to creativey and collaboration.

For those who've been unsure ProffieOS7 is for Proffieboard v1.5, v2.2 and when it releases v3.7 boards.

COUNTDOWN TO PROFFIEOS7

All New Visual Effect > Sound Effect Synergy

Style Controlled Sounds (Alt Font)

ProffieOS7 will introduce a whole new synergy between styles (visual effects) and fonts (sound effects). Alt Fonts allow for real-time changes in any and all font sounds controlled by the style without needing to change presets or reload the font. This allows for a whole new level of interaction and realism in your blade and sound effects.

NEW! Transition Sounds

ProffieOS7 introduces multiple new features and capabilities that will allow us to build "video game" type interaction and effects right on our saber. And the best part it's all done via the style code, which means you can load up multiple "games" in different presets alongside all of your normal saber presets to get even more out of your saber.

In this example I've combined the Interactive controls with the ability for style code to control sounds and our new transition sound effect capabilities for this simple demo. All of the code needed to create the "game" is in the style code, then you just need to set your font up to support and you're off and running. As you turn the hilt you can bring the two "sparks" together and as soon as they join the resulting explosion can be seen and heard on your saber. The sound effect and visual effect are directly tied in the style code, so now your visual effects can have matching sound effects that are always in synch. Add in the interactive capabilities and we can now create so many unique experiences on your saber. This is just a quick example, the possibilities are truly endless.

NEW! "Special Abilities" (Fett263 Prop)

I am expanding the "Special Abilities" in my prop to allow for even more customization at the style level. This will allow you to set up completely different experiences in each preset and be able to fully show off ALL of the functionality Proffieboard offers. Instead of being locked in to the same controls and features for each preset you can now have each preset act like it's own unique "video game" with completely different interactions, controls and experiences. You can mix and match the features you want and omit the ones you don't. And the expanded features allow you do even more in each preset than ever before.

Through my prop file I am introducing new "special abilities" which you can add for each preset. This example is based on The Last Air Bender and features 4 unique blades in one: Air, Fire, Water and Earth. Using the new synergy between style code, fonts and controls you can select any of the 4 "Bending" abilities on demand. When I want to use my Fire blade I can trigger the change immediately and both the sounds and visual effects will take over. This is all done in the preset and is different from the past ColorChange or Multi-Phase capabilities.

In addition, these expanded capabilities can be used together with all of the new functionality to make your saber truly yours and make every preset feel like a brand new saber and experience each time you pick it up. With the new style and "alt font" capabilities we can now recreate the Fallen Order type Kyber Crystal selection from the game in real-time on your saber in a single preset. This uses the ColorSelect capability in addition to multiple new functions, however, the previous methods for ColorSelect only allowed you to advance forward. I have added a new function and control in my prop to allow you to also go in reverse. Now you can set up different blade colors with unique sounds (via alt font) and scroll through them in real-time forward and reverse without changing presets or re-initializing the blade. Giving you many "blades" in a single preset.

NEW! Blade "States" (Fett263 Prop)

Combining "Special Abilities" with several new features in prop we are now able to have on-demand control over various "states" on our saber. In the past, if you wanted to recreate a "rain" blade you would need a separate preset or a timed effect but you could never have full control over it. Now, with the new "States" abilities we're able to activate and deactivate a looped rain sound effect (new transition sound capability) and the visual effects to have an on-demand rain blade. This capability can be expanded to many uses and you can set up multiple "states" in your preset with unique "Special Ability" controls. The rain effect is only the first example, I have many more planned...

NEW! Quote Capabilities (Fett263 Prop)

In OS6 I originally added quote support to my prop sharing the control with Force using a toggle, for OS7 I am giving users the ability to set up Quotes multiple ways with custom controls. You can choose to have quotes play randomly in one preset using any of the "Special Ability" controls and then in another preset you can have the quotes play sequentially. Or if you're the type of person who doesn't want or use quotes, you can now set up other capabilities in your presets -or- you can set up a preset that uses all of the quote functionality and others that don't and have the best of both worlds.

And now in OS7 using a combination of the new font capabilities and "Special Abilities" controls you can now set up quotes into groups by mood, situation, character, etc. and have your saber act like a mini-"micom" by setting up controls for each group but still have it randomly select the actual quote. This allows a whole new level of interaction and control over the quotes and lets you set up situations or conversations that you can control all in your font and then control them your way in the style code. You can also now "script" scenes in your presets using a combination of the chained effects and "special abilities" controls (combined with set up in the font to support) to recreate your favorite interactions from the screen or video games.

Up to 5 Individual On Demand Ignition Effects (Fett263 Prop)

With ProffieOS we can have so many ignition possibilities why opt for just one? Now using the 4 new OFF "Special Abilities" plus your base ignition you can set up to 5 unique ignition effects with unique sounds that you can use on-demand. In addition, with our new "Chained" effect capabilities we can also build out "scripted" ignitions that can use quotes or your default track as a special "preon" (in addition to normal or interactive preon effect).

"Chained" Effects

In OS7 styles can now "chain" effects or contain "conditional" effects that add more immersion and control to everything happening on your saber.

Interactive Blast Deflection

Here's another proof of concept demo for OS7, this utilizes two new capabilities to make your saber even more interactive and bring even more realism to the experience. For those you like to have the Blaster sound separate from the Deflection sound, I've combined that approach with a "game" feel using two new capabilities (the naming may change as we move through development); Conditional Effects and Chained Effects.

Conditional Effects take the interactive concept from OS6 and up the ante tenfold to create effects that you can choose to engage with or not. In this application, there is now a separate Blaster sound (a new sound for your font) to represent the shot being fired. After the Blaster shot sound plays you have a very short period of time to react to the shot, if you move your saber quickly it will them deflect the bolt and you'll here the deflection and see the effect on the blade. If you choose not to react (for example just step out of the way or dodge the bolt) there will be no deflection sound or effect on the blade. This adds to the realism as Jedi don't have to block every incoming shot. So now you can choose how to react to the Blaster shots.

In addition, we can also not chain effects and when we combine the conditional effect with a chain we can have several effects occur based on the condition. In these examples, if you deflect it will then chain another Blaster sound and that sound will then reactivate the conditional effect for you to deflect. If you deflect it can then repeat so triggering 1 blaster shot will then let you actually generate multiple blasts without needing to keep hitting the button. In the first preset I set up the chain to a max of 3 Blaster sounds but it's completely editable so you can have as many links in the chain as you want. In the second preset I set the chain up to be random so that I won't actually know how many Blaster shots will be fired and I can choose to react to each as I want. This adds even more realism as you wouldn't really know how many shots are being fired at you.

This was a very simple demo, the possibilities with these new capabilities are nearly endless as we'll be able to build a number of conditional effects and chains into styles to make them feel more and more like fully immersive video games. No more boring button click, block, button click, block. Now you can set the style and font up so you have to really react to an unknown number of blaster shots and then deflect them or dodge them.

There's so much more coming, this is still a teeny, tiny piece of the new capabilities so stay tuned!

More information = https://crucible.hubbe.net/t/proffieos7-proof-of-concept-interactive-blaster-deflection/2128

Interactive Preon Effects

This is a quick demo of a brand new feature/effect I'm working on for ProffieOS7. It's been just over 2-1/2 years since we introduced visual Preon effects (OS4 - video here: https://youtu.be/jz7HhsmLa1o) and now we've seen all kinds of variations of animations and sounds be developed. The only drawback, particularly for longer, drawn out preons, is "waiting" for your saber to ignite. It's fun to have a sparking preon, like your saber's a little faulty, but those are typically just long animations that have to run out before the saber ignites. Now with Interactive Preons, you can set the effect up to respond in real-time to any interactive control.

This demo is a faulty ignition, but just like when Han Solo smacked the Falcon, you can give your saber a smack (or in this version a quick twist) to get it to ignite and cut the preon effect short. With this style, if you just ignite and leave the saber be it will sputter 4 times before finally igniting, however, at any time during the preon, you can give it a hit or a quick twist in one direction (new Interactive control) and it will ignite immediately and interrupt the preon effect. This allows for a far more immersive and realistic feel from your saber.

The best part, everything is controlled by the style itself, which can now interact with the prop, allowing for each style to have it's own unique controls. You can set up different presets to run with different interactive controls for preons or other effects and have multiple unique experiences on a single saber (more on that in future videos ;-)

This is just one example, we can build these new effects to respond to any of the interactive controls we want and we can have them run completely different in every preset. We can also create a preon that acts like a "security" feature. Where the saber won't unlock unless you do a certain interactive step within a set amount of time from pushing the button. If you fail to unlock the saber it will not ignite, and there's a ton more uses.

And the Interactive Preons is just one small new feature coming in OS7, I'm working with Fredrik on some really big, game-changing features and capabilities, but those are for another video, so stay tuned...

Style-Based Interactive Mini Games

There's still a lot in development but OS7 is going to introduce a whole new level of interactive capabilities and integration between fonts (sounds) and styles (VFX) and while working on those I had a "crazy" idea to put some of these features together into a style-based "mini game". I had picked up Jesse's (KyberPhonics) "ANH Training" font a while back and it got me thinking, why not recreate Luke's first training experience as an interactive game. Jesse helped me out by providing some additional sounds to flesh out the concept that weren't in the original font, but the combination of some new font capabilities with the new interactive effects and functions allowed me to build a new style-based "mini game".

This game is actually just a layer in the style so it can be added to any style and modified to make it easier or harder or to have different scoring, controls and outcomes all within the style itself. I based this one on the scene in ANH when Luke is first doing the training remote, to win you simply have to get 3 deflections before you get 3 "strikes". To recreate having the "blast shield down" the game is based solely on sounds. You have to differentiate the "hissing" sound from the remote moving from the "blast" sound of it firing and then react by quickly moving your saber to deflect. The game is based on reaction time, if you're too slow to react or don't move the saber quickly enough after the blast sound plays you'll hear a "grunt" and your saber will turn red to indicate a "strike", then Obi Wan will provide some words encouragement and the remote will move again, the hissing sound is random with some short movements, some longer movements and some double movements, then once it fires you have to immediately react with a quick movement of your blade. If you react too soon or too late you'll miss and if you get 3 strikes you "lose" (but you can try again as often as you like to get better and improve your reaction time).

If you successfully block a blast, you'll see the deflection on the saber (like a normal blast effect) but don't get too happy - a successful block will be followed immediately by another remote movement so you have to ready yourself to block again, if you get 3 successful blocks before your 3rd strike you'll win and unlock a new blade style signifying a stronger connection to the Force. This mini game itself is just an initial "proof of concept" of what's can be done with the new capabilities, more complex games are entirely possible and each would be specifically built to line up with a specific fonts or sounds. The set up will only require a font built to match the game and the style code to run it. And the entire "mini game" concept itself is really just a tiny piece of what's in the works for OS7. We'll be taking fonts, styles and effects to a whole new level with what's coming ;-)

More Info = https://crucible.hubbe.net/t/proffieos7-proof-of-concept-anh-training-remote-mini-game/2117

New Features for Staff (Double Bladed Sabers) running on 1 Board

I have the initial proof of concept built out for handling a secondary blade on a staff saber like Darth Maul or the Inquisitors. If you want to run two physical blades from a single Proffieboard these new Secondary Ignition/Retraction Effects and the new Conditional Effects will allow you to gain independent control over each. To start, in your presets you will set up one blade as the Primary blade (this will work just like a single bladed saber) in the style code, then you will set up the "other" blade as a Secondary blade in the style code. This will allow you to have a separate ignition and retraction for the Secondary blade that you can control in several ways.

The way it will work is your Primary blade will control if the saber is ON or OFF through normal button/gesture controls. After igniting the Primary Blade you can then set up the Ignition and Retraction for the Secondary blade, meaning you can ignite and retract the secondary blade as long as the Primary blade is ON. If you retract the Primary Blade through normal controls this will also retract the Secondary blade and turn the saber OFF. The Secondary Retraction only runs while the blade is ON and only retracts the secondary blade.

The Secondary Ignition/Retraction use the existing out.wav and in.wav sounds for your font but play them independently from the Primary allowing you to get the sounds to match. There are a few ways the Secondary Ignition/Retraction can be controlled.- a 3rd Button (easiest will be addition of a 3rd button to the saber)- a new button control for 2 button sabers (1 button may not be possible without someone removing a feature and modding the prop on their own unfortunately) - TBD- a separate Conditional Effect - in the demo I set up a Conditional Ignition effect on the Primary Blade, if the blade is held parallel at the moment of Ignition, the Secondary Ignition will trigger once the primary blade finishes igniting we can add a delay to this as well, a la Darth Maul in TPM. We can actually set many different Conditional Effects and have different ones in each preset if we wanted.

Accelerating / Decelerating Ignition and Retraction Effects

Here's a quick demo of new Ignition/Retraction effects for a future update that will let you have your blade accelerate or decelerate as it extends and retracts. As opposed to the "fixed" speed application of effects like Trigger, this is a new Transition Effect that will let you set the time and a bend value to then have the ignition and retraction either start out fast and decelerate or start out slow and accelerate. On top of that you can actually set the bend value to make the difference in the starting and ending speed be larger or smaller creating either subtle changes or really dramatic changes in speed for the effects.

I've added a SparkTip version now and just like yesterday's version the new transitions will allow you to set up Ignition and Retraction effects that either begin slowly and then accelerate or begin quickly and decelerate over the ignition or retraction time. There were a few questions about the demo from yesterday (https://youtu.be/INkuR66y9P8) so I figured I'd show the transitions using WavLen to auto time to the in and out sounds from a couple of fonts. In addition to being able to set the ignition and retraction time or using WavLen you can also dramatically change the behavior by adjusting the "Bend" value in the transition so you can have a very subtle change in acceleration/deceleration all the way up to a really dramatic change based on the effect you're wanting. This is still just a demo of the effects, there is a ton of possibilities as these are new transition effects so they can be used for any effect you want beyond just ignition and retraction and you'll be able to fully customize the spark color, timings, bend value and how you use it.

"Quick Select" Preset Controls

Here's a sneak peek of a new feature coming to my prop in OS7. There are two parts to this capability, the first is a new control which allows you quickly ignite your preset right from the Select Preset menu. While in the Select Preset menu you are able to use the hilt like a dial to rotate through all of your presets, when you get to the desired preset you can now hold the PWR button to both select and ignite that preset. This allows you to quickly rotate through all your presets and ignite with a single button hold.

The second capability will be enabled via a define FETT263_QUICK_SELECT_ON_BOOT, and will boot your saber in the preset select mode so that you can immediately rotate to any preset and then either select it by clicking PWR or select and ignite by holding PWR. This feature is on boot only, so the first time you apply power to your board, via kill switch, kill key or inserting the battery the saber boots up in the selection mode to make it very easy to select your desired preset. After you've selected your preset on boot, the saber returns to normal operation until you boot again, but you can always use the normal Select Preset controls.

Circular Volume Menu and Visual Volume Options

I believe Brian showed this, Fredrik had suggested including a VolumeLevel function to make volume settings available for styles. In OS7 I have added a new "circular" menu as an option for Edit Volume, this will allow you to continuously turn the dial instead of stopping at min/max. You can now combine either the old or new volume menu with a visual effect if you want by adding EFFECT_VOLUME_LEVEL to your style.

NEW! Clash Detection and Settings (defines)

Fredrik has improved clash detection for OS7 (particularly for specific sabers that had issues with false clashes) and there are now even more settings and defines to further fine-tune your saber to get it "just right".

Easily Update Your Proffieboard with New Config Helper Tool!

I've added a bunch more functionality to the Config Helper Tool to make customizing and updating your Proffieboard even easier.In addition, to walking through every define and option for our board and simplifying the Presets set up, v1.5 will now compile your config for use in Fredrik's Web Programmer tool which allows you to Program your Proffieboard without Arduino (or you can generate a full config and upload through Arduino for those who prefer).

The Config Tool now also produces customized documentation based on your selections:

• Style Options you've selected from the Library for editing and use.
• Buttons and Controls based on the prop and defines
• Supported Sound Files

This will allow you to fully customize your saber AND get a custom "user manual" all in one place.

Deep Sleep Options

For those without a sense of humor, this is a "tongue-in-cheek" look at how to enable "Deep Sleep" options for your Proffieboard.

In reality, while Proffieboard v1.5 or 2.2 boards do not have a dedicated deep sleep mode, enabled IDLE_OFF_TIME (if you have accents or crystals) and ensuring peripherals like OLED or BT are properly wired per the manual, the "standby" time for Proffieboard is ~6 months. Given the run-time of 18650 batteries, a good install of a neopixel saber should have a removable battery, or killswitch or both. All of which allow for infinite "standby time". So when someone asks about "Deep Sleep" for Proffieboard, ask them if they understand how to actually install a Proffieboard saber ;-)

Style Library - Unlimited FREE Styles - All New Blade Builder and the Next Level of Customization!

For OS6 I completely rebuilt the Style Library to give an unprecedented level of customization. The library contains over a million unique effect options and combinations. You can now create the most complex and advanced blade styles quickly and easily and automatically include the necessary pieces to fully edit every style and see and play with your creation in real-time before even uploading to your saber.

ProffieOS6 is going to introduce so many new style capabilities with all of the new functions, transitions and style modifier capabilities that I wanted to give a glimpse into the level of detail we'll be able to put into styles.

This is a new "Water Blade" style that I put together to showcase some of what is now possible.

The "water" on this blade will flow based on gravity and slope, when your blade is pointing straight up it will flow towards the hilt very fast but as you move the blade towards parallel it will slow and level off. Then if you point down the water will start to "pour" out of the hilt towards the ground picking up speed the further you tip it. In addition, the ignition and retraction effects not only react to the angle of the blade with straight up or down being the fastest and parallel being the slowest but the direction of the transition will also follow gravity. If you're pointing up the blade ignites from the tip to the hilt and retracts in the same direction but if you're tipping down it will pour out from the hilt to the tip.

But to take it to another level the "water" flow also reacts to inertia, if you swing hard enough you can reverse the flow of water up the blade to fight gravity for a little while until gravity ultimately takes back over. The speed and amount of the flow up the blade fighting gravity will be based on how fast you swing the blade up, so really fast swings upward will let you reverse the flow for a longer period than slower swings. This also applies to the ignition effect, if you use Swing On and swing fast enough you can reverse the flow of water up the blade and have the ignition come from the hilt when pointing up.

Finally, I've added a new clash ripple effect that reacts to how hard the blade is clashed, with light hits producing a small quick ripple in the water and harder hits producing much larger ripples overs a bigger area for a longer time, the intensity of the ripples dissipate over time just like the surface of water adding another layer realism to the effect. And this is only the "tip of the iceberg" of what's possible. ProffieOS6 will take effects to a whole new level and make things possible nobody had considered before, just wait...

Style Modifiers

The idea behind them is like the "tool kit" in a graphics program where you can take an initial image (in this case a blade style) and then do all kinds of modifications to it to create even more unique and custom effects. This is only the "tip of the iceberg" on what's possible but here's a few of the new modifiers:

• Gradient Bump and SmoothStep
  • Think of these as a "Radial Gradient" or "Linear Gradient" tool in Photoshop. In OS 5 we were able to create faux gradients by layering multiple bumps or smoothsteps of varying sizes on top of each other, now we can achieve an even better gradient effect using the new functions in a single layer. Imagine the possibilities for clash, lockup, melt, lightning block and blast effects (wink, wink).
• Compress
  • Take your full blade style and "Compress" it to create all kinds of unique effect.
• MirrorOut
  • This function allows you to choose a center point (which can be fully responsive) and have the blade effect mirror itself out from the center. In OS 5 we were able to do a similar effect with Mix or multiple Layers but the styles (particularly Fire or Gradients) were off-center as they actually ran from the ends. With the MirrorOut function the style effects are actually generated from the Center.
• MirrorIn
  • The inverse of MirrorOut, this function will mirror your effect from the tip or hilt to the center (which can be fully responsive).
• Invert
  • And of course, we can Invert any style to have your tip and hilt trade places for styles, enabling a true Reverse Fire effect And the absolute beauty of these new functions is you can combine multiple functions to further enhance and customize your styles. The infinite possibilities for styles just got multiplied by your imagination.

New CenterWipe CenterWipeIn Transition Effects

In the past we've had "Center Out", "Center In" Ignition and Retraction effects that were created by Joining a Wipe and a Wipe In. This resulted in a decent effect but there were some limitations with this method. There was an inherent visual "lag" in the effect because one transition was obscuring the other for 50% of the animation so at first the effect was not visible until it passed the mid-point of the blade. The second limitation was that it only worked to the mid-point of the blade as it was 50% of the movement and you couldn't take advantage of responsive positioning with BladeAngle or TwistAngle, etc. The two new transitions are built specifically for responsive effects as they now can use any point on your blade to either expand from or retract into and the timings are now synched, even if the center point is at the end of the blade the timing will evenly balance both sides so they begin and end in synch.

This will allow you to use the Responsive Effects to change the center and then have your Center In or Center Out effects use that location in real-time.

New Enhanced Responsive Functions

OS6 will introduce multiple new Responsive Effects and Functions to allow you to take your styles to the next level and you'll be able to combine responsive functions to product really unique effects.

R&D / Proof of Concept Videos: