DIY Studio Lighting Rig Part 2 – Automation, Hacking Lights, MORE RGB, and Top Down Camera Mount

In the last episode of Andrew builds stuff kinda badly but hey it works, I built myself a custom lighting rig to finally get my studio lights off the ground and out the way, position the backsplash light better, and give me options for camera and mic mounts. In this video I’m finishing what I started, and going the whole hog on automating everything, which includes swapping the RGB lighting out! Let’s get stuck in.

First things first, the top down camera mount. This one is actually pretty easy. I’ve bought a tripod ball head that should match the same foot I already use on my point and shoot camera tripod, along with a 3/8ths inch 16 pitch thread bolt, and I’ll drill a counterbore hole in a fairly short strip of CLS timber, then drill a 10mm hole in the middle all the way through. That means I can stick the bolt through the wood and screw the tripod head into the other side – and there’s even enough space for a socket to fit around the bolt to tighten it (just). Then I can screw the block into the lighting rig directly over the middle of the desk. 

And now, as if by magic, I’ve got a top down camera view! I’m planning on using the point and shoot for this for now as it has reasonable autofocus, plus some zoom built in so if I want to show you I dunno a motherboard or something, I can zoom in for that. I’m quite pleased with this – both the widest field of view I can get, and positioning in general. 

Next up is automation. As it stands, I have to unlock my phone and press a button on my home screen to turn on the two Elgato lights, then grab this controller to turn the main lights, then plug the RGB strip in. That’s kind of a pain, so I think it’s time to kill two birds with one stone and improve the RGB lighting, AND automate the process. Replacing the RGB strip has been on my todo list ever since the resistor for the three blue diodes right behind my head died – probably four years ago now. Look I said it was on my todo list not at the top… This time I picked up a Zigbee controlled strip – a long one too. These two strips should be able to run all the way around the four shelves I’ve got here, nicely backlighting the wall. The strips themselves are just RGB, not RGBWW like the Nanoleaf ones I have in my bedroom, but for this these will do just fine. As usual they have an adhesive backing so it’s just a case of sticking them to the backs of the shelves and that’s pretty much it. One thing I do really like though is these little connector covers. RGB strip connectors are just awful – they have no good locating or locking features, it’s just terrible. Anyway these just clip over the two ends, nicely holding them together! Isn’t that great?

On the automation front, I already use a Home Assistant script to turn both Elgato lights on at once, so adding “turn the zigbee RGB strip on” is no problem. What I can’t easily automate is the main lights. If you saw my video on this software defined radio you might think you know where this is going, but just bare with me. These lights are controlled by this remote. It’s a radio frequency remote, specifically 433MHz radio frequency, and that means it isn’t exactly easy to just get Home Assistant to control these. Now in that video I mentioned I used this software defined radio, along with a truly amazing bodge job of a raspberry pi and a single wire, to capture and replay the off signal that this remote emits. While I absolutely could spend the time to properly capture the signals this controller emits and then work out a way to reliably (and legally) broadcast them, I realised I had a potentially easier solution. I have a spare remote I don’t use – because one remote controls both lights at the same time – so I took it apart and used some of the bits I’ve had lying around from the response time and latency tools to bodge a solution.

Basically, this is an ESP32 board running ESPHome, which lets it connect to WiFi and to Home Assistant. The four button presses I actually need are hooked up to output pins, which are connected to the gate of an NPN transistor via a 10K resistor. The buttons on the controller are active low, so I needed a way to pull the button on the controller to ground, ideally without putting any power in from the ESP32, so the transistors work fine. I’ve got the controller powered from the second 3.3V rail, which is just powered by the USB C port on the ESP – although I can actually attach a 4.2V LiPo battery if I wanted. I don’t know why I would, but I can. 

That’s all controlled from Home Assistant – but it’s still kind of annoying to have to unlock my phone and swipe to the right screen, so I took it one step further. I have these Moes Zigbee switches that mostly work ok, but they drain the damn battery every three months. That’s insane, especially considering they are basically special order batteries, but since I’ve already got a 3.3V supply freely available to solder to… I drilled some holes in the backplate and fed some wires through, then soldered them to the battery pads and my custom board. Oh and I stuck it to the post too, so now I can toggle all the lights with the left switch, turn just the main lights off with the middle one for more moody shots, and I’m writing a script to cycle through the RGB colours with the right button. I can of course still use my phone if I want, but having a single physical button is pretty convenient. 

So now I’ve got my lights out the way, all working both remotely and with a single click, I have a top down camera mount, and space for a shotgun mic if I want it. All in all I’m really happy with this. Ironically we’ve just agreed to buy this house so I might end up mounting it to the ceiling instead at some point for even more floor space, but for now I’m happy. It works as I want it, it’s easier to just hop in here and make videos, and that’s exactly what I’m after.