NEW LED Poi from Ultrapoi.com!!!

Why Hello everyone in the Home of Poi world!!!

HOP has been my home base for all my poi needs since I purchased my first pair here back in 2006 and began watching tutorials on this great website. Well in the last few months I have ventured out into the realm of creating custom LED toys of many sorts and it has began building into quite a collection. Now after so much research and prototyping we have come on final designs for a couple professional LED toys. In our arsenal we have of course our power house the ultra poi(Sock POI w/ 3 watt RGB LEDs with over 30 custom modes), the ultra hoop (30 RGB LEDs with over 30 custom modes), the ultra show stoppers (long POI w/ 30 RGB LEDs with over 30 custom modes), Ultra Pixel Poi( RGB LED Displaying pixel image modes) and a few other awesome toys to come as well. From all the reading Ive done on these forums over the years I haves seen many attempt at the task of programming custom RGB LED toys and only few have made it, so im sure many fellow spinners can appreciate the work that has been done here and may want to follow the progress of Ultrapoi.com. We are in the final manufacturing stages for many of professional toys that will be available very soon. Their are also a number of sweet videos on our website and on youtube to get a nice preview. Happy Spinning everyone!!! Stevo Check out our website And Hit us on FaceBook

"The brightest poi set in the world" bit of a claim isnt it?

seeming as tho there are Hyperlights in public hands.
second best but still look quite good. are they programmable?

cheap enough tho.

Don't see why they are not the brightest, hehe we have a 3 watt RGB stars with a nice little boost circuit that is blindingly bright!!! Yes Yes I'm a big fan of Jon's and am so proud of Hyperlights for finally getting into public hands was really beginning to get worried about that, I think I'm like number 380 in line when I registered like 2 years ago. But our company is shooting at someone who wants an awesome set of ultra bright performance poi with 30 unique custom built modes operating on rich sequences that can also be modulated 15 times to slow down frequency for added deepness to each of the modes. They will also have an option for on the fly changes for those who want it and they are geared towards those not willing to spend $500+ on locking down a set. The set will allow for upgradeable chips to expand the mode library and we may go into the programmable pro model in the future but of course that would drive up that awesome low price of $200 for a pro model. We are also going to be putting out a number of cool other LED toys for the future that lots will enjoy. And now some videos for you all.

Interesting, id like for Jon to comment on the "The brightest poi set in the world" statement. Would be nice to see these side by side next to hyperlights. What is the output in lumens?

What batteries to they run on, for how long? What's the weight of them. Any overheating problems?

I own Hyperlights, which are fantastic but am always interested in new/different toys

Cheers

Hahah well everyone is getting all caught up on the brightest poi set in the world statement lol. Maybe I should clarify that it is one of the brightest poi sets in the world instead of "The" hahah (good thing there is not much competition for those to confront me on the brightest multi mode LED Hoop in the world statement as well ).

Well you know until someone throws a 5w RGB on their set which would probably just be overkill; then everyone’s 3w RGB max brightness (depending on mode) is probably pretty comparable, even to hyperlights, check out pictures and videos on my site if you want to compare (and of course exposure settings mean everything in the world of media documentation of light sources so keep that in mind, also don’t know our exact lumens but I’m sure I could crunch the math).

I know Hyperlight has been on the block going on like 5 years now so there are some hardcore fans (even me) that have been with them the whole way and will defend their honor at all cost. Our poi that are currently being sold are available right now(no waiting lists) and are running on 1 cr2 for our second gen models but our 3rd gen mass manufactured models will run from 2 AAs as well as a whole new library of modes that I think is going to stun the masses. Although theoretically you could run them off any battery you wanted for a short length of time if you could connect it, even like a 2016 coin cell, bc the boost circuit only needs as little as .8 v to generate the 5 volt boost to power the chip that controls the 3 watt RGBs.

As for the weight I have yet put them on a digi scale but I imagine they are just a tad lighter than hyperlights due to them being a little more compact, but I find it to be a very enjoyable weight and they are by no means too light. No heating issues so far and they have been punished by a few festivals and letting on lookers and newbs beat them up. Nothing like a little friendly completion to help get the ball moving ehh!!

$200 is alot to spend on something without even seeing what they look like. Can you post some pictures of these poi under normal lighting..?

We too use 3W RGB's so you're going to have to change that to "One of the brightest"

The only way to be sure would be a side-by-side test but I'd put money on them being virtually identical brightness-wise. I agree on the point about making 5W versions and beyond - even with the 3W versions they're almost uncomfortably bright.



Nothing like a bit of baseless speculation eh?

Hyperlights are ~115g per poi head including their AAA batteries. A pair of AAA's is ~25g and a pair of AA's are more like ~60g (I'm comparing 1000mAh NiMh vs 2450mAh NiMh here). So I would be surprised if your production toys aren't going to be heavier.

...but yeah, competition is definitely good for all the spinners out there

*g* I was going to ask for some details

@ ultrapoi, less lol and more facts please: photos of them unlit and lit and measured weight of the head with batteries for the various models would be very helpful 'an it please you.

Yes was in process of putting together a user manual that would contain light module and mode pictures. It was also contain all of the details such as height, weight and power specifications. I have been working on the manual this week so that I can get it out to all of those who already have a pair from the last 2 months and so future buyers will have something to look at.

Anyone dig any of the videos?

My birthday is in July - you have 6 months to get the details up.

I like the videos.

The real test will come when you crack them together a few times - do they flicker, turn off/break etc

How do you change the modes, do you tap then, are there buttons that can smash (e.g. Oggz) so bits fall out? I had some poi where one knock made a loads of beads fly out everywhere!

A button on my oggz cracked in 3 places after hitting them together (even ifter i modded them to work upside down!)

How do the batteries secure? Is it easy to get them out/put them in? Do the contact on the batteries work well?

My flowlight in flowpoi seem to have rubbish contacts and 3 flowlights have stopped working now

Operating temperatures?

What happens when you wack one into your the back of your head, how much does it hurt? Are they solid metal with no padding? What are they made of, would the whole poi head crack in half if you wacked it into a table/wall when spinning them?

Ive owned quite a few different types of poi and they are generall made pretty crap. (unless paying for something that is well made) So far its only my monkey fists and hyperlights that I can say have been worth the money

That's fantastic to hear :-)

The pixel poi look very interesting indeed. A lot like the props Feeding The Fish use in their performances.

I noticed you mentioned patents in a previous post (not sure where that went). I'm looking forward to seeing what novelties you're adding. I came to conclusion there wasn't anything new enough to warrant it (or at least that would be defendable).

yes please more info they look great and i am interested but need specs

I hear that Geeza, I have pile of crappy spinning equipment sitting in my poi bone yard in my room. Making subpar gear is defiantly not the goal when we’re talking about a pro set of performance poi and other toys. Also by following Hyperlights progression over the years he has helped mold what caliber a pro set should be upheld to and I thank him for most of my inspiration.

When I first started my projects I realized that I could make a prototype for the poi fairly simply, but making a product that can be mass produced with a high standard of reliability was quite difficult. This led me to start working on other projects while putting the poi on the back burner to tinker with. That’s when we began the prototyping the Ultra Hoop (Hyperlight: which is one of the patents pending we are holding besides two other products that have not been released yet) and the show stoppers which have each been their own crazy can of worms hahah.

But back to the Poi, we eventually came upon a strong and simple polycarbonate mold for gen 2 that was very strong and provided a great host for the poi (we have tried to break them by slamming them but have been unsuccessful). The battery is held in by a Cr123 holder on the bottom of the unit which is secure and I have not experienced any contact or blinking issues and I have been spinning them for the last 6 months. They are extremely durable and the buttons are recessed so that the smash button syndrome on the flowlight and oggz are ruled out.

The modes are changed by one button and the frequency modulations (up to 15 parameters deep!!!) are changed by the second button, there is also option for an RF remote for external on the fly synchronized mode changes. The internal circuits are quite compact which helps with keeping the unit strong and protected against impact and the modules run warm but nowhere close to the damaging range of temperature spectrum.

About smashing them into the back of your head, yah that’s probably going to hurt hahaa but they do come with an optional padding which go around the modules, hopefully beginners won’t purchase them as their first pair. Even though they are pretty light weight (hyperlight: the weight comparison was just an educated guess based on the fact that you got more guts like the usb and programming circuit) and their made of polycarbonate so it really depends on how hard your spinning when you hit yourself .

Currently we are working on a few deadlines with two of the products we have not released yet. They are involved in some contractual dates in which they must be finished due to a third-party seller, so at the moment they are the highest priority. But I will get part of the user manual with pictures and specs up by the weekend. PM or email me at sales@ultrapoi.com

Thanks for the above. RF remote sequence changing sounds interesting

You know what they say - A picture means a thousand words. (A nice close up macro shot of them would be better!)

Really cool, there is inna world only one company that produce POV
Poi, but they didn't made public any resources. Your "pixel" Poi
and "Ultra" orbit looks really awesome.

There must be great fun behind these prototipes. Good luck
with the mass poduction. I'll remember your site
and spread the knowledge.

I will chime in that these look cool, but some close up pictures of them in daylight would be nice as well.

I love the pixel poi and the orbit! Will stay tuned for release and prices and such.

I didn't finish the manual this weekend due to major time consuming advances in our new ultra poi interface but here is a video to help.

Convincgly strong! Obviously only time will tell how they stand up under 'fatigue' conditions, with smaller knocks hundreds of times.

I'd still like to see some good pictures of them unlit, preferably with something to show scale, so I can get an idea of how they're constructed.

No hurry though - my budget has been Chrismassed, I won't be buying myself any more toys for a few months.

Close-up pics of them in light please??

I hear you loud and clear Geeza, as you said in your last post along with others, you want to see pictures of them in the light. Will put those up asap when I finish more of the manual. Thought the running them over with my truck video would help tide you over for a few more days. Although I do appreciate your enthusiasm.

So are the pixel poi a mode of the ultra poi or is that another product that's not yet available?

Nope the pixel poi are separate prop from the ultra poi, they feature 32 individually assignable rgb led per unit 64 total for a pair. They are at the moment the most complex poi we have so they may not be for sale for quite some time.

Had a chance to snap a few pics for you all!!!

check out our other albums as well

Ultra Poi pic 1

Ultra Poi pic 2

Ultra Poi pic 3

Interesting - do the 2 bits fit together so the battery is inside somewhere?

no sorry forgot to get the covers...If you spin with them on they are 50 g and the poi are 81 so they can help add some weight if you like them a little more heavy. I like to spin them without them in the socks and haven't had a problem with loosing the battery even when they are hit together occasionally so I leave them off.

Cover pic 1

Cover pic 2

Ahah! and thanks.

seems like it'd hurt? no padding?

Yah padding is optional....but I don’t use it. I am by no means a pro, but these poi are also not for newbs who are learning how to spin. Have not had a problem, but as I said before in prior post, yah it would hurt if you hit your self in the face or something...just like it would hurt with those demon orange led balls you can order here on HOP

Orange beaming poi

Sorry, this might have been answered before, but whats the battery life when running 1 poi head on on max power on 1 AA battery? (or 2 if it takes 2)

I like em. I ordered the white socks and led from here. I also have a set of gloves from liquidemotions. They do sell poi there and they have some of the brightest LEDs I have even seen in person, but I have yet to see poi like yours. Mine are close, but not near close enough.

I know I shoulda clicked the links but I am lazy. What is the total after shipping? (states)

Also, are those D or Cs? They look huge

We use rechargeable CR123 batteries in our poi at the moment. They can be run off any battery, but that is what we've designed our cases for to keep the size and weight down.

They last for several hours at a time, longer depending on the mode you are running with the poi. Things like constant super bright white will drain batteries faster than strobes. During testing i've left a pair on the brightest white for over 2hrs and they showed no signs of stopping. Its hard to watch them for longer than they because they are so bright!

So long as i have my batteries fully charged, i don't worry about them running out of batteries during a night of spinning. I still sometimes bring an extra pair just in case.

The cases are about 2 inches in diameter and about 1.75 inches tall. The batteries are about 1.5 inches long and .65 inches in diameter. So they are a little fatter than AA, but about 3/4 as long.

Shipping in the states is a flat $10.

Sure looks like PVC pipe fittings from the hardware store to me.

Notice the data printed around the rim of the cap. Those are PVC pipe fittings...

Well if your just jumping into the middle of this form, without reading any of the prior post you may be out of the loop. The current version you are seeing in the pictures are our Gen 2 Ultra Poi being hand made by me and are available currently if you would like to purchase them (just added the shopping cart to our website). The battery cover is a standard pvc pipe cap (very good Jared!!) but the poi body is a little more complicated. Right now I think they are pretty dam good for hand made and defiantly the most durable and exciting poi I have ever spun for the price. I believe the current host for the poi are completely functional and I'm not sure if you are trying to imply that this is some sort of sin or something. Our Gen 3 Ultra Poi on the other hand are being sent off to be professionally manufactured with a poly carbonate body mold and being mass assembled in stages (no more micro soldering for me!!!) which will be due for commercial sale by early next year. Hopefully this weekend I should be able to shoot some videos of the new mode sequences that we have been working on for the new sequence library.

Actually, I've read the whole thing; and you did say that 2nd gen ultrapoi were made with a polycarbonate mold, but said nothing about a PVC cap.
It is a misleading bit of advertisement, granted it may not be intentional, but still misleading. Coupled with the lack of specifications provided, it makes me wary of your products.

PVC pipe is not the highest quality material these days, and can become brittle. It may seem fine now, but give it a little time, and it could actually break quite easily if you hit it just right. I can tell you from experience, PVC will cut to the bone. I've worked with it for 10 years and I couldn't begin to count how many times I've cut myself on broken PVC.

Not trying to scare anybody away or anything. They are good looking poi, I just see a flaw that maybe you didn't know about. Also, if I were spending that much money, I would want to know exactly what I was getting. If I had been told polycarbonate, and got a set of poi with PVC pieces, I wouldn't be too happy.

I would come up with a temporary alternative to the cap, then put together some detailed information about them.
I might even be tempted to pick up a pair myself at some point, but it would have to be 3rd gen or later when the PVC isn't a part of them anymore.

Maybe something like this to replace the PVC?
Pipeconx cap

Since it's not holding any pressure, it should fit snug enough to hang on without the metal band.

Wow I'm really glad you have had such a long history in PVC although it does sound like you should be more careful. To my understanding their are a number of reasons why PVC becomes brittle. Well when used for plumbing it is exposed to constant ware on long stretches of pipe from water, changing temperatures and weathering in general. Now unless your planning to leave them outside during winter and such you wont have a problem. (and even then I still think they would be fine!) I have used them for 6 months now and have stressed tested pairs by swinging them against the concrete several times (and now running the over with my truck) with only minor scratches and I still use them today. Never have I feared of cutting myself to the bone (haha are you kidding me?) and I think you are ridiculously over reacting.

Those caps could be good too...although I usually don't spin with the cap on at all because the battery is secure and I prefer it off.

Well I'm not going to debate it with you. I've seen PVC be hit by truck and be fine like you said, and I've seen PVC break before it was ever even used.
I hope you don't run into the latter.

I've been watching this thread for a while, unsure of whether to say anything about my experiences with Ultrapoi. This is a fledgling company (extremely so, from what I can see) and yet they do need to learn some fundamental aspects of Customer Service. Some of their flippant replies to honest questions in this thread like "what exactly are you selling" have forced me to write this post.

I ordered some Ultrapoi back at the start of November and was quoted 7 to 10 days delivery for my $20 International postage. The package was not sent via FedEx as one would expect, but by US Postal Service. Nevertheless, in the past I have been sent all variety of things from the US to UK via FedEx (including electrical components that must provide some Customs head-scratching) and everything took only a few days to arrive. The Ultrapoi package got either lost or withheld in Chicago after 2 days and never turned up. There followed a lot of increasingly frustrating emails to Ultrapoi where I tried to get them to find out what was going on. In one case I was told that it was up to _me_ to keep them posted on the whereabouts of my package as "I've never mailed anything internationally, so this is a bit of an experiment for both of us". Often my emails would go unanswered for several days, which when I was in the position of feeling ripped off by $220 is not acceptable.

I was eventually refunded, some 34 days after purchase, mostly after I started making threats about how small the online poi community was. The fact that they were willing ultimately to refund is obviously a good sign for the future and I feel worth stressing. At the last minute, they offered to send out a replacement instead of a refund, but since they had no clue why the previous package had been lost then I could not bring myself to wait another month to find out if the same thing happened again...

Right at the start (Nov 11th) I was asking, understandably, for some instructions on the various modes that the poi offered, and was told that I'd be emailed them by the end of the week. Well, as you can see from this forum they still haven't written those instructions. And considering the interface of the poi is a couple of buttons, one that sets a colour mode and another that sets a sub-mode... it's not rocket science to knock up a quick list.

So in the absence of Hyperlights (I'm still 400 or so on the waiting list for Hyperlights myself) , feel free to try out these guys. If you _actually_ receive your goods then apparently you can have some cheap-Hyperlight clones (with actually a lot of missing functionality) within 10 days, which is obviously the attraction. But my advice, unless you have a spare $220 you have otherwise no need of, would be to wait around for them to become an established company with a proven track-record, and perhaps a bit more humility.

Also, be aware that according to Ultrapoi these are full-price, pre-production prototypes of something that people will "definitely want to buy all over again when they see the production model". At least... that's what they say!

JaredW and Rabbit,
Please excuse my brother, he can be a bit rough around the edges some times and feels like some people on this forum would rather see us fail than succeed. Let me make a couple of posts here to explain and resolve a few things.

There are a lot of Hyperlight fans out there who may see us as competition or a knock off and I want to explain that this isn't the case.

First, Hyperlights are their own product. They cost more than twice as much as an ultrapoi and the batches are produced maybe once a year. They have their own feature sets which we are not competing with.

The only similarity between Hyperlights and Ultrapoi is that we both feature the same light source. In contrast to hyperlights we offer a product that costs half as much, features 30 set modes (some of which can be duplicated on hyperlights, and some that cannot), with multiple modes that can be modulated out to change how a sequence is displayed.

When someone orders a pair of UltraPoi we do our best to see that their set arrives within 2 weeks. We are also working hard every day to expand our product line, the quality of our products, and to make it in a very niche hobby.

Most of all we are not trying to replace hyperlights, we are only trying to fill what we think is a need for more advanced props in the community and we are making multiple products such as hoops, orbits, ect to fill that gap.

JaredW
I've had my share of experiences with PVC and would like to address you first since you express a safety concern. With regards to our current gen ultrapoi using PVC cases I would like to point out a few things.
First, most PVC breaks at the pipe. Rarely do couplings ever become brittle and crack. Couplings are intentionally stronger and more resilient than pipe as I am sure you know.
Second, PVC is subject to some of the harshest conditions imaginable. How many poi props do you have that can withstand being left in the sun or buried underground, or subjected to the extreme weather conditions that PVC must withstand.
Any plastic can become brittle and break with a sharp edge. How many here can count on less than one hand the amount of broken flow lights they have seen? Plastics are brittle, but we cannot make our poi out of metal, glass, or brick either.

Someone with as much experience using PVC as you must also realize that 99% of the time it is strong, and as you said, can be run over by a truck. We chose our current gen cases with durability in mind. I've dropped these cases off rooftops, run over them, thrown them against brick walls, hit them with bats, ect. I have yet to damage a case without using power tools. They simply won't break. I can leave a case on my roof for you, and check on it in a few months if you'd like, but I have the distinct feeling the result won't be much different than it is now.

Rabbit,
As expressed in our emails back and forth, I am sorry that your poi set did not show up. But I issued a full refund after 30 days from the date I shipped it. I have never attempted to ship something internationally before, and my hope was that the US postal service would come through for me. It was a lesson learned for us, and now all of our products shipped out of country will be shipped via fedex. I recently shipped a pair of UltraPoi to Arizona, and while I still used the postal service, I paid extra for tracking, signature confirmation and insurance. We are just starting out, but we will learn from any mistakes made and seek to make amends.

With Regards to your story, I would like to reply point by point.

You paid on the 11th, a Thursday. It isn't unreasonable that I dropped your poi set off at the post office Monday morning. It was one of the first sets that we sold and I wanted to make sure everything came out perfect out of the box.

I quoted 7-10 days shipping because that is what was quoted on the postal service website for shipping to the UK. There was no way for me to know that the numbers would be inaccurate.

I try to answer emails promptly, but it is the holiday season. I know you do not have Thanksgiving in the UK, but during that week I was spending time with the family. It is an excuse I know, but a shipping time of 2 weeks also did not seem out of the question for me. I have had packages from China take nearly a month to arrive via their postal service.

Your refund had nothing to do with threats to post negatively about us to the poi community. It had to do with our product not arriving after 30 days from the day I shipped it. We agreed upon giving you a refund two weeks prior to that, and I issued it on the day we agreed. I also expressed hope that it would somehow still arrive, and that if it ever does you do not have to return it.

With several days left before the 15th I offered to send you a new poi set via FedEX with a tracking number as an option instead of a refund. I wish I had thought of this as an option sooner, but I still had hope your package would have arrived.

Lastly, yes these are pre production models. Yes we are working on new modes so we can continue to have a better product. But I also told you that anyone who bought a pre production model could receive an upgrade at near cost to us. We are already trying to sell the most advanced and brightest LED poi available. Instead of resting on that we are still trying to make our products better and trying to move from building props in our garage to having a full production model. It is not an easy road or a cheap one and we greatly appreciate everyone who has helped us along the way by purchasing our current gen props. Had you received your poi, you would not have been disappointed with the build quality or its capabilities.

In the end you received a full refund and if the postal service ever comes through, a free set of the most advanced poi prop you can buy for the price.

One last thing with regards to the manual. We are working on it.
Yes i can supply a list of our 30 modes, but we would like to have something that is a bit more visual.



In this video, Stevo cycles through most of the modes we have available this generation. The show stoppers use the exact same microchip as the ultrapoi and all the modes are the same. So let me explain some things.

The color strobe starting at 0:53 is completely different from the one at 1:20. The first one features random clumps of colors separated by random gaps, while the second is a traditional color strobe but the colors are also random.

From 2:00-4:00 that is the same mode. It starts off as a tight rainbow. Using the option button the rainbow can be stretched out 15 times. People are not used to this level of available options. We call it one mode with 15 different modulation options. But without pictures and other things explaining how the rainbow stretches out it is difficult to understand.

From 4:00-5:00 that is a completely different rainbow mode. The colors in it are random, an example of something a HyperLight cannot do. This mode can be stretched out just like the rainbow, but the visual effect is completely different.

From 6:35-7:05 that is the same mode. The magenta appears after pressing through the options. It is difficult to express this with just written words in a manual, which is why it is taking us time to make.

Here are some pics that we have taken so we can use them in our manual explaining these things:
1. Random strobe vs traditional strobe


2. Tight rainbow vs stretched


3. Random rainbow tight and stretched


4. Red-Blue strobe vs red-blue with magenta fill

I hope all these posts have helped to resolve any concerns/questions about our product. Please understand that we are just two brothers, not some factory in China. A lot of heart and effort goes into every set of poi we sell and some of the comments here may have left us a little defensive at times. Give us a chance to impress this community and change your mind about what you think LED props can do.

As I said before, I'm not trying to convince anybody to not purchase them, I had even considered it myself. And as we all agree PVC is usually plenty strong, but if you look back my concern was not exactly with using PVC in general. It's with using PVC fittings from a hardware store, that you have no quality control over, then saying 2nd gen are made of polycarbonate but not even mentioning the PVC. And even if it is rare, sometimes you get a bad batch of PVC, and brand new fittings break.

I hope all goes well for you and your brother, it's no simple task starting a business; but his responses(which I see you or him one have edited to seem less brash), the misleading statements, and still the lack of information, aren't good selling points.

JaredW,
No worries. It just seemed alarmist when saying a material we are using can break and cut someone to the bone. Even polycarbonate can be a brittle material and result in sharp edges if broken. I still feel more than confident that our current cases are of the highest quality we can create for the time being. In the future we are actually trying to use a material more like tupperware for our next generation case, soft yet not easily broken.
I see that you are in Arlington. If you ever find yourself in Houston you are more than welcome to look us up and spin a pair of UltraPoi. I was hoping to be in Dallas for New years at the Ghostland show, but it doesn't look like it is going to happen.
You mentioned that you had thought about buying a pair, and if you wanted to come down here for a weekend and try before you buy, we'd appreciate a review from someone who might approach what we are doing with a bit more skepticism.

Well it may seem 'alarmist', but it's the truth lol
Polycarbonate is less likely to break, and PVC cuts can be awful. So far I've not managed to cut myself with polycarbonate, but just for saying that I probably will in the near future. Just my luck.

I wouldn't mind giving them a trial run, next gen, but it's not likely to happen. I've left Texas a few months, soon to be leaving the country. If things go according to plan, it will be a long time before I come back.
Guess I should update my location.

That's not strictly true. We're also a fledgling business and to date have only made one batch in the middle of 2010, but we're almost ready for batch 2 six months later ...and like you, we're ramping up production now.

They may cost twice as much as your prototypes but they're a more finished product for it as well (CNC precision machined parts etc).


From all the photo's I've seen, I would suggest the opposite is true. Hyperlights can easily do all of the sequences in the pictures and videos on your website and Flicker. If there's new stuff you've not posted yet then maybe there's some truth to your claims, but I'd be interested to see some photo's of the one's you think Hyperlights can't manage


We welcome the competition and I definitely think there's room for more advanced props. As I said in a previous post, competition is most certainly good for all you consumers/spinners out there.

I really feel for the Utrapoi boys; we made plenty of prototypes which attracted a wealth of suggested improvements. I dare say the polycarb full production ones will look much better

well with competition comes improvement that all can benefit from

I was going to post this on Hyperlights, since that's where the original question was asked, but I figured I'd just put it here since this is where the most discussion seems to be happening.

Anyway, you should probably make some photos of all the different modes. I would think there are going to be a lot of people wanting to know.
Even though it won't be as impressive looking as a long duration photo, or a video, maybe do something like the pictures HoP does. Makes it easy to look at the patterns and know exactly which option to switch so you can try it out.

Well ignore that last post
I was just looking back at the first page and saw you had planned to put that in the manual.

We finally have a manual up for UltraPoi on our website.
www.ultrapoi.com

It is a bit long to post here.

With regards to HyperLights being able to duplicate all of our modes, I'm sorry to say that you can't. From my understanding Hyperlights can only perform preprogrammed sequences. Although it is amazing that your users can create their own sequences there are some things you definitely cannot do.

You cannot generate random colors. All of your modes follow set sequences. Many of our modes produce completely random colors with no identifiable sequence. I suppose you could create a sequence that is several thousand colors long to simulate this, but I'm not sure if there would be room for any other modes.



The very first photo cannot be duplicated with hyperlights. The photo depicts random vibrant colors flashes separated by random length gaps.
It is not simply red, blue, green, black, yellow, aqua, black.

It is all based on equations that either randomly choose to display a color or a black space, and then if it is a color, the color is chosen at random. There is no identifiable sequence, the entire mode is based around random variables and you will never be able to take the same picture twice.



Here is an example of a very simple red to blue fade and hold. But some of our sequences fade between completely random colors. Since you cannot choose a color at random and then fade to it from the current color you wouldn't be able to perform a fade like this if red and blue were chosen at random.

Hey there, it's looking pretty damn pretty.

I've been having a play with the 3 Watt RGB LEDs and let's face it, it's hard to go wrong when you're kicking out that many lumens.

2011 could be the year of monster LED toys breaking through to a new level...

i think the pixel poi for china are better. they are available now and are completely programmable. though they are single color, I would not buy ultrapoi or ultra pixel poi because you cant program your own design like the made in china ones.

Are you referring to these:-

http://www.alibaba.com/product/shinery-11923674-0/LED_Pixel_Poi_LED_Baton.html

If so then have you found out a price or where to buy them?

Incidentally, and kind of linking to another thread I'm in about building LED pois, I once made a 64 pixel single-colour POV display like this. But I built mine to be static, and hence the combination of _many_ ICs and lots of batteries would mean that it would be a serious weapon if swung. Oh, in case the "static" aspect has you pondering, it looked like a vertical line of slightly flickery LEDs until you glanced across it, whereupon the image would literally jump out into the air in front of you in a spooky fashion.

But life's too short for me to shoehorn that technology into a juggling ball, if there's a chance someone else can do it for me.

Two things I just found immediately after submitting my last post:-

1) http://v3.espacenet.com/publicationDetai...51234A&KC=A

Now I don't understand patents to be honest, but here's one that seems to pretty much own this whole (yet to exist) market...


2) http://www.genxglow.com/forum/pixel-poi-t47957

A thread on another forum with info and pictures on those Chinese Pixel Poi.

So, the Chinese pixel poi look really cool, but unknown are price (except presumably considerably more than $200 since a single colour knock off is $200), durability nor if they'll ever be made available commercially.

IMO that puts them out of serious consideration until / unless things change.

I think our pixel poi produce pretty impressive results for not being programmable. We are trying to get the cost down to 40 for a pair of 11 LED modules. They have 12 modes and also make great orbits. Look at our orbit video in the first post for an example.



We are also working on a larger full color version that produces amazing displays for around $150


Lastly, we have a programmable 'rainbow' pixel poi that we are working on. It is in this video from about 0:35 - 1:30 and again from 2:30-3:30
It can hold 12 different sequences that you can design. And slowly cycles through each one. We are trying to price these around $150 as well.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6Nrv7SkjNM

If anyone is interested in any of these go to our website and contact us, we may be able to work something out.

I like the pixel poi. You should make some patterns that look like old 8 bit video games. Galaga poi! I'd love to see little Galaga aliens buzzing around

That patent seems pretty comprehensive but I hope it's not going to hold progress towards ever-shinier LED toys. For example, figure 7 describes pretty much the entire software architecture that I used for the Mitochondrion (my microcontroller-driven RGB LED glowstaff). I just wrote the software that way last year, way before I knew of this patent, coz I thought it was obvious to do it that way. Obviousness is a legally-valid defense against a patent. Then again, I'm not a patent lawyer.

I guess we won't know how the patent owners want to treat this patent until someone makes a product that potentially infringes the patent, the owners sue, it ends up in court and the only people who are happy are the lawyers. Does anyone know the owners of the patent (Oliver Mylius, Alix Wilding) and what their plans for the patent are?

I think it being common knowledge among the more tech savvy members of the juggling community, as to how to make exactly what they describe, a whole 2 years prior to the patent being filed, is more than enough reason that the patent isn't valid.

In fact the two who filed that patent could be guilty of patent fraud, due to there being 'prior art' right here on this very site, and they could quite conceiveably have been expected to know of this site.

It looks to me like the patent was filed in 2007, so I don't think there's patent fraud here, just a patent that'll be hard to defend.

I don't know of any prior art before that, I started working on the Mitochondrion independently in 2008. Anyone else know of work on LEDs and persistance of vision on poi/staff/baton/stuff before 2007?

Okay, that's a fair point; Hyperlights do not currently have a random feature available on them. Like I said; I was just going on the pictures and the bits and pieces I'd read on here, your site and the Hyperlight website.

If you're seeding a random number generator and then using the random output from that, then technically it would be possible to see a repeat of a pattern if you started from the same seed (extremely unlikely though). I'm sure you wouldn't be able to tell just from watching them either.

The difference with that sort of approach vs programming a random-ish sequence is as you suggest; one is far more memory efficient. We're able to store thousands of commands on a single hyperlight though, so I'm sure you could write a sequence which appears random to all intents and purposes. Particularly as you can call one randomized sequence from another to build up a bigger sequence. You'd still have room for more.

We could add a random number generator to the hyperlights and update the hyperlight language to make use of it if customers wanted that, but we tried a feature along those lines in the early days and the resulting sequences always just looked sort of messy. Your implementation may well be more intelligent though

I started showing off hyperlights which use persistence of vision looong before that (I have pictures here on HoP from 2005).

They only used a single light source mind you.

A quick google suggests the patent owners are a French juggling duo.

Luxeon Poi...

LED skunkworks: Wish list/brainstorm.

Open source LED poi

[WIP]Cyberlight - Led poi

http://www.homeofpoi.com/gallery/showpho...all&page=20



Plenty of prior art right there, dating right back to 2004. Also while I was making my programmable multi LED poi back in 2005, I'm not the first, as there was a guy called Joe Derry designing multi LED poi called Illuminati that got mentioned a few times on HoP (shame the video isn't still up).

Well, if you're talking prior art, how about this one?

http://www.freepatentsonline.com/5748157.pdf

To be honest I think the way this goes is that a patent is pretty academic unless the holder decides to sue. And no one's going to sue you over making a few of something in your bedroom. But if you make a big name for your new company (with associated profits) then it makes it much more worthwhile for someone (anyone) to sue you. And at that point owning such a patent will probably help them in court. But I'm no lawyer.

I dunno about other people's implementations, but I've been having a play with generating random colour sequences and smooth colour transitions between them. Just randomly picking values for red, green, and blue gives a colour that tends to be just mucky. On average, you're going to get roughly equal brightnesses for red, green, and blue so you end up with something grey-ish.

What I've found better is to start with a certain number of points. Randomly assign these points to the first colour component, then assign what's left to the next component and so on until you run out of points. For example, start with 400 points. Pick the (0-255) brightness for blue, say it comes out at 190, that leaves 210 points. Pick the brightness for red out of the points that are left, say it comes out at 180, that leaves 30 points for green. In this case, we've come up with a nice purple that's not quite a pure purple.

This approach means you're much less likely to end up with something grey. You're more likely to get a purer colour or mix of just two colours. You can vary the number of points to limit the complexity of the colour, if you just choose lower point then you're more likely to end up with a single hue.

And hey, I'm not patenting this coz it's bleeding obvious.

Ooo, nicely found sir!

You are right on target HappyinMotion. One issue is that you can still end up with grays if you are unlucky. While our method for generating colors is actually a lot different from this (we never get greys), You've described a fairly simple means of getting good color variation and ending up with colors that for the most part are not dim or washed out.

I think the problem of dim colors comes from not having constant brightness.

The way I got round it was to have preset colors, and then have a system to fade between any of them, but make sure all the presets were of the same brighness, so that variable never changed, something like:

Red = 255,0,0
Magenta = 127,0,127
White = 85,85,85

While white was never as bright as it could have been, but it was also never brighter than any of the primaries on their own, and any other color maintained that brightness thanks to it's values being relative to the baseline white.

16 million colors includes every single possible combination of RGB(255,255,255) values, and a lot of colors the human eye simply can't distinguish between. It's just the next digitally produced color palette above 64 thousand, where it is still possible to tell between some of the colors.

Ideally you want to ignore values that vary saturation and brightness from the baseline, and only alter the hues used, because colors only look dim and washed out when they are seen relative to a full white value.

I think when it comes to hyperlights and ultrapoi the motto is the brighter the better.

Bright is definitely good, but sometimes some of the dimmer sequences and contrasts in brightness can work well too

And I'm sure anyone watching would appreciate not having an afterimage burned into their retinas.

Brightness is good, but only in terms of contrast ratio so you can use them in brighter conditions. At night, there is such a thing as 'bright enough'.

Lol who says that? I want it to be so bright I blind a pilot flying overhead and he crashes exactly 1000ft behind me for dramatic effect.

I'm less ambitious - but I would like them to be as bright as fire is.

Ah come on! There's no such thing as bright enough.

I want it to look like I'm juggling with lightning.

I want bystanders to be hiding behind solid objects.

I'm in New Zealand and I want Australians to think the dawn has come early.

That's how bright I want it.

Hey Friends,

We have got some footage for you displaying some of our new modes that are amazing! The full production of the new generation of Ultra Poi are due by summer after a few of our other products are released.

Our most current gear that has been set loose is the Dropz 4 Ultra which is an LED microlight that displays all of Ultra Poi's modes in an ultra compact form, they are being sold by our partners at www.Liquidemotions.com.

New Modes!!!

Some interesting looking modes in there although I could make out about 3 or 4 distinct patterns? It's very difficult filming high-intensity poi though

Their were quite a few new modes displayed in that video, of course their is nothing like seeing the real deal.

Taking a look at our mode list will hint toward the madness:










































Also here's a new video of us at Ultra Music Festival letting the public have some fun with the gear:



www.Ultrapoi.com

Any news on the ultra pixel poi? They seem to have dropped off your website

These are as bright as fire poi -

They don't _look_ as bright as fire poi ...videos can be misleading though. Any chance of a side-by-side comparison?

If you've only got one colour on at a time that's just 1W of light you're emitting right?

I like the tracing effects you get from the light cast through the holes - neat

REV CHIP IS LIVE!!!

Hey Ultra Poi Fans,

We have a very special announcement to make! We here at Ultra Poi, LLC are proud to present the Rev Chip, it is the most advanced Micro Controller Chip Technology that we have ever Designed. We found it critically important to make the Rev Chip extremely sophisticated because it will be featured in all of the upcoming Ultra Product Releases, including the Ultra Poi! When we began the Design Process on the Rev Chip we wanted to push the boundaries of how a user can Interact and Control the Visual Displays of the Lights they love to use. With this goal in mind we have paved the way to the most advanced on-board Operating System that a RGB light has ever seen.

With our new Rev Chip not only can you use all of the amazing Preset Modes that you have seen in all of our Ultra Poi videos but, you now are able to build your own Custom Color Sequence by operating the Button on the Light, no computer required! Additionally all of the Preset Modes and Custom Color Modes have been Upgraded with awesome new Colors and Display Options that are out of this world! Check out the Mode Sheets and Video below to get a taste of the madness on our first of many Lights using the Rev Chip, the Dropz Rev Microlight, sold on www.LiquidEmotions.com .

We will be releasing new products frequently for tne next few months so be sure to join our presale information list and keep visiting www.ultrapoi.com.

We will also be updating the website soon with a all new look!

We'll see ;-)

Yeah, bring it!

Glad to see that the fans share our enthusiasm!!!

Here's one of our newest videos to help cope with your excitement.