# Trigger for sounds



## epoweredrc (Aug 6, 2012)

Ok i plan to use the sensor from motion lights to trigger a few spot lights blacklights or scrobes in my yard i want to know is there. Way to trigger sound and what would be used??? Cd players have to come on and most have to have play button presed. Mp3 player same thing or is there a way i could have a player playing the whole time and just somehow stop the specker from playing then be played when motion is detected? Im not sure how the sounds in props are made i have a boo sign that makes all kinda sound when see somethingmove
thanks


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## Cole&Jacksdad (Jan 20, 2011)

I wonder if you could use a relay with the motion sensor? Splice the speaker wire and connect to the relay. Splice an extention cord and connect to the relay. Use a screw in bulb/plug adaptor on the motion sensor. Plug in the relay extention cord in the plug part and screw in the light bulb to the light bulb part. Play the mp3 or cd on a loop. When the light is off, you can't hear the track. When the light is on, you hear the track. The relay will work as a switch. When there is no power to the relay, there is no sound. When the light turns on from the motion sensor, it powers up the relay and closes the circuit of the speaker wires.


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## easycraig (Aug 30, 2011)

i was planning on buying one of these devices... they look easy to use and have some nice features on them.

http://www.frightprops.com/picoboo-ac-0913.html


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## Otaku (Dec 3, 2004)

Cole&Jacksdad said:


> I wonder if you could use a relay with the motion sensor?


In some cases, you sure can. If you're talking about one of the security lights w/sensor, get a socket adapter that you lets plug in an extension cord. Cut off the other end, strip the wires and attach them to an AC coil relay. When the sensor trips, the relay closes.
The downside is that the sensor may not have the "on" time that you want, and in most cases can't be locked out to prevent multiple triggering. For that, you need some type of timing control (adjustable on and off times, ignoring the sensor until the off time runs out).

Edit: C&Jsdad - you beat me to it lol.


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## epoweredrc (Aug 6, 2012)

Cole&Jacksdad said:


> I wonder if you could use a relay with the motion sensor? Splice the speaker wire and connect to the relay. Splice an extention cord and connect to the relay. Use a screw in bulb/plug adaptor on the motion sensor. Plug in the relay extention cord in the plug part and screw in the light bulb to the light bulb part. Play the mp3 or cd on a loop. When the light is off, you can't hear the track. When the light is on, you hear the track. The relay will work as a switch. When there is no power to the relay, there is no sound. When the light turns on from the motion sensor, it powers up the relay and closes the circuit of the speaker wires.


might be worth a shot.

Wow that device is nice but out of my price range, should said on limited buget but thats for that website looks like lot neat stuff


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## Cole&Jacksdad (Jan 20, 2011)

epoweredrc said:


> Wow that device is nice but out of my price range, should said on limited buget but thats for that website looks like lot neat stuff


The picoboo is nice. Someone let me borrow one once. I use an Arduino for my props. Cost less, more input/outputs, but it takes some figuring out. They can be had on amazon for about $20, but for what you want to do, you would need a PIR, sound card or wav shield and relay board to use the arduino. The PIR's are about $10 at radio shack and I just bought an 8 channel relay board for $8 on ebay. A sound card cost about $15 from electronics 123 and the wav shield cost about $20 from Ladyada.net.

But if you want to keep cost down, I would look into the relay way. Maybe save up and buy a controller down the road.


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## epoweredrc (Aug 6, 2012)

Cole&Jacksdad said:


> The picoboo is nice. Someone let me borrow one once. I use an Arduino for my props. Cost less, more input/outputs, but it takes some figuring out. They can be had on amazon for about $20, but for what you want to do, you would need a PIR, sound card or wav shield and relay board to use the arduino. The PIR's are about $10 at radio shack and I just bought an 8 channel relay board for $8 on ebay. A sound card cost about $15 from electronics 123 and the wav shield cost about $20 from Ladyada.net.
> 
> But if you want to keep cost down, I would look into the relay way. Maybe save up and buy a controller down the road.


Thanks for the info


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## Cole&Jacksdad (Jan 20, 2011)

Here is a timer control how to.
http://www.earthween.com/timer_control.html


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## epoweredrc (Aug 6, 2012)

Thanks everyone most motion lights can do 1 3 or 5 mins or test that does like ten seconds.
1 minute i hope be enough. Guess imma try anyways.
Have to figure out how to wire up a relay not sure what will use for soun yet maybe pc speckers in a mp3 player


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## Xpendable (Sep 19, 2006)

Take a look at the MonsterShield. It has 4 outputs that can handle up to 10 amps AC current on each output and has an MP3 module. It can do animations up to 16 minutes long. It's cheaper and more powerful than the PicoBoo. The MonsterShield actually plugs into an Arduino, and can be purchased with and without the Arduino. Full disclaimer -- I'm the guy who designed the MonsterShield.


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## Palmdale Haunter (Mar 3, 2012)

Have your cd palyer on a looped track connected to a pair of powered computer speakers (can be had for really cheap). Plug the wall wart for the speakers into the same AC output of your PIR. When the AC comes on the speakers power up with no hesitation...


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## epoweredrc (Aug 6, 2012)

> Take a look at the MonsterShield. It has 4 outputs that can handle up to 10 amps AC current on each output and has an MP3 module. It can do animations up to 16 minutes long. It's cheaper and more powerful than the PicoBoo. The MonsterShield actually plugs into an Arduino, and can be purchased with and without the Arduino. Full disclaimer -- I'm the guy who designed the MonsterShield.


What is a arduino? Sorry im a newbie to sum this


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## epoweredrc (Aug 6, 2012)

Palmdale Haunter said:


> Have your cd palyer on a looped track connected to a pair of powered computer speakers (can be had for really cheap). Plug the wall wart for the speakers into the same AC output of your PIR. When the AC comes on the speakers power up with no hesitation...


Thats a idea thanks... only thing i asked my father about thi he said some music players could get damaged not having the speckdrs playing all time maybe now day players have saftys


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## Xpendable (Sep 19, 2006)

epoweredrc said:


> What is a arduino? Sorry im a newbie to sum this


The Arduino is a microcontroller that is extremely popular with hobbyists and artists because it is well designed, easy to program, very capable, and inexpensive. It is open source and has a HUGE following. I'm not kidding... The Arduino has spawned all kinds of businesses, books, etc. Even RadioShack carries Arduinos now. There are tons of companies making "shields" for it (our product is abtly named the "MonsterShield") which are essentially expansion boards that stack on top of the Arduino.

The Arduino has 13 digital input/output pins on it and 5 analog input/output pins. You can connect other electronics to these pins and write very simple "C" code using the Arduino software to make it do what you want.

Here's the link to the main Arduino site: http://arduino.cc Note that I do not have any affiliation with them.

Here's a really simple example that flahses an LED light on & off once per second. The LED would be connected to pin 13 and GND:

```
int led = 13;

// the setup routine runs once when you press reset:
void setup() {                
  // initialize the digital pin as an output.
  pinMode(led, OUTPUT);     
}

// the loop routine runs over and over again forever:
void loop() {
  digitalWrite(led, HIGH);   // turn the LED on (HIGH is the voltage level)
  delay(1000);               // wait for a second
  digitalWrite(led, LOW);    // turn the LED off by making the voltage LOW
  delay(1000);               // wait for a second
}
```
But don't let that scare you. With the MonsterShield, I've done all the programming for you. In fact, I've written over 2,400 lines of code to make the MonsterShield do what it does.

The MonsterShield operates very similiar to a PicoBoo or a NerveCenter when you use the keypad. Just wire up the devices you want to switch on & off to the 4 relay outputs, then press the "record" button on the keypad. Now press the 4 other buttons on the keypad to turn the relays on an off. Holding down a button keeps the relay on (and the device connected to it on) and releasing the button turns the relay off. When you're done recording the animation, you press the record button a second time. Everything you just did is now recorded onto the MonsterShield's non-volatile memory chip. That means that it remembers everthing even after you turn the power off. When the MonsterShield is then triggered by something like a motion sensor, it plays back the animation you recorded.

But the MonsterShield does a lot more than that. You can actually record up to 15 different animations and have the MonsterShield randomly select one of those 15 animations to play when it is triggered. And each animation can have it's own MP3 audio track.

What I think really sets the MonsterShield apart from the rest of the crowd, though, is the fact that you can connect it to your computer using a USB printer cable and you can use the MonsterShield Editor software to create and edit your animations visually, right on your computer screen. These animations can be downloaded to the MonsterShield. Or you can even upload the animations stored on the MonsterShield to your computer and you can edit them, fine tune them, save them, whatever. Here's a video showing the MonsterShield software in action. Each time you see a red square on the left light up, that's a relay actually being turned on. When the red "light" turns off, the relay turns off.


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## epoweredrc (Aug 6, 2012)

thanks for the info i did find a video about it pretty neat


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## goneferal (Sep 8, 2010)

Arduino is really versatile. It takes a little learning, but for a complete newb like me it wasn't that hard to learn. (Not that I have it all figured out!).


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## Xpendable (Sep 19, 2006)

Of course the MonsterShield hides all that from you... out of the box, it's a ready-to-run full-featured prop controller. Most of our customers know nothing about Arduinos, nor do they need to know anything about Arduinos. It's designed to be easy to use so that anybody can use it, yet it's got the versatility and hack-ability for the advanced electronics geeks and programmers. I would say it's the most versatile prop controller out there. We have the ability to introduce new features by changing the MonsterShield code, and the end-user can update the code on their units to take advantage of these updates without ever having to do any programming. Nobody else has the ability to do this that I know of.


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