LED Grab

Ambient lighting system that captures screen content and drives LED strips in real time. Supports WLED, Adalight, AmbileD, and DDP devices with audio-reactive effects, pattern generation, and automated profile switching.

What It Does

The server captures pixels from a screen (or Android device via ADB), extracts border colors, applies post-processing filters, and streams the result to LED strips at up to 60 fps. A built-in web dashboard provides device management, calibration, live LED preview, and real-time metrics — no external UI required.

A Home Assistant integration exposes devices as entities for smart home automation.

Features

Screen Capture

• Multi-monitor support with per-target display selection
• 5 capture engine backends — MSS (cross-platform), DXCam, BetterCam, Windows Graphics Capture (Windows), Scrcpy (Android via ADB)
• Configurable capture regions, FPS, and border width
• Capture templates for reusable configurations

LED Device Support

• WLED (HTTP/UDP) with mDNS auto-discovery
• Adalight (serial) — Arduino-compatible LED controllers
• AmbileD (serial)
• DDP (Distributed Display Protocol, UDP)
• Serial port auto-detection and baud rate configuration

Color Processing

• Post-processing filter pipeline: brightness, gamma, saturation, color correction, auto-crop, frame interpolation, pixelation, flip
• Reusable post-processing templates
• Color strip sources: audio-reactive, pattern generator, composite layering, audio-to-color mapping
• Pattern templates with customizable effects

Audio Integration (Windows)

• Multichannel audio capture from any system device (input or loopback)
• Per-channel mono extraction
• Audio-reactive color strip sources driven by frequency analysis

Automation

• Profile engine with condition-based switching (time of day, active window, etc.)
• Dynamic brightness value sources (schedule-based, scene-aware)
• Key Colors (KC) targets with live WebSocket color streaming

Dashboard

• Web UI at http://localhost:8080 — no installation needed on the client side
• Device management with auto-discovery wizard
• Visual calibration editor with overlay preview
• Live LED strip preview via WebSocket
• Real-time FPS, latency, and uptime charts
• Localized in English and Russian

Home Assistant Integration

• HACS-compatible custom component
• Light, switch, sensor, and number entities per device
• Real-time metrics via data coordinator
• WebSocket-based live LED preview in HA

Requirements

• Python 3.11+ (or Docker)
• A supported LED device on the local network or connected via USB
• Windows for GPU-accelerated capture engines and audio capture; Linux/macOS supported via MSS

Quick Start

git clone https://github.com/yourusername/wled-screen-controller.git
cd wled-screen-controller/server

# Option A: Docker (recommended)
docker-compose up -d

# Option B: Python
python -m venv venv
source venv/bin/activate        # Linux/Mac
# venv\Scripts\activate         # Windows
pip install .
export PYTHONPATH=$(pwd)/src    # Linux/Mac
# set PYTHONPATH=%CD%\src       # Windows
uvicorn wled_controller.main:app --host 0.0.0.0 --port 8080

Open http://localhost:8080 to access the dashboard. The default API key for development is development-key-change-in-production.

See INSTALLATION.md for the full installation guide, including Docker manual builds and Home Assistant setup.

Architecture

wled-screen-controller/
├── server/                          # Python FastAPI backend
│   ├── src/wled_controller/
│   │   ├── main.py                  # Application entry point
│   │   ├── config.py                # YAML + env var configuration
│   │   ├── api/
│   │   │   ├── routes/              # REST + WebSocket endpoints
│   │   │   └── schemas/             # Pydantic request/response models
│   │   ├── core/
│   │   │   ├── capture/             # Screen capture, calibration, pixel processing
│   │   │   ├── capture_engines/     # MSS, DXCam, BetterCam, WGC, Scrcpy backends
│   │   │   ├── devices/             # WLED, Adalight, AmbileD, DDP clients
│   │   │   ├── audio/               # Audio capture (Windows)
│   │   │   ├── filters/             # Post-processing filter pipeline
│   │   │   ├── processing/          # Stream orchestration and target processors
│   │   │   └── profiles/            # Condition-based profile automation
│   │   ├── storage/                 # JSON-based persistence layer
│   │   ├── static/                  # Web dashboard (vanilla JS, CSS, HTML)
│   │   │   ├── js/core/             # API client, state, i18n, modals, events
│   │   │   ├── js/features/         # Feature modules (devices, streams, targets, etc.)
│   │   │   ├── css/                 # Stylesheets
│   │   │   └── locales/             # en.json, ru.json
│   │   └── utils/                   # Logging, monitor detection
│   ├── config/                      # default_config.yaml
│   ├── tests/                       # pytest suite
│   ├── Dockerfile
│   └── docker-compose.yml
├── custom_components/               # Home Assistant integration (HACS)
│   └── wled_screen_controller/
├── docs/
│   ├── API.md                       # REST API reference
│   └── CALIBRATION.md               # LED calibration guide
├── INSTALLATION.md
└── LICENSE                          # MIT

Configuration

Edit server/config/default_config.yaml or use environment variables with the LED_GRAB_ prefix:

server:
  host: "0.0.0.0"
  port: 8080
  log_level: "INFO"

auth:
  api_keys:
    dev: "development-key-change-in-production"

storage:
  devices_file: "data/devices.json"
  templates_file: "data/capture_templates.json"

logging:
  format: "json"
  file: "logs/wled_controller.log"
  max_size_mb: 100

Environment variable override example: LED_GRAB_SERVER__PORT=9090.

API

The server exposes a REST API (with Swagger docs at /docs) covering:

• Devices — CRUD, discovery, validation, state, metrics
• Capture Templates — Screen capture configurations
• Picture Sources — Screen capture stream definitions
• Picture Targets — LED target management, start/stop processing
• Post-Processing Templates — Filter pipeline configurations
• Color Strip Sources — Audio, pattern, composite, mapped sources
• Audio Sources — Multichannel and mono audio device configuration
• Pattern Templates — Effect pattern definitions
• Value Sources — Dynamic brightness/value providers
• Key Colors Targets — KC targets with WebSocket live color stream
• Profiles — Condition-based automation profiles

All endpoints require API key authentication via X-API-Key header or ?token= query parameter.

See docs/API.md for the full reference.

Calibration

The calibration system maps screen border pixels to physical LED positions. Configure layout direction, start position, and per-edge segments through the web dashboard or API.

See docs/CALIBRATION.md for a step-by-step guide.

Home Assistant

Install via HACS (add as a custom repository) or manually copy custom_components/wled_screen_controller/ into your HA config directory. The integration creates light, switch, sensor, and number entities for each configured device.

See INSTALLATION.md for detailed setup instructions.

Development

cd server

# Install with dev dependencies
pip install -e ".[dev]"

# Run tests
pytest

# Format and lint
black src/ tests/
ruff check src/ tests/

Optional high-performance capture engines (Windows only):

pip install -e ".[perf]"

License

MIT — see LICENSE.

Acknowledgments

• WLED — LED control firmware
• FastAPI — Python web framework
• MSS — Cross-platform screen capture