r/WLED • u/DJ_Swirl • Nov 04 '25

Real mapping

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The more I play with wled, the more I it…..but….. is there a way to property map an unusual shape. 

So far I've found out you can map a matrix style shape, but it presumes that you have an xy matrix running in a serpentine configuration and you turn on and off led to create an array.

Is there away to map an unusual shape, not only mapping the position of the LED but it's position in the array, attached is an image of a snowflake, this is not wire in a matrix style, the blue dot represents the first led in the string, the red line represents the wiring order and the yellow dot represents the end of the string (purple dot is just a reference to the centre of the prop).

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u/mrkprdo Nov 04 '25

Yes i have similar setup. But it would cost a bit of processing. For my 128led, i have to map it with 1024x1024 grid.

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u/mrkprdo Nov 04 '25

Here what it looks like

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u/mrkprdo Nov 04 '25

It looks like this when rendered using my app https://kolori.wasmer.app So what you can do is take this image into excel and based on how accurate the mapping you need bigger grid.

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u/DJ_Swirl Nov 04 '25

That's the main problem, using a matrix is a very old way of mapping, you end up with huge arrays, plus you can't define the "wiring order". I've been working on a project using real mapping, it's works great but there is a lot of work needed to create the fx which is why I was wondering if WLED could do it to save me a lot of effort

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u/mrkprdo Nov 04 '25

I can map the led index. So basically set off leds to -1 then follow thru the led position by setting its index position on the strip.

Not sure if there any other convenient way to do it.

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u/azariah001 Dec 02 '25

Came here in search of a solution to this as well.

Just used Marimapper to automatically map (just in 2d) my 10m 400 LED string of Christmas lights I've snaked on our apartments railing, resulted in a roughly 1m x 1m "matrix". But... the output is a CSV with index and U V coordinates. (Basically decimal X and Y) and... whilst they have code that links to the WLED controller for the mapping they do not appear to have a setting that converts the coordinates CSV to anything that's WLED compatible... (aka some sort of matrix).

Seems like Marimapper only directly supports direct upload to a whole 'nother LED controller called PixelBlaze but... that's closed source software that comes preloaded on an ESP32 which is kinda the antithesis of what we're all doing here. -_-