⚠️ Photosensitivity Warning Patternflow displays rapidly changing light patterns that may trigger seizures in people with photosensitive epilepsy. Viewer discretion is advised. If you experience any discomfort, stop use immediately.
An LED synthesizer. Play light patterns with your fingertips. An open-source reinterpretation of Nam June Paik's Participation TV (1963).
Patternflow is an open-source hardware instrument: four rotary encoders controlling generative light patterns on a 128×64 LED matrix, powered by ESP32-S3.
Long-press encoder 4 to switch between patterns — all bundled in a single firmware image, no reflashing needed.
Build it from the files, or wait for the kit.
👉 Ready to build? Follow the Current Full Build Guide (docs/BUILD.md) to assemble your own Patternflow from scratch! You can also explore the modular Assembly Map (docs/assembly/README.md) for alternative enclosure and electronics paths.
v2.0.0 is live. Cold-boot fix, runtime pattern switching, browser flasher, Live Editor, journal, build map, and AI-assisted custom patterns.
Patternflow ships with a prompt template designed for AI coding assistants (Claude, ChatGPT, etc.). To make a new pattern:
- Go to the Live Editor in the Pattern section on patternflow.work and click Copy creation prompt.
- Paste it into your AI assistant (Claude, ChatGPT, etc.) along with a description of the look you want.
- Copy the generated JavaScript code, paste it into the Live Editor, and turn the virtual knobs in the web preview to test the pattern.
- Once you are happy with the visuals, click Copy C++ prompt in the editor and send it to your AI assistant.
- Save the C++ output as a new
pattern_*.hfile in thefirmware/patternflow/folder. - Register the namespace in
pattern_registry.h. - Open
firmware/patternflow/patternflow.inoin Arduino IDE and upload your custom build.
No GLSL or rendering pipeline knowledge needed. The template handles the encoder mapping, brightness curve, and HUB75 buffer interface; you describe the visuals.
Custom patterns require a local Arduino IDE compile/upload step for now.
PatternFlow OS v2.0.0 includes:
- Origin — concentric sine waves sampled by an emergent grid
- Wave Saw — rotated sawtooth waves with fractal noise distortion
More pattern studies and experiments are posted on Instagram. Not every study becomes built-in firmware; the feed is where ongoing visual research lives.
Everything about Patternflow began with Origin.
Two posts on r/arduino brought Patternflow to 150K combined views and 3.5K upvotes.
Hundreds of comments asked when it would be available, where to find the files, and how to build their own. The community was not asking for a product. They were asking for the files.
So Patternflow was opened — schematics, firmware, case, build guide, all of it in this repository. Hardware designs under CC-BY-SA 4.0; firmware and web code under MIT.
Patternflow is a reinterpretation of Nam June Paik's Participation TV (1963). Paik brought participation into art. Open-sourcing the design is an attempt to carry that gesture further, from participation into creation — not a finished object but a starting point. Build it, modify it, fork it, share it.
For the full story — failed prints, broken potentiometers, two weeks of debugging a strapping pin, the first PCB — see the 30-day journal.
- patternflow.work — browser flasher, Live Editor, journal, build map
- Releases — stable bundles
- Discord — questions, builds, custom patterns
firmware/— Arduino code for ESP32-S3, plus the custom pattern templatehardware/— enclosure files and electronics source files (case, PCB, Gerbers, schematic PDF)web/— Next.js site (landing, browser flasher, Live Editor, journal)docs/— build paths, build guide, media, license summary
If you already built a v1 unit, it still works as-is. v2.0.0's only PCB-side change is a 10kΩ pullup on GPIO0 that resolves the v1 cold-boot issue (pressing RESET on power-up was the v1 workaround). If your v1 boots reliably — especially likely with a genuine Espressif module — you don't need to change anything. To bodge the fix onto a v1 board, see Issue #16.
Firmware v2 is backward compatible with v1 hardware. Flash freely.
Guidelines for contributing to the repository are currently under preparation. In the meantime, please refer to the CONTRIBUTING.md file for more information.
- Firmware & web — MIT (LICENSE-MIT)
- Hardware & designs — CC-BY-SA 4.0 (LICENSE-CC-BY-SA)
"Patternflow" is a trademark of SeungHun Lee.
The Patternflow series: LED Synthesizer (2026) · Origin (2026)
