Repo for my created pixel art, and projects involving the CRKBD OLED Displays
The older method (below this section) has limitations, such as not using the entire screenspace, and limiting you to 1 pixel art per keymap. The new method uses OLED_WRITE_RAW, uses the entire screen, and allows for more than 1 piece of art in your keymap (amount dependant on firwmare size limitations) The newer method involves:
- Setting a canvas size to 128x32 pixels on MSPaint, then sketching out whatever you want your art to be (will be rotated 90deg counterclockwise of how it ultimately displays)
- Loading the image on Image2cpp
- Set Draw Mode: "vertical" and generate output (depends on your OLED rotation in the keymap)
- Grab the output and drop it in your keymap (sample code here)
- Call your new function near the bottom of the keymap in the void oled_task_user section.
This will be re-written in greater detail at some point, but should be enough to get you going. Play around with it, and you should be able to figure something out.
Disclaimers: this is going to be very long-winded, and definitely won't be perfect. This is only a list of steps detailing what I did to get mine working.
Helix font editor - for making custom glcdfont.c files
So, I'm writing this with the assumptions that you:
- Have a split keyboard with two OLEDs
- They have already been enabled in your firmware
- You know how to manually edit and compile your firmware (use Newbs guide above, if not)
- You can grab a copy of the default glcdfont.c from the directory
qmk_firmware/keyboards/crkbd/lib
OR
- Grab a copy of my glcdfontstarter.c from the github repo Just right-click "raw" and "save link as"
In my "starter" copy, I outlined the usable area to make it easy to see your "canvas size" while editing the file. The solid line border corresponds to the outermost pixel border on your OLED screen.
-
Open it in the helix font editor page (linked above)
-
Edit as desired, download, and save to your keymap directory (in my case
qmk_firmware/keyboards/crkbd/keymaps/rustyjonez) -
Add this to your config.h file:
#define OLED_FONT_H "keyboards/crkbd/keymaps/YourUsername/YourFontFileName.c"e.g. keyboards/crkbd/keymaps/rustyjonez/glcdfontstarter.c
This step configures your keymap to point at your local copy, instead of the default font file. You can rename your file to whatever you want, just make sure your path matches your username/whatever you've named the font file.
- Finally, make sure you have the right stuff going on in your keymap.c - use the QMK logo documentation above
There's a few factors at this point.
First: rotation (since it's the first thing addressed in my OLED section of the keymap.c)
See this link. The highlighted section shows my master (left hand) OLED orientation - It's at 270 because I like to display my layer information vertically. (stole that from /u/drashna 's keymap! Thanks Drashna!)
I've got the OLED_ROTATION_180 setting for the non-master side. Because the glcdfont's logo space already at 90deg when you edit it, you don't need to rotate it as far to show your image vertically. This was key in making sure my image wasn't a garbled mess.
Secondly you'll want to ensure you have the render_logo piece discussed in the QMK docs.
In mine, you can see I named it "render_rj_logo".
You can name this however you want, but keep it simple enough so you can reference it in the next piece.
Third, We then reference this directly below, specifically in the render_status_secondary block at line 241. You can ignore the stuff I have commented out there, just take note of line 246- that's where you'll need to reference your `render_logo block.
Lastly, ensure your master/slave setup for your halves call the proper render_status..
Once you compile and have flash both microcontrollers, you should be in business! If you want to do a logo on both sides, or tackle it differently than my setup, that'll be a different can of worms, but is entirely doable.
Once you play with all the pieces above, you should get a pretty good idea on the basics of how the OLED's do their magic. From there it's just a matter of trial and error!
Best of luck to anyone who uses this guide, let me know if there's anything that needs clarification or is otherwise confusing. I'm by no means an expert, but if I could figure this out, you definitely can!
Cheers :D