Lightbringer
A Burning Man mutant vehicle — an art car wrapped in LED lighting and propane flame effects, rebuilt and refined across multiple years.
Tech: Arduino · HMTL · LED arrays · propane flame effects · PCB design
The Lightbringer is a Burning Man mutant vehicle: an art car covered in addressable LED lighting and propane flame effects, driven by the HMTL control framework. It has been built up and reworked across several years — each year’s application notes are preserved as blog posts, linked below.
The detailed year-by-year notes live in the blog; this page is the consolidated overview. (Draft consolidated from the original application posts — pending Adam’s review.)
2017 — Concept and first application
The original mutant-vehicle application laid out the concept, deck layout, and the lighting and flame-effect control system. See Mutant Vehicle Notes (2017).
2018
First playa year for the rebuilt vehicle. See Lightbringer 2018 Application Notes.
2019
A substantial change to the front of the vehicle and a reworking of the lower decorations to better cover the base vehicle’s frame, plus the first of the flame effects running on playa. See Lightbringer 2019 Application Notes.
2022
Replacing the previously fabric panels with rebuilt sections, completely rebuilding the upper fin and wings, and building more extensive flame effects into the fin. See Lightbringer 2022 Application Notes.