Multiple color pickers for MQTT (arduino) light?

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Setting up some string lights - WS2811 (neopixel) with an ardunio/esp8266 thing. I have it working with the “bruh automation” code but it’s not quite what I’m looking for.

I’d like to create a group with 3 color pickers in the UI that each send a color (and maybe brightness) as an MQTT message to the arduino/esp8266. The goal is to create 1 or 2 simple string light animations with them (like a 3-color candy cane or static c1/c2/c3/c1/c2/c3 display).

I can probably figure out the arduino code side, but what’s the best way to set up the UI? Just create 3 separate MQTT lights?
Or is there something similar to an “input_number” that’s just a color picker?

Thanks

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Okay I have something working but it’s not ideal.
I’ve added 3 MQTT RGB lights in Home Assistant and set each to a separate mqtt “topic” and set my esp8266 to subscribe to all 3 topics and parse all 3 colors, brightness and states separately then turn on the light string accordingly.

The “bruh automation” code isn’t stable and crashes after a while (even when just a solid color is set) but that’s a totally different problem I’m trying to solve.

In the UI I now have Color 1, Color 2 and Color 3 and they all appear with separate on/off switches. I’d prefer to just have one on/off switch, then 3 color pickers. Then a brightness slider and an animations drop down select. Is that possible?

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have you looked at ESPHOMELIB? I just used it with the effects engine to create a custom “animation” which is what you are going to want to create.

https://esphomelib.com/esphomeyaml/components/light/fastled_clockless.html

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That looks interesting. So what does the UI look like? You can set multiple color pickers for one led strip?

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I have esphomelib up and running and I like it a lot! Were you able to do anything with the multiple color pickers? I would love to implement this as well.

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I was only able to do it successfully with bruh automation’s code but it would not run more than 15 minutes.

I can’t really even figure out what esphomelib is… you install it on an esp8266 then configure it with yaml? I’m not even seeing how you flash the esp8266 in the guides. Sounds cool but really just makes the hardware less flexible. I opened up the github, no way I’m smart enough or have the free time to modify the code to make custom automations.

I will probably end up starting my own arduino code that receives mqtt messages for 3 different mqtt topics and creates light strip animations that better suit me using Adafruit library. Unfortunately without a stable starting point I definitely won’t have time until after the holidays so I’m stuck with the generic “Merry Christmas” animation.

I just wish I knew what was making Bruh Automation’s code unstable because it’s a perfect starting point (other than having terrible commenting)

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Were you able to to any custom animations with multiple color pickers? Just wondering if someone had created this before I recreate the wheel.