For this project I really want to use acrylics and since there needs to be light I’m really excited to try to LED lit side of acrylic type thing.
I have made a design that will have three layers each with their own color. Which color is depicted in my inkscape drawings may not be the final colors but I will be working with blue, red, and green LEDs so it could be!
I look inspiration from these pieces of art. When I saw the second picture I thought there was a line drawing of a figure and I loved that idea!. Then I realized that is not at all their design so I decided it was gonna be mine! And I have always been fascinated with the human skeleton as well as taken a few figure drawing classes so it seemed like the perfect opportunity to combine the two.
I have ordered sheets of 8×12″ Lucite Light Acrylic from Inventables and after much searching finally found 3 differently colored 12″ LED strips that each come with their own battery pack.
My question is how do I display this project? I need ideas on what I should make the house the LED stips so that the acrylic can be securely centered over the strips (both have a width of 1/4″) and what material to use for this “stand”. All Ideas are welcome!
Right now I’m thinking I could try and design a simple box maybe 2″ deep that has a whole cut out the top for the layers of acrylic to fit into, one tight enough so that the stack stands up straight together even through they are sitting on the lines on LED lights that are stuck to the bottom of the box. The battery packs are a good size but I would be fine with them inde the box or outside with maybe the cord going through the back wall so they can sit on the sace surace of the lantern but stay hidden behind the display.
Thank you for reading my post and if you share any ideas for the display!
Hi! to try to answer your questions : possibly you could have a box with the strips at the bottom, then a layer of clear acrylic, then your acrylic for the different colors stood up ontop of that and potentially glue or mechanically fixed into the box. You could then have a hole in the back bottom portion of the box/frame to access the light strips and their battery packs.
Hi Iris! Your design is really beautiful and I can picture an anticipated final piece in my head. What you described after asking your question was what I was thinking of. If you spaced out your pieces a tad inside the box, it would look layered from the side bit all come together in the front! Good luck!
Hi Iris,
For the base I think your idea is good to make a box from the box.py website and cut a slit in it to hold the acrylic, then add a hole on one side to insert LEDs. Or maybe you could try getting a box 3D printed at the makerspace, I don’t have any experience with that tho. How large do you plan on making each acrylic layer?
Thank you for your suggestions! For size I am not totally sure just yet, but I ordered three 8×12″ acrylic sheets but now that I think about it I will need materials for tests, so I might end up making them 6×8″ so I have enough material to mess up once. But it really depends on if I can cut the LED stips shorter than the 12′ they come in, and unfortunately they won’t arrive until maybe may 7th.
Hi! I think having a box to store/hold the lights and piece would work. I think you could also incorporate aspects of a skeleton/the skeleton piece into it if it seems out of place?
I think that it would be good to make the base out of birch wood and painting it black or a neutral color. I would recommend makercase website.
Hi iris! I think building it into a black shadow box picture frame would be really cool. If you have some space between each layer and an LED strip build into the picture frame you could super easily hide all the electronics and lights. let me know if you need help with the LED’s I’m playing with them right now too.
Hi Iris! This is a super cool idea! I think a stand would work well. What you could do is have 2 layers of the stand so that the top layer could hold the acrylic pieces with the design and then you could wedge the LED strips between another layer under it. The top of the stand that is under the acrylic sheets should be clear so that they can shine through, but to make it neater you could add a black box around it!
Have you thought about playing around with the shape of the box as opposed to a rectangular base? Something with a slope perhaps?
I have not, but I will now!