[smash_hand] had a clear goal: a big, featureless, white plastic disk with RGB LEDs concealed around its edge. So what is it? A big ornament that could glow any color or trippy mixture of colors one desires. It’s an object whose sole purpose is to be a frame for soft, glowing light patterns to admire. The disk can be controlled with a simple smartphone app that communicates over Bluetooth, allowing anyone (or in theory anything) to play with the display.
The disk is made from 1/4″ clear plastic, which [smash_hand] describes as plexiglass, but might be acrylic or polycarbonate. [smash_hands] describes some trial and error in the process of cutting the circle; it was saw-cut with some 3-in-1 oil as cutting fluid first, then the final shape cut with a bandsaw.
The saw left the edge very rough, so it was polished with glass polishing compound. This restores the optical properties required for the edge-lighting technique. The back of the disc was sanded then painted white, and the RGB LEDs spaced evenly around the edge, pointing inwards.
The physical build is almost always the difficult part in a project like this — achieving good diffusion of LEDs is a topic we talk about often. [smash_hands] did an impressive job and there are never any “hot spots” where an LED sticks out to your eye. With this taken care of, the electronics came together with much less effort. An Arduino with an HC-05 Bluetooth adapter took care of driving the LEDs and wireless communications, respectively. A wooden frame later, and the whole thing is ready to go.
[smash_hands] provides details like a wiring diagram as well as the smartphone app for anyone who is interested. There’s the Arduino program as well, but interestingly it’s only available in assembly or as a raw .hex file. A video of the disk in action is embedded below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBKDtne5SQE
Making LED lighting interactive comes in many different shapes and forms, and as the disk above shows, shifting color patterns can be pleasantly relaxing.
I like my wifi-enabled toilet seat.
Solid
You might be able to reduce the work involved in making this thing by using a premade tape from China.
There are tapes with up to 144 LEDs per meter. The only thing you have to watch out for is the gap between the first and last LED, but you could easily design around this by tuning the circumference.
That’s a great idea. Also, if you could get away with using acrylic for the disk then laser-cut acrylic comes out of the laser cutter with a glassy-smooth polished edge. No post-processing required. You could even notch out small spots for the LEDs themselves so the LED strip sits flush. (Not so with polycarbonate, however. It laser cuts relatively well but comes out with a yellowish brown gross residue/burn.)
I can not imagine any reason, why acrylic should make a problem. The question is probably, what material he had on hand.