Sometime in mid 2022, I found this online instructables from a guy who designed and created a relatively inexpensive fiber optic art installation in his home. The key ingredients were (1) individually addressable LEDs, (2) cheaper side-glow fiber optics made out of plastic, and (3) an arduino nano to run everything. I’ve had previous experience with the kind of LEDs that he used, so the project piqued my interest. I’ve always been fascinated at the intersection of art and technology, especially when it involves pretty lights. I was fortunate enough to have the time, budget and resources to complete the project. I’m very happy with how it turned out!
The project itself involves creating nine different fiber optic squares, arranged in a 3x3 pattern on a single wooden board. The electronics are hidden inside these squares, with wires coming out the back of the board. Fiber optics are randomly weaved through the inner portion of the square, connecting two different LED lights from end to end. Thus, after ordering all the needed materials, the first step was to try creating one of these squares and seeing how it actually looked. Once we could figure out how to make one, making the other eight would just take some time and patience.
The step that actually proved to be the biggest challenge was actually 3D printing these squares to hold the LEDs and electronics. The original plan was to have my roommate, Nick, use his 3D printer to create the squares, and I would work on the inner electronics. Unfortunately, we found it quite hard to print a nice-looking square. 3D printers work by “printing” many different layers, one at a time, on top of one another. For some reason, the printer he had never could make these layers align with each other. After several months of trying to work around this issue, my lab-mate Will luckily bought himself a Prusa 3D printer, which ran him around $800 dollars ($200 cheaper than the regular price, since he could assembled the printer himself). Turns out, this printer was much more stable at printer out our squares; he had all the pieces done within a week!
It took me about a month to fit all the LEDs and wires within the squares. The longest step during this process was cutting and soldering the wires at just the right length so that LEDs would align with the holes in the squares, so the light could shine through. By the end of this project, I am much more comfortable soldering now.
The last steps involved cutting, drilling through-holes and spray-painting a piece of plywood. This served as the back frame to attach all nine squares, behind which all the wires and electronics would hide when hung on the wall. I must say, it was a magical moment when all nine squares were attached to the back frame and turned on for the first time.
The whole project was a good learning experience for me, for it combined a lot of things I already knew about (LEDs, arduino) with a lot of things I could learn about (3D printing, basic woodworking). I’m really happy with how it turned out, and hopefully I get to create other projects like this in the future!
