Concept sketches
Prompt: Design and fabricate two enclosures for your soldered LED/Button circuit. One with a laser cutter. One with a 3D printer.
Since my LED light was green I was inspired by the color and wanted to create enclosures that were on theme and could be paired together. I thought of a lily pad and a frog.
My initial thoughts were that the lily pad could be the lid to a laser cut box and a water lily could be placed on top to act as a button. The frog would be 3D modeled/printed and when the tongue is pressed the eyes light up.
3D modeling in Rhino
I started by modeling my circuit board with exact dimensions so I could test how the board would fit and be positioned in each enclosure. I also created a 3D model of the hexagon concept with the lily pad lid to see how that placement would look. I then used makecase to get the box plans for the hexagon box and I imported the file into Rhino and scaled it to fit the circuit.
After finishing the lilypad enclosure, I proceeded to model the frog enclosure by combining multiple spheres. I sliced the frog in half and added thickness to the walls. I also placed the circuit inside to make sure that the placement of the mouth was right above the button.
Since time allowed, I also modeled the water lily that would be used as the button press for the lily pad. I combined a variety of shapes in order to resemble the flower.
Fabrication
Once everything was 3D printed and laser cut, I started with prepping the frog enclosure. The printing filament was very dark and I wanted my frog to be green; I sanded the frog, painted it white, and sanded again. Once it was smooth, I spray painted the frog green in order to get a shiny smooth finish. The acrylic box was assembled by putting the joints together, and only some edges didn't quite fit so I used some thick double sided tape to keep them in place.
In order to make my circuit button functional in each enclosure, I needed something that would be precise enough to fit through the lily pad and reach the button. For the frog, I needed something that would look like a tongue but also function as the button press. The best solution I found was air dry clay because I could mold it to the exact length and thickness I needed. Once it dried, I could also sand it down if needed and paint it,
Final Enclosures & Demo videos
