Pearl Progress 4/13

I made a lot of progress on my project this last weekend and am about to make even greater strides tomorrow and this weekend. This last weekend I laser cut all of my pieces out, the map and the pieces to create the 3D buildings. Then I spent time cleaning them all off in preparation for spray painting them. I got a frosted glass spray at McGuckin’s that wold help give my extremely clear acrylic the more opaque look I was going for. This was a great way around buying very expensive already frosted acrylic and it gave the plastic a really cool texture. After spray painting many of the surfaces which took quite a bit of time I started glueing my building pieces together with epoxy glue and waiting for them to dry.

clear plan
Before frosting/spray painting. It has a nice aesthetic on its own, but would not adhere to the function of my design.
frosted plan
The new frosted look after the spray paint. I think it turned out pretty well.
frosted buildings
Completed building pieces that have been cleaned, sprayed, and glued.

This weekend I will be finishing the project, including having my electrical engineer friend help me out with the lights and finishing the form and aesthetic of my design.

lasercut, LEDs, light, map, pearl, progress
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2 Comments. Leave new

  • Katie Hortik
    April 17, 2016 8:11 pm

    The frosted pieces turned out really well! I am glad the frosted spray paint worked. What color lighting did you decide to you use? Are the buildings going back into the design? From what I can tell the edges look a little brown. With this project, I have been doing lots of laser cutting and discovered that (at least for the ones in the engineering center) the pieces turn out a lot better if I cut at a low power and low speed several times. For a while, the pieces were melting slightly so that seemed to fix the problem. I don’t know if this is helpful for this project, but it might be helpful in the future.

    Reply
  • Peter Brunsgaard
    April 17, 2016 1:26 pm

    Elyse, you’ve been making some major progress! It looks really good, and the frosted glass spray was a really nice addition. Were you able to get an even coating? Also, do you plan on frosting the edges of the buildings to get the frosted effect on every side of each building?

    Reply

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