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July 17, 2011
Braden & Callan's Lithophane
COMPLETED
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These images first show the Aspire created simulation of the photograph.
The first engraving pass uses a 2mm Ball nose End Mill, this is known as the Rough Cut.
The final Finishing pass uses a 1mm Ball nose End Mill stepping in only 15% for each line. The total machining time this all took was about 3+ hours.
The first engraving pass uses a 2mm Ball nose End Mill, this is known as the Rough Cut.
The final Finishing pass uses a 1mm Ball nose End Mill stepping in only 15% for each line. The total machining time this all took was about 3+ hours.
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This is the first test on the purchased light box. First OFF then ON.
Now for mounting and back lighting with my own system, I first milled the back of a purchased wooden frame to accommodate LED strips Top and Bottom.
These shots show my engraved back light panel.
I place a white sheet of thin Glossy Film on the back engraved side to reflect as much light as possible forward. The 3rd photo is of the back of the back light panel set into the frame with the LED's ON
I place a white sheet of thin Glossy Film on the back engraved side to reflect as much light as possible forward. The 3rd photo is of the back of the back light panel set into the frame with the LED's ON
And this the finished product, Now I will admit to doctoring this image a little to even out the back lighting as mine system is not yet quite this good. However what you see in this image is in fact the actual result using the purchased back light panel.
Currently my panel design tends to fade out slightly towards the centre and even though it looks quite acceptable in real life, a photo taken of it over exaggerates this unevenness.
At the moment I only light from the top and bottom but tests show that if I lit on all 4 sides I would get an almost perfect even light over the surface. I am also experimenting with other engraving patterns and getting really good results just lighting from 2 sides.
Currently my panel design tends to fade out slightly towards the centre and even though it looks quite acceptable in real life, a photo taken of it over exaggerates this unevenness.
At the moment I only light from the top and bottom but tests show that if I lit on all 4 sides I would get an almost perfect even light over the surface. I am also experimenting with other engraving patterns and getting really good results just lighting from 2 sides.
This my second try at creating a true Lithophane. Selecting the type of Translucent Acrylic is critical to obtaining good results. If it has too transparent the final result will not give enough contrast between the lightest and darkest arias. For this one I used 4mm thick ACS-445 Opal Acrylic, the 3D image was carved to a maximum of 2.5mm deep. I have also done one of an Aston Martin Car using Blue Translucent Acrylic and the results were remarkably good. Anyway it is early days yet and I am still experimenting.
I first tested my results on a commercially purchased backlight panel, however these are expensive so I am also currently experimenting on making my own backlight system using LED strips and a clear acrylic sheet engraved with a pattern to give as even as possible light dispersion over its surface. You can get an idea of how I am making this from photographs further down this page. I am trying various engraved patterns and what you see is just one idea. So all this is a work in progress and below is one of my results to date.
I first tested my results on a commercially purchased backlight panel, however these are expensive so I am also currently experimenting on making my own backlight system using LED strips and a clear acrylic sheet engraved with a pattern to give as even as possible light dispersion over its surface. You can get an idea of how I am making this from photographs further down this page. I am trying various engraved patterns and what you see is just one idea. So all this is a work in progress and below is one of my results to date.
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Working on the back lighting system I made a significant discovery. To date I had been positioning the LED strip along the edge that was parallel to the engraved lines. I happened to try placing it along the edge that was at right angle to the engraved lines and found that the light dispersal travelled much further up the panel. In fact almost the full distance. I also found that if I increased the distance between each line to around 1.3 to 1.5mm this also improved things.
So in the images opposite these are untouched and as the camera took the shots. Now the final result does not look as good as the touched up one above but I am getting closer and honestly in real life it looks a lot better than in the photo. There is still some over brightness at the top and bottom and I have a way of dealing with this.
My latest modification test after these photos were taken indicate that the next version should be really, really good. This however will mean I have to machine a new frame as the positioning of the LED Strips and panels are different. So it will take another day or so.
So in the images opposite these are untouched and as the camera took the shots. Now the final result does not look as good as the touched up one above but I am getting closer and honestly in real life it looks a lot better than in the photo. There is still some over brightness at the top and bottom and I have a way of dealing with this.
My latest modification test after these photos were taken indicate that the next version should be really, really good. This however will mean I have to machine a new frame as the positioning of the LED Strips and panels are different. So it will take another day or so.
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After more refinement of the back lighting system these are the final images for this project. Painted the Frame black. I machined a new diffuser and now the lithophane itself is separated from the diffuser by 3mm. This way the lighting is more even over the entire surface and there is no visible sign of the engraved stripes when looking at it close up. There are some other refinements that I will cover on the separate Diffuser Backlight page.
From these photographs compared to the previous ones you might not see a lot of difference. This is because when lit they do not photograph that well due to the automatic nature of the camera compensating for the brightness of the light. I guess you will have to take my word for it that the final version in real is quite amazing, not my words but from a few friends that have seen it.
From these photographs compared to the previous ones you might not see a lot of difference. This is because when lit they do not photograph that well due to the automatic nature of the camera compensating for the brightness of the light. I guess you will have to take my word for it that the final version in real is quite amazing, not my words but from a few friends that have seen it.
Video available on YouTube
UPDATE 1
UPDATE 2