Mirrored Icosahedron dome - Pocket Universe

Projects
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Hello

I am attempting to write a arts grant proposal for GVIAS ( Greater Vancouver Interactive Arts Society ) - Playafied Art Grants Grants – GVIAS

I have never written a art grant proposal before and I don’t know what kind of wording they want or how much detail they need. I am use to writing building automation proposals that need every detail defined and complete schedule, gantt charts, etc. These proposals normally range in the 250-400 page range. I am told that its too much for arts grants.

I am looking for advice on my project. (Suggestions are welcome! ) and the overall wording of the proposal.

I am also looking for someone to help me render a image of the dome with the LEDS. (ray tracing) I want to show how the lights will bounce off all the walls.

Name of project: Pocket Universe

Physical Description:
Please describe physical aspects of your project, including final vision, placement, materials, and interactive components.

The ~10 foot structure is a wooden Icosahedron dome made out of 15 identical equilateral triangles. The inside surface of the dome is wrapped in Mylar reflective film creating a mirrored surface. Controllable RGB LED strip lighting will be attached to inside roof sections.

The light from these LEDs will bounce off the non parallel mirrored surfaces of the dome. This will creates an interesting visual pattern that should be different then most other mirrored boxes.

Inside the dome will be a control box with several buttons and sliders that allow the user to change the patterns on the LED strips. This will create vastly different lighting effects inside the dome.

The LED controller will be an clear acrylic box (12x6x6”) with ten arcade buttons and three slide controls. You will be able to see thought the box into the electronics inside. The box will be powered from 5v 1A power supply and have an Ethernet jack for connection to the LED strips.

A space of 15x15 ft will be required to set up the dome, the dome itself only takes up around 10x10 ft of space.

To make set up quicker and reduce the chance that people will poke and rip the Mylar reflective film. I will be cutting 15 identical equilateral triangles out of coroplast. Then pasting the Mylar reflective film on to these coroplast panels. On set up I plan to use zap straps to attach the panels to the struts of the dome.

The LEDs are button style 12mm WS2811 individually addressable RGB. I plan to cut holes in the coroplast with a laser cutter and arrange the LEDS in patterns on the ceiling tiles.

The floor will be made out of a combination of Mirrored acrylic with a protective lexan sheet bolted on top. This should take the weight of 2 people as well as being reflective.

Dome height: ~10 ft
Dome base: ~10x10 ft

Struct length: 6ft
Triangle area: 15.6 ft
Triangle height: 5.2 ft
Floor area: 61.9 ft square

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Interactivity:
Please describe how participants will be able to interact with your proposed project.

A person will enter the dome and will be able to alter the internal RGB LED lights from a small control panel. The control panel will consist of 3 sliders, and 10 buttons. The light from the RGB leds lights will reflect off of the internal mirrored surface to create a dazzling effect.

Timeline
Please detail your construction schedule which reflects your budget e.g. when materials will be purchased, milestones for completion of stages of your project, etc.

Oct 20, 2014

  • Purchase and pickup of the dome anderson plates, lumber, nuts and bolts.
  • Cutting the lumber to size and pre-drilling the holes for the Nuts and bolts.

Oct 25-26, 2014

  • Purchasing the Mylar reflective film,
  • Purchasing the LEDS, LED power supply, LED controller hardware.
  • Purchasing coroplast sheets.
  • Construction of the dome
  • Testing of stretching Mylar reflective film.
  • Testing assumptions.

Nov 1 - 4, 2014

  • Building the LED control console
  • Programing the LED sequences
  • Construction of the reflective dome floor.

Nov 4-10, 2014

  • Iterate on design as needed.
  • Completion.

Submit a Budget
Please upload a single file detailing all expenses for material, rental, or asset costs. Research your costs carefully and be specific. Art Grants cannot be used to pay for labour, transportation to / from GVIAS events, event tickets, or alcohol.

Suggestions welcome.

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Built at VHS
http://instagram.com/p/uhi8bBg5XC/?modal=true

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Here is a rendering that @RobertButterworth made for me

it looks so pretty.

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I like it. It also looks like an episode of Doctor Who, in the Tom Baker era… :smile:

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The dome is slowly taking over my apartment. I hope to add the mirrored film on to the panels today.

http://instagram.com/p/yMKAETA5eB/?modal=true

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More pictures here

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What kind of material the shiny stuff?

Is it something you could run a heat gun over to tighten it up over the
pieces a little?

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Mylar

Yes!, that is the next step.
But this is also a problem. I am planning on taking this down to burning man this year. Burning man has a normal high day time temperature of 99-114 F. Mylar starts to degrade and off-gas at 120 F (If I am reading the MSDS correctly). The mylar is inside an enclosed dome with little or no air flow, so I expect it to be hotter inside then outside.

So I am a little worried about it bursting in to flames on the playa, or more likely melting in to a puddle.

Acrylic would be the obvious choice instead of mylar but it would be prohibitly expensive as I would require 15x sheets of it (4x8’)

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Egads! Unless the intent is a heat/sweat lodge, I’m thinking some
pinholes to vent may be a good idea

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You might need to make it vent during the day and close at night… could be rather nice in there at night

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Can you insulate the outside? Would that even help or just make it hotter?
This is awesome!!!

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I’m not sure.
But I do have some heat lamps and a heat gun, two remote temperatures sensors and a love of testing.
Time to do science !

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I think you guys are probably right.

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Excellent. Please report back with results.

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AWESOME!

I must ask, is your real name Zarniwoop?

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I will be bringing the dome to

I have uploaded more pictures here

A video with some random string of LEDs running inside.

Its hard to take a menaningful picture of mirrored surface.

Now I have to make a choice

The mylar while cheap is not the best material for this project. its not 100% reflective, does not react to heat well, and scratches easy. At about ~175 F and it will cloud and shrivels. Not a good feature to have when I am taking it to the desert. (Burning Man)
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Mirrored acrylic is the obvious choice for this project but it costs too much. anywhere from $100-$250 a sheet depending on quantity and location. Its also heavy and tends to shatter under stress

Currently the structs are 6ft long each, A sheet of coroplast or mirrored acrylic is 4x8 feet. I can’t make a 6x6x6 triangle out of a single 4x8 sheet and you need to combine to differently cut sections out of the 4x8 sheet to get it to work.

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I have 6x sheets (4x8) of mirrored acrylic. With these sheets I could cut down the size of the structs to ~4.5 ft (height of the Equilateral Triangle will be 4ft). This would give me 3 panels per sheet, and I need 15 panels for all the sides for a total of 5 sheets of acrylic.
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The problem is that the dome will be considerably smaller. The current dome could easily fit 6 people in it, while the smaller dome would only be able to fit 2 people in it. (although it would fit in my apartment!)

So my choice is to shrink the dome down and use mirrored acrylic or keep using the mylar and use a swamp cooler in the desert to keep it from melting.

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Just throwing this out there. How about [rustoleum mirror paint][1] on a cheaper acrylic sheet?

Mark
[1]: http://www.rustoleum.com/product-catalog/consumer-brands/specialty/mirror-effect

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Here is a time lapse of the construction of the dome

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Have you considered using polystyrene mirrored sheet? Its intermediate in impact resistance between acrylic and polycarbonate.

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I don’t think that there’s a cheap way of getting the mirror effect you intend. Is there a geometric way of making a larger dome structure using 3 triangles per sheet as the base size without getting too crazy?

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I have decided to create panels for the outside of the dome. I can create all the panels by myself but I thought that it would be fun to let other people design them too. See below for the design spec. No pay! you don’t get to keep the panels. I am getting them cut at maker labs, and I need them done by the end of april.

Pocket Universe - Panel design spec

The outside of the dome is boring, I would like to add some CNC cut panels to the outside of the dome to make it look better. I am opening up the design of the panels to a few friends to they could also create them.

There is no pay
I can not give you panels when I am done with them.
I don’t have anything to offer you in exchange for designing the panels.
Sorry.

More project information
http://blog.abluestar.com/projects/pocketuniverse.html

More images

The panels that I am working on and template files can be found here

Other people have made similar projects with similar CNC cut panels for the outside of the dome. The most remarkable version is probably the “temple” at burning man

https://templeguardians.org/about-the-temples/

Other examples:
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The design tends to lean itself towards Islamic geometric patterns ( Islamic geometric patterns - Wikipedia ) and Girih ( Girih - Wikipedia )

Don’t feel limited to what other people have done, do what you want to do.

Due date:
I am going to start cutting the panels now, so the sooner the better. The last day that I can delay to is end of april.

Details
Birch plywood, 9mm (3/8”) 7 ply
Hexagon shape (6 sides) Each side is ~24.2 inches
File format: SVG preferably but anything will work including jpg, anything…

These dimensions have been selected so that I can cut two panels on each 4x8 sheet of of birch plywood.
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Hexagon of 42 inches tall and ~48.4 inches from point to point. These numbers below are approximate but will give you a good idea of the shape and size of the panels.

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This is a rough outline of where the panels will be mounted on the outside of the dome.

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