Tree of Lights

Umm... I posted this on twitter three years ago, so it's at least that old. I'm really surprised I haven't posted about it here already.

Anyway, it was a very simple project. Hanging around the hackerspace someone was giving away laser cut extras. I nabbed one, painted it in a mostly transparent metallic green. Then I took twelve RGB auto-changing LEDs, bent the legs, and perched them on each of the branch tips. I connected them all by way of conductive paint traces. My paint was quite old, a bit dry, and rather difficult to work with. I've since gone over the traces with wire glue (that you can get most places that sell soldering and pc repair gear), and that went much more smoothly. Many of the LEDs don't want to cooperate and in some cases I've had to hot glue them in place, repeatedly. I've also hot glued some wires onto the conductive paint traces at the roots to attach power. The power is unevenly distributed, but it's still pretty to look at.

Tree of Lights; RBG LEDs connected by conductive paint
Photo by chebe