Together with my daughter we started a new project: an alien bioluminescent branch with multiple glowing life forms and crystals on it. It is supposed to be an enhanced night stand - night lamp. We had a lot of fun with it. Hope you like it too.

Supplies

Construction foam
Epoxy resin and forms
Paints (Amsterdam)
Diorama bushes, trees, rocks and sand (Army painter)
WS2812b cuttable led strips (for the crystals)
little Christmas leds for the mushrooms
lots of hot glue and a hot glue gun
SP110E bluetooth led controller for the crystal led strips
Hobby bandage plaster

Step 1: Construction Foam Modeling

Using construction foam we started making a lot of branches, larger and smaller. Since one can is a lot, we just kept going also knowing we didn't need it all.

Actually, in between we made another project with my son using a part of this foam: https://www.instructables.com/Halloween-Monster-Arm/

Step 2: Bandage Plaster Encasing

This step is needed if you want to give your lamp a more sturdy feel. Encasing it in bandage plaster, was the best option for us. And it also makes kind of fun to work with it. Also the little branches were easily formed with them. Just encase everything with short 10-15cm strips, so you can control it better.

Step 3: Base Paint

After the plaster dries out, a base paint of acrylic paints can be applied directly on the plaster. No primer is needed since the plaster takes the color in just fine.

Step 4: Crystal Works

Using the epoxy resin we made the crystals. Mix three colors to pour in the forms and give the crystals a nice gradient look from dark at the bottom and light at the top. Also putting some glitter in the resin gives the crystal some nice sparkling when the leds shine some light into it.

Step 5: Preparing the Electronics and Lights

Ok, now for the electronic part. We needed three short strips of the programmable WS2812b leds for the crystals mentioned above. Theese go in series and after putting some holes in the base branch, we put the cables through till the other side, where we connected them to the SP110E module.

The SP110E module can be connected to your smartphone via Bluetooth and about 200 programs can be chosen for the lighting.

Now for the mushrooms we also prepared a base from the little christmas led wires. First you wrap the wires around the base branch, keeping in mind where the mushrooms should be. There you form a little mushrooms out of the wire. Then with the hot glue gun, you pour some hot glue on top of the mushroom wire like shown in the last picture.

Step 6: Painting and Greens

The last step is the most creative one.

First you have to paint some shadows and lights on the base branch to give it a more "branchy" look.

Then the mushrooms have to take just as much color for the leds to be still able to shine through. Mixing paints with water did the trick.

The next step is to stick some grass and bushes with the glue gun on top of the branch, around the mushrooms, etc.

The last step is to put also some little rocks and sand on the branch (see last picture)

And that's it!

Hope you liked it ...

Introduction: Alien Bioluminescent Branch Night Lamp