This is a remake of a SHIELD Wall Art by coventrymakerspace, which I thought was excellent, but being as I like things shiny, I thought I could improve on it..

My plan is to have a beacon light in the centre of the wall art light up when something important happens like, I get mail, a txt, my cooker has finished, some one has pressed door bell. The idea is that it is configurable. For this instructions I will add the lights to make it glow and the red beacon lights in the middle. I will enhance this project in the future to add a ESP8266 which will let me interact with it via WIFI. You will have to pop back agent!

Material / Tools Used

Recycled Coke cans

Glue Gun

Soldering Iron

Small LED Strip sections

Wire

Step 1: Recycle Aluminium Can to Be Wall Offset and LED Holder

Process Can

Being careful with a pair of scissors cut can in half, cut down the edges to form flanges
Cut off top of can, recover sheet to build wall mount

Make wall mount

The hanger is made simply by folding the can strip into a suitable shape for hanging, the shape needed will depend on how you intend to hang the finished article on the wall.

This is fastened to the back centrally using hot glue.

Attatch bottom of can to enclose red LED

The center cover is also attached using hot glue, ensure you pass the wires of the led's out before you glue it in place !

Step 2: Add Some Light

Next I cut the LED strip at the appropriate points and placed them on the back of the Shield where the best coverage will be achieved, this is trial and error, the application of common sense is also very handy :)

Next, time to wield the soldering iron and connect all the strips together remembering to ensure the LED strip polarity is followed correctly.

Most strips need to have power input at one end, you will find that if you do not have this correct, when you apply power not all if the strips will illuminate, if this is the case, locate the offending LED strip and re-route the power in.

Step 3: Future Change

I am planning to add some method of making the center flash when receiving an email to give some interaction, this I thing could be done with an Arduino, Mosfet, and something like an ESP8266 Wifi Module, you never know that could appear on here in the next day or so !!!

Another possible improvement would be to fully cut the lettering out so the words around the edge would shine through as well..