We got the idea while visiting a furniture store. They had a similar installation for sale, for a lot of money.
This moon is a joint effort. A friend modelled the moon itself out of Moltofill (a German wall filler), and everything around it is mine: the box, the light and the controller.
The box
The base is a 50 × 60 cm plywood board with a circular cut-out for the moon. I cut the circle with a cordless trim router.
Around the cut-out I stapled white plastic angle profiles. The LED strip goes onto these profiles later. To make them follow the curve, I notched them at short intervals with side cutters. At first the whole profile snapped every single time. Only once I drilled pilot holes did it work.
The same profiles also run along the outer edge, for a second LED strip that shines backwards onto the wall.
Four wooden blocks in the corners keep the distance to the back panel.
Paint
I painted the panels in a dark colour. Apparently I hadn’t stirred the paint properly beforehand. The result is an unplanned but rather interesting patina.
The tech
The light is controlled by a Wemos D1 mini with an ESP8266 running WLED. Two LED strips hang off two separate outputs: one for the frame, one for the ring around the moon. That way both can be controlled independently.
Which LED strips they were exactly, I no longer remember after three years.
Power is distributed via Wago terminals, labelled 3V3, 5V and GND. Rounding it all off is an infrared receiver in the corner, which recalls the presets set up over Wi-Fi.
So that someone still knows later what goes where, the wiring is written in pencil on the board.
The first test: the frame lights up.
Done
The present went down well and is still in use. 😊