Adjusting a panel

Yesterday me and Irena went to the Design Factory to try to figure out the adjustment of a single panel. Basically we found some cardboard-like material, drilled some holes to it, stuck nine CDs on it and tried to lift their edges so that they would reflect to a single point.

Reflection before adjusting

Adjusting the CDs to reflect to a focal point at around two metres of the panel was surprisingly easy and didn't require great accuracy. Basically we "measured" the right angles of one side CD and one corner CD by sticking a cardboard cylinder through the holes and twisting and turning it until the angle seemed right. This way we would figure out the measurements of the wedges that go under the CDs. At this point, though, we were just playing around with play dough, so we just put four "equally sized" (measured by eye) pieces of the dough under the edges of the corner CDs and and four thinner pieces under the edges of the side CDs, and voilà:

Reflection after adjusting

Perspective of the focal point

We also noticed that by curving a CD just a tiny bit (basically just giving it a little bit of pressure), you could increase the intensity of its reflection at a single point significantly. Unfortunately it can't be seen in the photo that well, unless you try hard to see it:

Reflection when curving two of the CDs

Another thing we noticed was that the adjustments worked quite well with angles and distances that were close to the originals. We were in a small space, so we didn't really test big differences in distances. However, the more the angle changed, the worse was the result:

Reflection of a light that met the panel in a bigger angle

We figured the next step could be doing this with better materials and accuracy and not just play dough, tape and rough measurements, so we might be going back later this week (possibly Friday) to do that. Feel free to join if you're available!