faceted ellipsoid mirror

Yesterday, we fabricated a faceted ellipsoid mirror following up on some of the tangent planes work we’ve done over the years. The mirror is made of laser cut acrylic and plywood pieces. Each acrylic mirror piece is laminated to a plywood piece that has integrated holes for connectors and labels on the edges to aid in construction. For this piece, we made the interior surface mirrored and left the exterior raw, showing the construction method and logic. Our main goal for this prototype was to improve on our previous work by making a very sturdy and cleanly fabricated construction.

As you near the focal point of the ellipsoid, shard-like perspectives of the environment gradually transform into 70 reflections of the viewer. The video below sort of gives you a sense of it.

We’ve hoping to make some more mirrors of different geometries and with different focal points and possibly do an exhibition in our space in the coming months. Also I’d like to make some giant ones from steel mirror. Do you want to help? The construction process is a bit tedious…


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  1. Mahsa vanaki

    Amazing. Thanks for sharing the process.

  2. Andrew Heumann

    Do a paraboloid next! crazy optics, or use it as a solar cooker…

  3. Tamara Murphy

    How does the light refract? It seems you could do some incredible installation-type projects with this idea.

  4. Ben D

    reminds me of this amazing work by Anish Kapoor:
    http://pinterest.com/pin/274649277247545736/
    Saw it recently at the MCA in Sydney. Stainless steel mirror facets attached to a fibreglass dish reinforced by a steel frame.

  5. Harri

    Hi guys,

    Thought you might be interested in a large scale project we did using similar techniques.

    http://www.harrilewis.com/?p=360

    http://www.harrilewis.com/?p=302

    You can see that hinged supports are enough to lock the structure together – perhaps this could simplify the construction process. Let us know if you want to go really big! We are applying this to buildings..