Lighting Panels

[rugby1]

Take a look at the picture on this site, 3rd picture from the left. (http://www.umaandgautam.com/viper/).   

He is obviously using LED's for a light source but I can't figure out what kind of material he is using for the panel.   I don't think it would be possible to take a clear or translucent peice of plastic, mask off the lines and letters and then paint it flat black and have it come out this nice.   

I'm thinking that this would be way cool to do something similar on a CP for 4/8 way joysticks.

Any ideas on how to do something like this?  has it been done before?  any tutorials?

[Xiaou2]

 It may be a printed overlay that is directly behind the front panel.  Then, theres a layer of white
plastic that the leds are embeddded into - which diffuses the light.

 As for the other way with masking and paint..  not sure.    Maybe with the new plastic sticking paints..  but ive never tried them yet.

 Btw - seems silly to use so many leds.   Why not use a single flourescent light, and add a green layer off
film (or printed on the overlay) ?      Unless its a space issue.    But in a cab,  youd have plenty of room.

[rugby1]

In this case I think he used so many LED's because space is an issue.   He is building a full mock up of an F-16 for a flight simulator.  Looks way cool and I would love to have one, but the time and expense is a bit over the top. 

This guy has over 1000 hours into the build of his simpit and still isn't done.  http://www.xflight.de/f16/

Supposedly all the buttons work.   can't imagine the amount of wiring that went into this.  Check out the pictures section!

(site is in english and german - click the appropriate flag to change)

edit:  Very detailed reproductions (too time consuming for my lazy @$$).... check out the "original equipment" vs his "repro equipment"

First pic is the original.