We've all seen various incarnations of weighted companion cubes from Portal, but I thought it would be nice if the cube was a little more than a dead weight. I offer here my take on a more loveable cube, the laser cut Lighted Companion Cube.

The lighted companion cube is completely portable, and gives many hours of light from a set of six standard rechargeable AA NiMH cells tucked away in his over-crowded interior. He has ambient and radiant modules. The radiant side is an array of 25 white LEDs, arranged in four concentric zones (1 x 1 LED and 3 x 8 LEDs) that can be controlled separately. With all four zones on it is very bright! His ambient module consists of a number of RGB (red, green, blue) LEDs. Each color can be controlled separately, allowing the user to set any possible color to reflect/complement their present mood.

The ambient side is also controlled by a charge/discharge circuit. Pressing the Charge button charges an internal 10,000 uF capacitor, which in turn drives a series of transistors to power the mood light. Over time the capacitor will discharge though, dimming the mood light and eventually switching off the light entirely. The light will gently fade away and automatically switch itself off, saving its battery power for many successive uses.