Hello everyone,
As promised here are some pictures of the finished thing. Managed to get it finished in time after a very late night putting it all together on Thursday, amazingly it worked first time and I only had a couple of dodgy soldering joints on the LEDs to fix.
@MrRB - The PICs weren't supplied by the lecturers, I had to buy them out of the budget for the project, but they're only £1.70 each so not really a massive expense. I went to try and get the code off the lecturers yesterday afternoon but they'd gone home for the weekend so I can't post it!
@blueroomelectronics - I work for a university, my official job title is 3D visualiser and graphic designer, but I get given a broad range of projects to do.
Thanks again to everyone for all your advice, I apologise if anyone feels I've not listened to your suggestions but in the end I had to go with the solution of people who were on hand to help, however absurd it may be.
Let the torrent of criticism begin!