Do or do not, there is no try:
This is Stéphane Gigandet’s “Yoda”, a lovely simple Star Wars character fold taken from a video I found on a Chinese version of a ebsite (the English version is here) – try it you should. Continue reading
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607: (57/365) Storm Trooper
…now I am as much a fan of Star Wars as the next browncoat. I loved Orac, thought he was the best little droid sidekick since Starbuck and 7 of 9 was my favourite character in all of the series:
This is Tadashi Mori’s “Storm Trooper” – a lovely little clone of a guy from the SW universe. Continue reading
605: (55/365) Starship
Origami, the final frontier. These are the journeys of the paper folder “Wonko”, his ONE YEAR MISSION, to seek out new models and folding techniques, to boldly fold where he has not folded before:
This cutie little Trek-inspired ship was hidden away in a Tanteidan convention book I have and all the annotations are in Japanese so I have no idea who the designer is, sorry. Continue reading
603: (53/365) Tsushima Cat
I have had this lovely little feline on my “must fold” list for ages. Found in a cursory scan of a Tanteidan convention book, the folding sequence was fascinating:
I waited until I had the right paper – in this case another sheet of hand-made Daiso paper with fibre inclusions in a rusty red. Continue reading
602: (52/365) Jason Ku’s Lizard
I bought some hand-made paper with inclusions from Daiso and wondered how it would fold, so looked for a punishing model to test it out:
This is Jason Ku’s Lizard – a lovely little critter with toes, an elegant tail and a funky face with gaping mouth and bulby eyes. Continue reading
601: (51/365) Hideo Komatsu’s “Rhino”
I want to pretend that I have the skill level to master a fold first go, but in truth, sometimes it is not as simple as that:
This Rhino appeared in the current edition of the JOAS magazine Tanteidan and I was determined to try it – an hour or so and it would be done – right? Continue reading
598: (48/360) Neal Elias’ “Rocking Horse”
This model is testament to the design genius of Neal Elias:
Taking the bird base, and a colour change, we fashion a jockey (with the cutest little cap) atop a rocking horse. I love the detail here and will probably fold this again, only with a slightly bigger bit of paper. Continue reading
594: (44/360) Shore Crab
A folder I follow on Facebook asked for volunteers to test his diagrams for a new crab design so naturally I put my hand up:
This is Tuan Hoang Pham’s “Shore Crab” design, a delightfully dense creation that is morphologically fairly close to a ghost crab in my opinion. Continue reading
592: (42/360) Sooo…Mr Whitehouse, Can you Fold a Paper Plane?
I have lost count of the times I have been asked this by students, presumably based on the assumption that because I fold paper I must make a mean paper plane:
Truth be told when I make simple paper darts they fly terribly, not sure why. Many of the worlds great origamists started with paper planes – I did not. Continue reading
590: (40/360) Daisy
“Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer do. I’m half crazy….”:
There were fewer chilling cinematic moments than the last conscious moments of HAL, the conflicted computer in Kubrick’s 2001 A Space Odyssey. The slow disappearance of cognisance is so beautifully portrayed. Continue reading
589: (39/360) Box with Hinged Lid
I seem to have an endless fascination with clever origami boxes – this one caught my eye and I knew I needed to try and fold it:
Anna Kastlunger has designed a nifty scalable box with an integrated hinged lid that is delightful and possibly useful for precious things. Continue reading
588: (38/360) Sipho Mabona’s “Swallow”
When planning origami models that will be good for permanent display, locks and paper tension matter as a model will try to unfold itself:
This genius design results in a fairly faithful swallow, the body is rounded, beak and head cleverly proportioned, tings and tail streamlined – it looks like it would fly. Continue reading
587: (37/360) Spider on a Leaf
Trolling around in the members area of Origami USA, I found a model that looks like it is made of 2 separate pieces of paper and decided to give it a try:
This is Diego Fernando Becerra Ramirez’s “Spider On Leaf”, a clever use of paper that fashions, via a bird base, a spider and leaf, managing a colour change in the process. Continue reading
584: (34/365) Tadashi Mori’s Facebook “Like”
Social media, gift that it is, has fundamentally broken two concepts I think. The “friend” and the “like” now no longer mean what they used to, and culturally I am not sure we are not really ready for that change:
The “friend” has come to mean some random that stalks you, watching what you do. Continue reading
582: (32/365) Flapping Bird wearing a Tsuru Costume
Those of you familiar with a traditional crane (Tsuru) will notice this one is a little odd – that is because it is folded on top of/inside a flapping bird:
This is an ingenious and complicated fold, for bi-colour paper that cleverly interweaves one model in the other. In the 3D photo below you can see the flapping action more completely – this model moves!
I realised I had never folded a traditional flapping bird, so this was a bit of a revelation – such a simple action model indeed. Continue reading