35min

360: Masu

| wonko

It is Boxing Day, and I thought it appropriate to try a box I have had in my “must try” pile – David Brill’s Masu:

A Masu is a traditional Japanese timber box that used to be used to measure rice or beans, these days it is used for sipping sake out of.

This ingenious construction is fully 3d – outer and inner edges kept apart via a nifty corner trick (must remember that sort of pleat) and the bases are sprung using a brilliant twist.

An exercise in fifths, the pre-creasing makes all the points necessary for a wonderful collapse – this is a keeper, as it’s proportions and technique have other applications – particularly like the corner collapse that I thought was initially impossible.

Folded from an A3 rectangle, I then tried an A4 (just to prove to myself it was not just a fluke) and it is even cuter – nice.

269: Brill’s Dolphin

| wonko

Now I am going visiting to the Sunshine Coast today, so thought something marine would be appropriate:

This lovely dolphin reminds me of “flipper” who appeared to frolic in the sea. The sad truth about captive dolphins however is that they lead miserable, confused lives and have a really short lifespan due to stress and noise in their tanks. There is increasing and justified pressure to release dolphins and orcas from captivity as it is inhumane.

The design for this model is ingenius, the body is triangular in cross-section, lovely tail flukes, sharp dorsal and pectoral fins and a beak, with open mouth.

It was difficult to photograph this model, so I perched it (via a blob of blutac) atop a mangled paperclip. Well dome Mr Brill

263: Enterprise (Micro Machine)

| wonko

Those who know me know that I am a bit of a trekker, always on the lookout for Star Trek related stuff:

When I saw this simple model I knew I would give it a go some day. Tonight my mate Mike and I watch some retro Trek (Original Series) and I thought it opportune to roll out the micromachine version – not sure if you remember the concept – there was a sort of “matchbox” to that was tiny versions of other things – this looks a lot like the micro machine version of the enterprise.

At this scale it was very fiddly indeed – tiny little folds in a very dense mid-section, but it figuratively represents the model so I am happy enough with it. If I were to fold it again I wold start with a much bigger sheet of paper.

Cute saucer-section, nacelles in more or less the right place, I even fashioned a deflector dish in the right place – cute if torturous.

Space, the final frontier, these are the voyages of the starship Enterprise …

161: A Dragon

| wonko

Now I have been looking for nicely shaped Dragons:

and stumbled across a Hungarian fold that reminded me of a cartoon one.

Lovely wings, thick and powerful tail, nice head – a fairly simple fold actually but sometimes simplicity is good too.  

I am working towards a Satoshi dragon, so I need all the dragon-practice I can get. I would like to pretend this one was my first-fold, but I scored a Year 11 Maths C stuporvision at school, and got bored with matrices and vectors so tried it then – so sue me.

Was going to give it to Josh, who has not shut up about dragons since he heard I was going to try the ancient dragon, but then he did not stop talking so took it back – you win some  lose some I guess.

157: A Little Mage

| wonko

You see a gaping cavern, the sudden rush of sulphurous breath hints at a hiding dragon, you fumble in your robes, raising your wand and hope your newly learned incantations are sufficient defence against the scaley foe …

I love RPGs, get lost in them all the time, as does my Wife. She has a good friend, on the other side of the world, who is having a birthday today – **Happy Birthday MIKE!!! ** So I thought making a mage (his fav class) would be a good idea.

Cute model, relatively few folds (which is good as I am not feeling the best atm), hope he likes it. Doubly fitting as it is also Draco Malfoy’s Birthday (potter geeks should confirm this).