box pleating

1105: En Garde

| wonko

It is a wonderful thing when designers share their processes, crease patterns and diagrams. Boice Wong is one that readily shares the CPs of his amazing designs, and when I saw “Sword and Shield V2”, I knew I had to give it a go:

Although I have been folding for decades, most of what i have folded has been from DIAGRAMS (step by step folding guides). By far the MAJORITY of origami out there does not exist as diagrams, but a larger proportion exist as CPs (crease patterns). I have been, over the last few years, working on my crease pattern solving skills.

This model is based on Boice’s 24 grid CP, and the collapse is relatively straight forward. Sometimes CPs give you crease orientations (red=mountain, blue=valley), sometimes not. The skill comes with deciding which creases to impose first as part of the collapse. Sometimes it does not matter, most it does, some you can derive based on “knock on effects” on one crease that causes the orientation of a sequence of subsequent creases. Sometimes it is pure witchcraft.

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1079: Neelesh Kumar’s “Experience”

| wonko

All too rarely does an origami fold feel autobiographical, but when I first saw the CP and published fold of Neelesh Kumar’s “Experience”, I knew I needed to try it:

1079: Neelesh Kumar's "Wisdom"

From a SINGLE uncut square we have 2 separate fully formed characters – an elderly wizened “know it all” and a youngster at the beginning of a large book he is holding. The clever narrative thread is that they are connected by the the beard that morphs into the book.

1079: Neelesh Kumar's "Wisdom" - OLD

“Experience” is many things to many people: knowing when to shut the fuck up and when to assert your opinion, a willingness to pass on what you know, knowing what you do not know, knowing what to say when.

1079: Neelesh Kumar's "Wisdom" YOUNG

This clever boxpleat is one of many NK specialises in, and I am not sure i have done it justice, but the character of the model asserted itself in the folding process so I went with the flow.

I struggled with the whole transition between characters, and initially completely forgot the collapse that formed the book, needing to un-do the little person almost completely before doing the book crenellation. Based on a 40×40 grid, the face of the elder was feature-rich, but the face of the younger very plain – I sort of muddled along, thinking the concept was as important as the detail.

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987: Ryu Zin Junior 2.1

| wonko

Rounding out my Ryu journey, I decided to use a small scrap of Kozo left over from another project to fold Jason Ku’s Ryu Zin Junior 2.1:

Jason Ku Ryu Zin 1.2

While sharing some of the nomenclature of the Satoshi Kamiya chinese dragon series, this little chap is markedly different on every level. I found a set of photo diagrams lovingly annotated by Daniel Brown, and thought I would give is a whirl.

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867: (317/365) Not Drowning, Waving?

| wonko

This time of year is horrible. The plain truth of it is that, for a teacher, we have more marking than a reasonable person can do, and deadlines that seem impenetrable:

I guess it is why teachers in Australia are payed the big bucks, right? Continue reading →

857: (307/365) Maekawa’s One Sheet Flower Stalk

| wonko

Many origami designers have tried to pack lots of details into the one sheet. I have folded Brian Chan’s One sheet Rose many times but I like the simplicity of this flower, stem and leaves:

Using some interesting box pleating and colour management make a rather nice simple flower atop a divided stem and pair of leaves. Continue reading →

794: (244/365) From little things, big things grow

| wonko

September 1 is often trotted out as the first day of Spring in the Southern Hemisphere:

Purists will argue that the spring equinox is not until the 21st of September, but with the climate as it is, it has felt like spring for weeks now in Brisbane. Continue reading →

784: (234/365) Fold-me Elmo

| wonko

Flipping through Tanteidan convention books I have I came across a delightful little figure that was screaming to be folded in orange:

This is Riki Saito’s “Mr Puppet Man”, but I reckon he looks a lot like “Elmo” so I am calling it so. (On second thoughts, isn’t Elmo Red? Oh well, never mind) Continue reading →

763: (213/365) There’s a Fly in my …

| wonko

Looking for something to fold that was vaguely “insecty”, I stumbled across a lovely box-pleated fly mangled from a 2×1 rectangle:

Based on a 16×32 grid, we isolate head, legs, lovely plump abdomen and leave the back flap for a lovely set of wings. Continue reading →

671: (121/365) Winter is Coming

| wonko

I want to pretend that we have a discernible Autumn in Brisbane, indeed there is a moderation of temperatures, but we lack the temperature drops and seasonal flora to clearly mark the change of season:

Having been places that have deciduous trees, and seen the glorious colour changes in leaves from yellow to red and all colours in between I appreciate the milder climate but miss the beauty. Continue reading →

505: Dragonfly

| wonko

As part of my JOAS membership, I get sent magazines with models to try – a really excellent collection of complex models from the worlds best designers. When I saw Satoshi Kamiya’s Dragonfly, I was really scared of it.505DragonFlyThe level of pleat management and re-arrangement of flaps and layers is truly terrifying when viewed as a whole.

As a “treat”, to reward my marking progress (I am a teacher, I set assessment but hate marking it) I allowed myself to complete a couple of steps each sitting. This fold has taken place over the period of 3 weeks, a little at a time. the advantage of this method is that I did not get freaked out by what was to come, just concentrating on the couple of steps I was allowed to complete. Continue reading →

500: Jackass

| wonko

To celebrate the 500th unique fold documented on this blog, I thought I would hold a guessing game whilst trying a fold I have been considering for a while.500JackAss

This is “Horse Laugh” by Kunsulu Jilkishiyeva from Nicholas Terry’s “Drawing Origami Tome 1” – a fun fold that sees some amazing box pleating and layer management to make a really detailed head (with lips, teeth, eyes, the works), tail, rather lovely mane and some funky legs. Continue reading →

447: Black Forest Cuckoo Clock

| wonko

In need of some therapy, and with my procrastinator set on FULL, I embarked on a punishing box-pleating exercise:

I remember as a kid in New Zealand we had a cheezy Cuckoo Clock (Mum loved it) that used to have metal pinecones as counterweights and a faux timber case that used to “cuckoo” and scare the life out of me every hour. It had the loudest tick of any clock I remember.. I am fairly sure it did not survive the emmigration back to Oz because I do not remember it afterwards.

Robert Lang is known for beautiful mathematical models and when I first saw photos of his “Black Forest Cuckoo Clock” it seemed impossible to tease all that details out of an uncut sheet. Continue reading →