blarg

blah blah blah, about nothing in marticular – may contain traces of aaaarrrggghh

330: Billfold

| wonko

There is something I have learned about Australian paper money – it is NOT paper and it does not want to be folded. So I entered a little bit of a counterfeitting mode and made some paper money out of images and paper:

This is a billfold – one of HUNDREDS of models designed to be folded with an American $1.

Many are intricate and detailed, this one is merely figurative and works on many conceptual levels – making money work, making dollars with dollars etc.

I wonder what “greenbacks” are like to fold – the paper must be pretty strong to survive circulation and for there to be so many designs devoted to the medium I imagine it folds pretty well.

I miss paper money, I miss lower denomination coinage – as we jettison it, prices go up, value goes down, inflation goes crazy and exchange rates go through the roof.

A wise man once said that there is much unhappiness in the world because people spend most of their lives chasing little bits of coloured paper – this is odd because, on the whole, those bits of paper are not the least bit unhappy. DNA, I miss you.

329: Xmas Trees

| wonko

Synchronicity happens – i was asked by my lovely wife if I could make an origami xmas tree – I said I would have a look, and did – there were lots to choose from but then came a posting on the British Origami Society mailing list with possibly the best design of them all:

Designed by Francesco Guarnieri, demoed by Sara Adams here, this beautiful modular is a very clever design. Sure, it is a little labour intensive but wow!

Held in shape by paper tension, lovely pendulous layers interlock and sit atop a snarly trunk, each tree probably takes about an hour and a half but it is a thing of beauty.

I made 4 – naturally. One for the lady in the print room (one of my paper dealers), one for the library (then the TL asked where the angel was – she did not realise I was obsessive compulsive so I folded 4 small gold Brill angels) and 2 for the counter of my wife’s office.

Very happy with these, they look wonderful from all angles and are suitably festive as we creep ever so closer to holidays.

Market Forces

| wonko

…so here’s what I am thinking, right.

I have all these models – HUNDREDS of them, and rather than burn them (as my psychologist recommends) or let them gather dust at my place or throw them away I thought I would sell them for charity.

Some models are extremely beautiful, some complex and interesting, others classically simple and elegant but I have very little space to keep them so I thought that sharing the love was a good plan. There are some models I cannot bear to part with, sorry. This is NOT a commercial sale, as I am not the copyright owner of most of the models, this is a CHARITY ACTION.

Charities that will benefit directly are Australian Red Cross (particularly for their foreign aid programs) and Medicine san Frontiers – sharing the love is important, right? ALL proceeds will be channelled to these aid agencies, the joy I have had in this project is folding the models in the first place – enough wonder and awe wonder for one person.

WANT TO HELP?

Stay tuned, details on what you can do to OWN a unique bit of my 365 Project and more importantly support these great causes will be released here.

BROWSE the model list (https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AjCUWfazDAWDdGhsTmlWVGtTemIzc2U3eFhlcXBjNVE#gid=0) and check out what they look like in the DeviantArt Gallery (http://neubauten.deviantart.com/gallery/28292036 ) and when the time comes GET IN EARLY to avoid disappointment.

Naturally I will also take orders/requests(for re-folds with the same direction of monies – these aid organisations deserve our support – you get something beautiful and do something beautiful as well – WIN WIN.

Celtic Cross Revisited

| wonko

When I first folded Tadashi Mori’s Celtic Cross I knew it would come in handy, being that it is a part of the symbology of my College:

My year 12s (well, I call them mine, they were the leaders in my tutor Group – a lovely bunch of chaps) had their last day of classes today so I thought it a good idea to mark the occasion with cards – naturally they would feature origami.

Hope they liked them.

311: Air Mail

| wonko

“Once upon a time, boys and girls, people used to use hand-held ink dispensing rods to make marks on flat sheets of manufactured plant fibre, fold them, place them inside an envelope of the same material, write a distant geospatial reference on one side, their own geospatial reference on the other. They would then pay for a coloured sticky icon and then hand this package over to a corporation that used to exist solely for the carrying and dispensing of such message envelopes” the old story teller said. The assembled children gasped in amusement, then vlogged about the experience collaboratively via the ether.

Snail mail, you remember that – I like the idea of air mail – this sort of letter has a Terry Pratchett, Discworld sort of feel to it.

Designed by Hojyo Takahashi, this delightful model is just what it says on the label.

Happy with this as a first fold.

310: Tutankhamum

| wonko

On the 4th of November 1922, almost by accident, a water carrier for Howard Carter stumbled across what looked like a step. They had all but given up hope of finding the legendary tomb of Tutankhamun but, on digging they discovered another, and another. By the 6th of November they had uncovered a sealed entrance to a tomb that bore the elusive cartouche of the boy king and so began one of the greatest archaeological discoveries of our time.

I admire an explorer that showed such great restraint – rather than rush is, as he was being urged to do, he covered up the entrance and went away, re-mounted an exploration mission 26 days later to actually open the tomb and painstakingly uncover and catalogue in-situ such wonderful things that belie imagination.

Having made a mask yesterday, I thought I would try another, and what better than a figurative representation of that famed gold and precious stone-inlayed death mask for the boy-king. I have seen this mask when it toured our city museum – it is breathtaking.

Scale was an issue here – it could have been made from an A4-cut square, but I could not tell how much was tucked away so made it from A3. I like that it hints at a snake in the headdress, the beard and overall proportions are nice. With time and a little patience I dare say you could fashion facial features – there is certainly enough paper there to do so.

Happy with this as a first fold – I could do a month of masks, there are lots of designs and a plethora of approaches to origami mask making – maybe that is for another day.

309: V for Vendetta

| wonko

Remember remember the fifth of November
Gunpowder, treason and plot.
I see no reason why gunpowder, treason
Should ever be forgot…

As a kid I remember cracker night – well in truth, it was cracker week because you could buy fireworks and we used to spend the week blowing things up. In retrospect, all that messing around with gunpowder was really dangerous, but apart from some occasional superficial burns and the odd scorched letterbox we came to no real harm.

I am generally not a fan of Natalie Portman – the Star Wars prequels put me off a lot but she has been outstanding in a couple of subsequent movies – “Black Swan” and “V for Vendetta” for example. This is “V”, the psychopath in the Guy Fawkes mask and I am pretty happy with the result.

Designed by Brian Chan, it is an exercise in restraint, as you have a black/white paper and fold all the black inside, then, later, carefully reveal tiny hints of it – very clever design actually. you get eyes, a rather splendid nose, pencil moustache and goatee in a lovely mask shape, nice.

You can have a go for yourself – it is fairly easy and totally appropriate for Guy fawkes day

October, Done and Dusted

| wonko

What a massive month October has been:

During this month I explored the works of Neal Elias, paid tribute to Eric Joisel and much more. Lots of lovely things and a terrifying amount of time expended creating them.

Two months to go until the one-a-day pressure lets up.

ABC Radio Interview

| wonko

…so I was approached by 612 ABC Radio to come in and talk about the 365 project, having been dobbed in by Michelle Williams (thanks Shelly) initially for Friday morning. Given I had a fairly full teaching day they re-scheduled to Monday morning as a pre-record in at the Toowong studios.

Over the weekend I also developed a streaming headcold (totally predictable) but soldiered on regardless and completed the brief interview, and folded a little hoodie also in the process – red for studio colours.

I am not naturally at ease talking like that, I get all nervy, but it seemed to go ok apart from a little nervy stammering intially. Terri Begley was very supportive and coaxed me through the thick of it. It was nice to meet her and I hope the adoring public found it a valuable use of airtime.

For those interested, the podcast of the interview is available here

10 Things I have Learned So Far

| wonko

1. Paper is not paper

This may seem obvious but it is really not. I started this challenge determined to see what I could get copy paper to do and to my surprise it can be coaxed through many a torture.

Wood-pulp based papers are damaged each time you crease them – the crease breaks the fibers and hence weakens the paper at that point. Given most folds have common fold axes and vertices, after repeated manipulation the paper disintegrates at those points first – often just before you finish the model.

I have discovered that large format does not obviate the problem, actually it makes it worse. 80GSM copy paper is pretty fragile, the torsion of a large piece actually stresses common folds and vertices more.

I have folded with tissue foil (well, origami shop’s tissue foil which is different to laminated tissue+foil) which has a lot of cotton in it, and lithography paper – both take creases well, do not disintegrate easily and hold their shape after folding also which is a good thing. I am always on the look out for nie folding paper. Surprisingly, brown paper (as used for kitchen cooking etc) also takes folds well and is remarkably strong. I have also folded vellum (plasticised tracing paper) and it is strange – it is really hard to crease but once creased it stays creased. All papers vary in their re-foldability (the ability to take a crease and reverse it’s direction).

Most papers are hygroscopic meaning they absorb water – oddly copy paper is milled on one side which means it uptakes moisture unevenly causing it to curl and unfold. I have taken to storing my finished models in an airtight box with silica gel sachets to keep them dry. Continue reading →

279: Computer Mouse

| wonko

It was announced today that Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple Computer passed away today after a long battle with pancreatic cancer:

It is my considered opinion that Apple Computers lead a revolution in personal computing for many reasons, an important one being the re-introduction of the computer mouse as an integral pointing device for a graphical user interface that drove the computer.

They did not invent it – that particular landmark belongs to Douglas Engelbart’s computer mouse, whose patent was issued in 1970 for a X-Y Position Indicator For A Display System, but I think the Macintosh computer helped popularise it and it seemed to take the PC world years to catch on to this great idea – Jobs saw it immediately.

The world needs visionaries – good visionaries persist as figureheads of successful ventures and Apple’s success in part is directly attributable to the charisma and marketability of the man. Rest in Peace Steve Jobs.

A more complete photo diagram is here:

Have a go at it using this diagram

September, Done and Dusted

| wonko

September was a busy month, they all have been. Looking back at the models achieved this month I am amazed:

Amazed that I was able to do some of them, that I somehow found the time to complete them and amazed I am still just as determined to complete this challenge as I was when I started.

3 months to go means I have completed 3/4 of the journey so far … roll on January.

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

251: Infinity

| wonko

Now in my quest to fold 365 models, one a day for a whole year, it seems like I have been doing this forever already. Not having an infinite amount of time, I thought I wold fold an INFINITY in paper:

this is a rather ingenious pair of interlocking rings, the whole of which (hole … a ring joke there, lol) was folded from a single square, no cuts, no glue.

This ingenious fold is from Jeremy Shafers book “Origami to Astonish and Amuse” and is the first step towards achieving a snarly fold that features EIGHT rings (again, from ONE piece of paper)

A lovely accordion fold and some tidy end pleating and presto, an infinity symbol which I think is splendid. Even the wife did not believe it was only one sheet until I unfolded it and proved it was.

August, Done and Dusted

| wonko

Another huge month, some super snarly models and good riddance to winter:
I am finding it easier to select models based on a cursory glance at their diagrams but shudder to think of the time used here when I am sure I should be doing something else – there are worse habits I suppose.