675: (125/365) Centipede

Gagging for complex folds I thought I would torture a bit of paper with a super complex model from Robert Lang’s “Origami Insects II”:

The paper survived and the resultant creepy crawley is interesting if not perfect.

Missing steps and powering on, only have to backtrack, characterised this mammoth 6 hour fold. Some steps are small but have long term consequences and I was worried that unfolding and refolding would cause the paper to disintegrate, fortunately not. Continue reading

674: (124/365) Red Leader Standing By

May The Fourth be with you.

Now I must admit to being one of the original Star Wars nerds, seeing the films when first aired a number of times – they heralded a new style of Sci-Fi, a place where space was common place, space ships were clean and villains announced their evil plans with enough time to allow the rebel alliance to thwart them:

The spacecraft in the Star Wars universe were unique and wildly illogical. I can remember seeing Tie Fighters and thinking wtf? Continue reading

673: (123/365) Longhorn Beetle

Itching to dive into some thing complex (365 challenges are lousy for this, the one fold a day schedule makes longer hauls really difficult), I decided on an insect from Robert Lang that I had not folded before:

Folded nearly life-size, this is a longhorn beetle, a lovely little bug with seemingly ridiculous antennae. Continue reading

672: (122/365) Lang’s Butterfly

Continuing on the theme of butterflies, I could not go past this one, designed by Robert Lang:

Taken from “Origami Insects II”, it is one of a number of creepy crawlys that I have yet to fold from this book. Continue reading

671: (121/365) Winter is Coming

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

669: (119/365) Lillian’s Butterfly

Dedicated to Lillian Oppenheimer, a luminary in the early ’70s Origami world, this butterfly, designed by Michael LaFosse is pretty neat:

Interestingly, not poles apart in technique from “Alexander’s Swallowtail“, I chose different colours and was careful with the wing formation so it was morphologically distinct. Continue reading

668: (118/365) LaFosse’s Origamido Butterfly

Continuing my exploration of Michael LaFosse’s Butterfly folds, I present the “Origamido” Butterfly:

Named after his signature brand of hand-made paper (of which I have a couple of sheets yet to fold), this little butterfly is lovely – the wings seem delicate and the body seems in proportion and is colour changed. Continue reading

667: (117/365) Alexander’s Swallowtail Butterfly

I must admit to never having folded any of Michael LaFosse’s designs, not sure why:

I found a few designs that I thought I would like to have a go at – all butterflies, and this is one of them. Continue reading

666: (116/365) Parent Teacher Interviews

As a teacher, we periodically get the opportunity to meet with parents of our students. Invariably they are interested in how their sons are going, how they went on the test and what can be done to continue to encourage them to give of their best:

I actually like meeting with parents – they are great allies in the battle to teach kids. Fortunately I teach a fairly interesting subject (IT), but can imagine it is a real battle in subjects the kids HAVE to do, as opposed to wanting to to it. Continue reading

664: (114/365) Compact Cow

 

This is a simple water-bombic critter, from a family of compact animals designed by Perro Cerdito:

I decided to fold the cow, from a collection that contained a dog (thing) and a cat-ish thing. Continue reading

663: (113/365) Lil’ Lion

If you have not seen the movie “Lion” starring Dev Patel, you really should, it is a wild ride, lovely story and contains reference to an Indian name that means “Lion”:

I have been looking for nice lion models and a friend on Fakebook (Oriol Esteve from Spain) graciously shared a recent design. I knew I needed to have a go at it. Continue reading

661: (111/365) Multiple Rippling Deltoid

I have passed this model many times, thinking “not sure what that is, maybe later”, but decided to give it a whirl tonight:

What a curious object. Designed by Jeremy Schafer, from his book “Origami to Astonish and Amaze”, this odd ripply mathematical conundrum hurts your brain to look at.

A fun paper manipulation first makes a nested tetrahedron, which is then accordion pleated to make the deltoid. You can then open it up like some surreal book, 4 separate rippled deltoids emerge – curious indeed. Continue reading

660: (110/365) Riki Saito’s Alien

It is late, I am tired, the first week back at the start of the term is exhausting but this little alien is looking after me:

Folded from Japanese foil, it compliments yesterdays model. Incidentally today is a few days after the 56th anniversary of humans in space as Yuri Gagarin first left our atmosphere  Continue reading

659: (109/365) I WANT To Believe

Now I am not so conceited as to think that humans are the only intelligent life in the universe, but the more I understand about humans, the more I am convinced that the sure proof there IS intelligent life elsewhere is the fact that they have in no way attempted to contact us. Nothing. Not a peep:

I want to understand what form extra terrestrial life might take, but I am continually confounded by plethora of lifeforms on this planet.

I am sure that ET will not resemble the Sci-Fi little green carbon-based bipedal life we see in popularist imagery. Continue reading

658: (108/365) Yoshizawa’s Goldfish

Few origami masters did more for modern origami than Yoshizawa Sensei:

With delightfully few folds, his models evoke shapes, creatures and personalities. Continue reading