modular

992: Venom Kusudama

| wonko

For the last 10 or so years, I have used Origami as a pastoral care group “getting to know you” exercise, encouraging the students in my care to get involved, learn something new, and share the skills.

The WHOLE is greater than the SUM OF THE PARTS.

I laminated red and black paper, then sliced it up into 2:3 ratio rectangles. I taught some kids, they taught others – together we made the 30 modules necessary to make this spikey ball (a stellated icosahedron).

Venom Kusudama

The modular construction is an interesting exercise in 3 and 5, and because the paper is quite rigid, the resultant kusudma is lovely – it joins a nice collection of similar of collaboratively constructed modulars – a testament to the power of the idea, the value of being open to new things and the willingness to have a go.

Chinese Dragon in Repose

| wonko

My usual line “if you find interesting paper, get it and I will make you something out of it” has been the start of many fascinating journeys:

Mikiller觅晨’s modular dragon

Peter and Majella travelled to Japan, and found some lovely paper – one, a sheet of hand-made natural Kozo with botanical inclusions screamed out for something delicate and textured. I had intended to return to Mikiller觅晨’s modular dragon, having already folded it large, I thought it might be interesting to fold it tiny and trap it in a shadowbox frame.

The handover
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963: Hanji Ryu Jin

| wonko

A colleague brought me back some Hanji paper from her visit to Korea, and I was wondering what to fold with it when I stumbled across a post on Facebook describing a modular money dragon fold.

Hanji Ryu

Designed by Hieu Dang, modified & diagrammed by Lien Quoc Dat ( tutorial: youtube.com/c/LQDchannel ) to be folded from 10 x bank notes, and thought it was worth a go. When I wrestled with an american dollar, deciding it too small for me to fold, I scaled up and cut 10 x 1:2 rectangles from a burgundy sheet of Hanji, and began folding.

Made with bank notes

This reminds me a LOT of Satoshi Kamiya’s Ryu Jin 3.5, but not as many scales, still, it s a time-consuming fold, and many of the techniques are repetitive, but manageable. I found the diagrams on the head really difficult to fathom, and the low resolution images made it difficult to to work out what’s what. See for yourself.

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958: Ilja Trochanowski’s Kusadama

| wonko

Cruising around on facebook, as you do, I saw a call to test a new Kusadama by Ilja Trochanowski:

958Ilja_Trochanowski_kusudama

I put my hand up and set about folding the 6-piece cube, an interesting intricate design based on an octagonal collapse with some fiddly treatment of the flaps to make curly floral facets.

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955: Versailles Box

| wonko

Looking for a rose-based box for a gift, I came across Tadashi Mori’s tutorial for this fold:

Versailles box

Made of “curler” units, the rose-like structure on top of the box required 4 squares. The box lid also requires 4 squares, the base also – 12 squares all up.

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954: Simi Flores’ Spikey Ball

| wonko

Cruising around on Fakebook, as you do, I came across a module that seemed really familiar. I am sure I have seen it elsewhere, but am not able to find it (I think it is a Bascetta variant?):

spikey ball

I decided to give it a whirl – nice and simple, and quick to fold, it locks nicely with a positive paper tension keeping groups of 3 together, then you group the 3-unit points into clusters of 5 and you get a nice positive curvature. Using other combinations I can imagine zero curvature (6 modules) and negative curvature (7 modules) … hence a torus is possible?.

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950: Urchin Kusudama (Priceless Artwork #2)

| wonko

Riffling through boxes of stuff from our kid’s Kindy years, we came across a cache of artworks my Son painted. Being too precious to throw out (and long since removed from the fridge), I set about cutting it up into 2:1 rectangles – LOTS of them:

Urchin kusudama

I then arbitrarily folded them into a modified unit based on one I used that was designed by Tomoko Fuse.

paper prep
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ONE WORLD – Six Intersecting Pentagonal Prisms (revisited)

| wonko

When you have a little time, and 90 bits of paper on hand, you should have a go at this delightful brain-breaker designed by Daniel Kwan:

6 intersecting pentagonal prisims

This is not my first attempt at this model, back in 2011 I folded it in white, and decided to re-work it in colour.

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949: Tomoko Fuse’s Truncated Hexahedron

| wonko

I love a good modular, and this little charmer uses a module not completely unlike “the little turtle” combined to form a rather lovely cube-like thing:

Tomoko Fuse's Truncated Hexahedron

I decided to use wood-grain paper, and the result looks like the work of a woodie with way more time on their hands than is healthy.

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946: Regenbogen by Maria Vahrusheva

| wonko

As part of the Sydney Origami group’s weekly challenge, we were tasked with a modular:

946: Regenbogen by MariaVahrusheva

This is Regenbogen, designed by Maria Vahrusheva, described in the following Youtube tutorial video

The units (you need 30 for a ball of this configuration) are quite easy to fold (I managed to teach them to my Pastoral Care group kids – their version of this fold is still a work in progress … yes, I have folded nearly 2 of these now) and luckily (for boys at least) consists of mostly folding in half – something most people can do.

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935: Snapology Icosahedron

| wonko

I have seen amazing geometric models based on Heinz Strobl’s strip-based modular technique called “Snapology”, and thought it about time I gave it a try:

Starting simple, I divided A4 sheets lengthwise into eighths, then gridded squares on those strips. I used grey for the core, 6×1 strips were cut for each triangular core. I used red for the connectors – 4×1 strips were cut for these.

The locking mechanism is simple, and in situations where the modules are tightly packed it just sort of holds itself together, but I can see how, with small extensions to the connectors you could easily and securely lock adjacent modules more securely. Continue reading →

934: Mikiller觅晨’s Modular Dragon

| wonko

Assignment time at school is fairly boring, for the most part, for a teacher. Students have lots to do, you need to be available to help on demand but there is a fair bit of sitting around waiting to be needed:

I had found a bunch of PDF’s explaining briefly how to fold parts of what I had assumed would eventually be a dragon. After trial folding the head and a foot I thought it was something I could do in stages. I (arbitrarily) decided my “standard square” would be the biggest cut from an A3 page. Most parts were then made using this standard.

Origami purists would probably have issues with this design, as there is an element of paper craft in some of the details, the head, for instance, is actually 1 standard square and 6 other bits of paper, folded and (shhh) glued in place. The body was made from 7 separate standard squares, 6 of which were the same, the tail segment was a little different to create the fan end.

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929: Penrose Triangle

| wonko

I love geometry that messes with your head, and a “penrose triangle” is a faux 3d shape that is clearly impossible as a whole:

Looking at any 2 adjacent vertices, it looks fine.  The twist of dimensions is what makes it difficult for our brains to comprehend. Continue reading →

928: In Memoriam – Francis Ow

| wonko

The international origami community recently learned of the death of Frances Ow:

Francis was an active and beloved member of the Singapore Origami group, and sadly I never had the privilege of meeting him in the real world. But, via the magic that is the Internet I have been personally encouraged and supported by him over both of my recent 365 challenges. You can try this Tsuru Wreath for yourself – one of many designs he shared freely. Continue reading →