Reviews on Origami books/websites

I do not own many origami books, but I like to search online about many books and websites. Because there are many ways of foldings for one subject, many books were categorized by certain themes such as aircrafts, dinosaurs, toys, animals, and money folds.

"Awesome Origami Aircraft Models of the World's Best Fighters" by Tem Boun includes the foldings of the model airplanes which aren't flying type, but simulating real fighter airplanes. The models require retangular papers, and would be best with thin strong paper or foil. The author included some new techniques and maneuvers which may interest some explorers.

"Origami Fantasy" by Fumiaki Kawahata includes many extremely challanging models, mostly dinosaurs, but also includes pegasus, a mythological winged horse. Many of the models easily take more than an hour to complete. A reviewer added the stegosaurus took him more than four hours to complete! This book is recommended to the folders who are well experienced and like to explore challenging origami. By the way, I personally want to own this book!

"The Guide to Hawaiian-Style Money Folds" by Jodi Fukumoto is a book full of paper money origami. The book includes information about types of currency to use, dimension calculation, and explanations on the folding symbols. Each diagram has text explanations in different colors for easy notice. The models also utilize the features of the bills which result nice-looking designs on the finals. Fukumoto also has published "The Guide to American Money Folds" which includes the Christmas tree and the Staute of Liberty. Many reviewers say both of the books worth the price.

"Origami Zoo" by Robert J. Lang and Stephen Weiss contains many different kinds of animals. The models are vary in levels, simple to complex. and the book includes a detailed guide of symbols and procedures used in diagrams.

"Origami USA" is a website that contains many information about its organization and good resources on Origami. You can easily find popular diagrams and links to other well-known websites. There are many origami collections as other people have posted that you can view and get inspired.

"Robert J. Lang Origami" is a website of Lang who invented many figures in various types of origami including insects, animals, and mathmetical figures. It includes pictures of his complements and diagrams. His origami is very detailed and well shaped like real objects.

As many people enjoy playing with papers, it is very easy to find good websites that fit your level. I hope more people find origami a good source to kill their spare time and maybe get more interest in it.

http://www.giladorigami.com/Books_default.html

http://www.paperfolding.com/links/

Paper Toys for Beginners

As I mentioned about the book I published earlier in other post, I like to add more information about the book, "Paper Toys for Beginners."

Last summer, I have published a book called, "Paper Toys for Beginners." I had many different options, but I chose to make an origami book because I wanted many kids to get interested in origami for fun as I did when I was young. So I decided to collect some instructions that are easy to follow but interesting enough to play with. I recall my memory and picked few that interested me the most. Totally based on my personal taste. Then I leveled 11 instructions into three different categories; easy, medium, and hard. Based on their previous experience or understandability of instructions, people could choose which one to do first. I also added diagrams showing how to make a square out of a rectangular piece of paper since it is hard to find origami papers here in US unlike in Japan or Korea. About 80% of origami starts with square, but I added few with retangular requiring objects to show the variation. The contents are dancing octopus, caterpillar, monkey climbing a tree, piano, box, airplane, boat,butterfly, heart, and talking crow.

In order to get some feedbacks, I visited a school, Banneker Charter School in Cambridge, MA. I went to Kindergarten, 2nd grade, 4th grade, and 6th grade classes to show them how to make origami. Of course, I taught them things I included in my book. I taught caterpillars and dancing octopus to Kindergarteners, dancing octopus and airplane to 2nd graders, airplane and boat to 4th graders, and boat and talking crow to 6th graders. Kids needed little bit of help from their teachers, but they mostly followed my direction well.

Time with these kids really helped me how to explain each diagram in words. Since I had so much fun with them, I added their pictures of making things at the end of the book. The process was fun for me. I have sold about 10 books to my teachers and friends. They thought my book could be a good gift to children, their kids or cousins.

Types of Origami

Besides the usefulness of origami in the industry, origami has various types and kinds. Usually, people think origami as folding a squared piece of paper to make 3D object with flattened surface and angles. However, as a part of art, origami had developed into several different catagories by its characteristics; Action origami, Modular origami, Wet-folding, Pureland origami, Origami tessellations.

Action origami is origami that creates action to the object such as Wing-flapping Birds, Paper Fortune Teller, Jumping Frog, Nodding Dog, etc. It creates objects to fly, requires inflation to complete, or uses persons' hands to change shapes.

Modular origami means putting the identical pieces together to form a complete model. Usually the complete models are symmetry. Sometimes, small pieces built an astonishing objects like the "Hello Kitty." The individual pieces can be easy to fold, but the complete object can be tricky as you can see below.

Wet-folding is a technique to create a gentle curves on the object rather than flat surfaces and folds. Use the wet paper to mold and dry the paper to keep its shape. Because they have curves, the models seem natural. For that reason, this technique is mainly used in making animal models.

Pureland origami is developed by Joh Smith in 1970s. this type of origami restricts folding and techniques: only one fold at a time, no reverse folds allowed, and all folds in straightforward locations. It is helpful for the people who are beginners in origami or who are limited in motor skills.

Origami tessellations is growing popularity these days but already have a long history refering as far back as the Ancient Egypt. Such technique was applied on their fabric. Tessellation is the pattern of shapes arranged side by side with no gaps in between. And origami Tessellations use a piece of flat paper to fold into such patterns without any gaps. Shuzo Fujimoto have organized and published few books on origami tessellations in the late 1960's. Now, we can easily find more information about their history, their diagrams, and their application in mathematics, fashion, and science industries.

http://www.origami-resource-center.com/index.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origami

http://www.arthistoryguide.com/Origami.aspx

Science of Origami

In these days, origami has been not only used as toys for kids, but also applied to science.

And it seems many people accept the benefitial facts of origami to their brains after a study had proven: origami lessens the risk of getting Alzheimer's disease because it constantly uses the tip of fingers stimulate the sensors not to degrade. There are alot more studies proving the benefits of origami convince some of parents to teach origami to their children for the better brain development. Besides, the science fields have found various places to apply origami to their technology.

Science Daily reported the comments on origami use; "Science, technology, space, automotive, medicine -- all these different fields have benefited from origami," said Dr. Lang. He has written many books on how to make paper planes and animals and has found the best way to stow a car's airbag.

The invention of the air bags in the car is originated from the folds of paper insects. "An algorithm that origami artists had come up with for the design of insects was the right algorithm to give the creases for flattening an airbag," Dr. Lang said. "So that has now been adopted into airbag simulation code, and presumably automotive engineers are now using those codes to design airbags."

Also, astronomers use origami to compute the optimum configuration of space telescope lenses. "One key challenge facing all large space telescope designs is that they must be packed into fairly small payload compartments for launch into space," Hyde, a space scientist, said. "Origami can be very useful for an Eyeglass telescope by providing a compact way to fold it up for launch." And Lang has succeeded in folding 100-meter sheet of plastic into the rockets that are 3 to 5 meters in diameter using paper-folding method.

Moreover, origami is used in the study of mathematics explaining and applying to scientific theories.

People also use the techniques of origami to design games, puzzles, and magic tricks.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/videos/2008/0910-science_of_origami.htm

http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/origami_design_020220-1.html

Dancing Octopus - level 1

Dancing Octopus is the one of the simplest paperfoldings for kids. It involves simple cuts and paste as well. To start our journey to become a paperfolding master, dancing octopus will be a good practice for you and for your younger siblings and cousins.

1. Fold bottom edge up to top edge.

2. Place folded edge downward as shown.

3. Cut folded edge seven times vertically to mid-section for the octopus legs.

4. Bring the two edges together and tape two top layers from each ends to form a cylinder. Then draw an octopus face!!!

5. Slide two layers of octopus with your two fingers.

6. Your octopus will dance with legs moving.

Octopus should not be hard, but has to follow the steps correctly as shown. Cutting the wrong edge taping over outer and inner layers with one tape will fail you. So please be careful with those steps!^^

A Rectangle to a Square

Most of paper-folding art work use squared paper. But it is easier to find rectangular papers around us. Since paper-folding follows the symmetric rules often, it is better to have an exact square if necessary. Here is the direction how to make a square out of rectangle without using a ruler and a pencil.





1. Get ready with a rectangular piece of paper vertically as shown.





2. Fold top-right corner to left edge as shown. Make sure left edge lines up.

3. Cut out the leftover area that does not overlap as shown. Now you have a square!!

This method is usful in many ways, but you must start with an exact rectangular sheet of paper which has right-angled corners.

Paper Folding Experience

Introduced by my aunt, I started to fold paper with paper folding books. My first complishment was a crane with a help of my mom. I borrowed books from my aunt and learned new folds. For couple of my birthdays, my parents bought me the origami books for the gifts which I asked for. Paper folding has been my best friend for more than a decade.

With my interest and skills I used to make dolls, cases and etc as birthday gifts for my friends, and families. I also taught my friends how to make roses, birds and ornaments when they asked me for the instructions.


During the high school life, I could have From my high school, one of my school faculty suggested me to teach other students for an art credit. So I had Origami Class for two years sharing my skills and producing tissue case, dolls, Christmas ornaments, cases, and etc. Some were located in the school exhibitions for other people to get fascinated.



I also got a chance to work with kindergarteners and elementary students for volunteer. I felt great joy while my fellows enjoy making things.



Besides, I published a book called " Paper Toys for Beginners" as a high school capstone project in 2009 using a publishing website, Blurb. While organizing material for the book, I found how easy and close origami was to us!