Light Doodles & Hoodbot

While looking at some artists websites i stumbled over a link to lightdoodles.com where they paint with an LED light into the dark air and use a camera to capture it in one long exposure photograph. Pretty neat idea!

Refering to the BC Butler a friend did send me a link to instructions how to create Extreme Business Cards, like a card that deals the phone number itself via DTMF dialing tones, etc.

The paper model I'm working on atm (and guess I'll have it finished later this evening) is the Hoodbot template from Luke Twyman. He asked for people to test his template and send it to me. It's a great model, but you need steady hands to build the small bot. ;) I'll post a picture once it's done.. you should get it after release.

Cookie Caskets!

Alright, probably I'm the only one who thinks this is funny... but who cares? =)
While writing an answer to a discussion over at Nice Paper Toys i came up with the spontaneous idea to create paper cookies. While the first version was a more complicated model (sides in a more complex shape) i thought about my recent discussion concerning papertoys and function. So i came up with the idea to create paper cookies that serve as a casket for one larger cookie to be given as a gift. The bottom is blank, so you can also write a small message on it. The casket looks like a cookie itself and you could also just use them as paper cookies. There're large flaps that serve as a "open/close mechanism" for easy access to the cookie content.

"Sometimes me think what is love, and then me think love is what last cookie is for. Me give up the last cookie for you."
                         - Cookie Monster

I changed the shape to a simple one as this will make it very easy to customize your own cookie in about 15 minutes. Just take a picture of your favorite cookie and customize one (download the blank template) - if you do, please post it here. Wouldn't it be great to be able to use a bowl of several different paper cookies instead of those ugly wax apples?!? ;) I created two cookies for the start... looking forward to see more.

Download here:
 cookie casket "chocolate"
 cookie casket "colors"
 cookie casket "blank"
(just choose the FREE option)

e440 in DHM style

Finally i found the time to put together all the parts for the e440 in DHM style i started a few days ago. I *really* like this model... Ringo created a great template. Once the weathers turns better again (it's drizzling a lot those days) I'll take a picture for the e440 travel blog. The idea of sending in pictures of papertoys you craft reminds me a bit of Postcardware. I think I'll try to come up with an idea about a design where you have to build model 1 and send in a picture for the blog to obtain model 2 by eMail.. or something along the lines. Could be a nice idea to involve people.

I had some minor trouble with the blog layout, some graphics were hiding text behind them. If you did not realize it, probably you used Firefox like me - as i did not see it first. Hopefully all fixed now. I'm very satisfied with my "creative phases" recently, even bought a jotter to remember them. Only need time to finish at least some of them. ;)

blank BC Butler

I cleaned up the template and added a blank BC Butler one to the post. Feel free to use/modify it - would be nice if you drop me a line if you created your own card holder. I can also post it in my blog if you wish. If you see different designs for card holders, I'm interested in a pictue/design as well.
Looking at the model again gave me a great idea for a more 3D look of the hands holding the tray. As the arms & tray are connected with a seperate piece, it should be easy to glue additional hands inside the arms as well, then you can glue them to the tray and have it look like hes really holding it. On the pic you can see the idea (which i just glued together in like 20 seconds), you get the picture. Maybe someone wants to include that in a custom design? Feel free to use that idea to your liking.

Working on the BC Butler really gave me some creative ideas on using designs with some sort of more sophisticated features or just playful ones. My next idea is rather quickly sketched out, so i expect to post it in a few days. While having a look at Alen's papertoys.ru website (no, i don't speak Russian, but he got lots of pics to understand the content *g*) i saw a review about lens hoods made of paper and a cigarette packet flash diffuser - great ideas!

BC Butler

My first own paper model was supposed to be a kind of kung-fu bunny (an hommage to Usagi Yojimbo), but after recently thinking about functional papertoys i got inspired by the C3 Biz Card Holder and the toxic-myk model and put the bunny on hold. Therefore i decided to create another model first, my own business card display: The BC Butler.

I tried to create the model sturdy enough to be of real use offering business cards and not to collapse after a withdrawal. An additional challenge was to split up the model as it won't fit on one page, being designed for a certain size of business cards. The model will hold approx. 50 cards in his tray. I'm not satisfied with the look of the hands holding the tray - tried to use white gloves - but I'm not much of a illustrator. I'll upload an empty model for customization tomorrow, maybe someone will create a better texture - or an alien for a scifi-shop.. hehe. Of course feedback on the model is welcome.

Download here:
BC Butler original
BC Butler blank
(just choose the FREE option)

ambient art made of papercraft

I'm in the process of building the DHM version of the e440. Ringo was so nice and did send me a bunch of e440 models i asked for. Looking at his website and the adidas model he did (but does not share *sobs*, probably due to legal brand issues) it got me thinking about papermodels not being used as toys but more as a kind of art objects for the living space.
I have a friend whose living room uses a lot of black & white. Two of those adidas e440 or maybe even the DHM model would look great on his sideboard. Paper in all kinds of shapes is already being used as "ambient art" for all kinds of lamps, even Ikea has a lot of paper made lamps and those that look like it, but use plastic. So why not build more abstract paper models you can use as ambient art for your living room? I know there are lots of models out there representing all kinds of geometric shapes... just never saw one using them in his living room. And maybe even better those models could have a function, like offer a stand for your iPod (also available as boombox) or maybe a place for your keys? Should be fun to work on a model that's not just a toy, but has "function".

evil calakraft

I had to get rid of the standard thumbnail pics from flickr... had a look at picasa and some others, but did not find one which creates the thumbnails in a size i want. It should also be a nice idea if you could create some standard frames the service attaches to your thumbnails when it created those or posts them into a blog. Ah well, back to manual work i guess. Still fiddling around with the blog layout... In addition i started to use Google Analytics, which is free and seems to be very powerful with many features to discover info on site hits, etc. Looks very promising.

I crafted the calakraft skull figure in "evil mode" from Triloblog. Funny line of designs, i like the shaped head.

heartbox & nicepapertoys

Today i joined the fairly new urban papercraft & papertoys community www.nicepapertoys.com - a great place to share thoughts & designs. As far as my research went, many of the talented designers joined there and I'm sure that place will bust with activity soon enough. The forum is a bit cumbersome (more like blog comments), but it's from the ning network i guess.

I'm still in the process of getting a better feeling for the designs and will try to build a papertoy every other day to get more ideas for own designs.. already have a bunch of ideas for my own models. I'm not satisfied with this blog yet, but did not have the time to fix the stuff that annoys me yet - so expect the layout to change every now and then.

Talking about building papertoys, i found this heartbox today by accident. It's an "empty" design you can customize and maybe someone needs a little something for valentine tomorrow. ;)

cutnejo deranged bunny

A few days ago i crafted the cutnejo bunny which is simple but fun. The feets are a bit small tho. Have a look at the custom pictures at the website (or the flickr group), some are quite funny. I like the deranged look.. wonder what carrots that bunny smoked. Check out the small video at the website as well, nice touch with the self-folding model!
Also check out the www.dumpr.net webseite, i discovered over the flickr group - the museum picture option is quite funny.

urban papercraft

About a week ago i stumbled over a program called Pepakura Designer, which is able to transform 3D Data into papercraft models with labels. I always liked papercraft models, but the idea to design my own seems appealing to me. While i researched further on the matter i discovered a small, very creative urban papercraft community with loads of funny models and ideas. As i wanted to try out a few things with blogger anyway, I'll use this blog to document my journey through mountains of papertoys. ;)