How to Draw Origami Diagrams

 
For this exercise let us imagine that you have been fooling around with a bit of paper for an hour or two and, finally, you have created your latest masterwork......a peace crane. The trouble is you are not sure how you got to this point. You can remember starting to create a box with a fancy lid and half way through you thought it looked a bit like a rhinocerous....


1. Gather together the following materials;

Blank sheets of ordinary white printer/photocopier paper,
A sharp 2H pencil (an automatic pencil is even better.)
An eraser,
A ruler or straight edge,
3 drawing pens, 0.7, 0.3 & 0.1 mm are good sizes,

And, of course, a freshly folded peace crane!

 

 

 


2. Lay the crane flat on the paper and carefully draw around the edges.

At places which are not corners around the edge or are in the middle somewhere (red stars in the picture), place the tip of your pencil over the place, move the model out of the way without moving the pencil, and then make a mark on the paper below.

3. Move the crane out of the way and join up any incomplete lines using the model and the marks from the previous step as guides (drawn in green here).

Now pick up the model and work out what was the last fold you did. In this case the little zig-zag fold for the beak.

Undo the fold and lay the model flat on the paper.



4. Draw around it again, remembering to mark any significant places as before and sketch in the position of the valley and mountain folds for the beak. If you feel the need to write something, feel free, this is just a rough draft. You have not used the ruler, pens or eraser yet!

Slide the model out of the way and join the dots to look like it should.

 

 

5. Your drawing should look something like this.

I've left the red dots in, added lines are green and actual folds are blue.

Now pick up the model and decide which fold to undo next. In this case it is the opening fold for the head. but in a less familiar example it may not be immediately obvious. So TAKE CARE!

 

 


6. Once again, lay the model flat on the paper and carefully draw around it, making marks at significant places.

Slide the model away and join up the dots.

 

 

 

7. The added lines are green. The significant places are marked by red dots.
The actual folding for this step, opening the head out, I've shown in blue.

Continue in this fashion, one fold at a time, until you eventually arrive back at the starting point, a square of paper.

I would encourage you to actually do this exercise, regardless of how well you know the model or how many versions of the diagrams you have. There is nothing like the practical application of knowledge for really learning something.

By the time you have finished you should have something similar to the next page...

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