Paper Airplanes
This was the first origami book I ever owned
I first got into Origami over a decade ago in Preschool. Back then, it was with simple paper airplanes, but I always wanted to progress and improve my skills with it. When I was presented with the opportunity to get my hands on more advanced books, I would always jump at the designs, even if I wasn’t able to fold them. At first, I would follow around my parents or even babysitters trying to get them to show me how to make these designs. Following this, it would sometimes be weeks, months, or even years before I was able to finally accomplish the folding I aspired to do originally, usually through trial and error. One common similarity between all of these designs were that they were paper airplanes, and I prided myself on my ability to make them fly.
The papercraft books, by Andrew Dewar
Another direction I took during the time would be taping paper together to try and make larger airplanes. Following this, I eventually got into a form of papercraft that involved cutting out uniquely shaped parts and gluing them together to form the more advanced shapes of airplane hulls and wings. This, however, eventually would stop as the inconsistency of the method was proving to be infuriating. However, I would eventually get back into this, as I got a series of advanced papercraft books. These books contained pop out segments that would be glued together to form realistic body shapes for the paper airplanes in them. While I originally taped these together, as I was afraid of glue for a while, when I learned to use glue my craft improved drastically.
Advanced Models
When I was about 10-11, my parents got me an origami book as a fidget for therapy sessions. To prevent me from getting distracted with throwing airplanes, the book was focused around static creations: such as boxes, instead of paper airplanes. While making these boxes in sessions, I learned many new techniques, and also learned a focus on detail.
Assorted models from this book:
For example, this ME262 Jet...
With this focus on detail in mind, my paper airplanes morphed from designs for flying, to static models I made to replicate actual aircraft. A notable feature of these designs was that I would look at a picture of an airplane in a book, and then try to replicate it in origami form.
And this origami model I made using a photo of it!...
Website Challenges
Despite the supposedly in-depth guide to HTML...
Originally, my website was going to be made in the raw HTML format I currently use. However, there were several hurdles that presented themselves along the way. The original plan was to self learn HTML from books, but after this stalled out early on, I made a change to using a website builder.
I only had this to show for it after a month of work!
Website builder progress in the same amount of time
This seemed to go smoothly, and eventually, I reached a point I considered far enough that I switched from building the website to producing the origami.
However, as I started to upload my content to the website, I realized that to obtain a badge, I would need to put in more effort, and as such switched back over to doing raw HTML. This time, however, as to not suffer the same end as the last attempt, I was able to get in touch with a mentor to help me with learning HTML coding, and the process went much smoother.
With an experienced instructor to help guide me, I was able to direct my efforts into producing this site!
Origami Challenges
Compare the quality of the original model (left) to the remake in 2X scale (right)
When I started the models, I tried to work with as small of paper as possible. However, this quickly proved to be a bad idea, as the small size of the paper proved to cause more inequalities between individual components. This only became obvious when the modules were assembled, as the smaller models were more fragile and less consistent in shape than I wanted. To solve this, I was able to switch to larger paper that allowed me a larger area to work with. These larger modules meant that any imperfections would be smaller relative to their respective size, allowing better fit with one another.
I only had this to show for it after a month of work!
Website builder progress in the same amount of time
Some compromises had to be made however. Originally, my plan was to make a total of 16 models, but due to time, as well as moving aside to refocus on the website at the beginning of April, I was only able to complete a total of five. This decision was made with the help of feedback from my mentor,
With an experienced instructor to help guide me, I was able to direct my efforts into producing this site!
