Next step is to wire this up to a Cricut [1] or similar device to never have to worry about finicky cuts!
Papercraft with Blender
31–40 of 52 posts
Re: Papercraft with Blender
#32I had the idea a while back for a project that would involve something similar to this, but for sewing patterns to make stuffed animals. It seems like you could do that with this with maybe some minimal modifications.
Re: Papercraft with Blender
#33This is essentially what UV unwrapping is. Seems like a pretty neat auto-UV layout algo... Are people in the Blender community using this plugin for texturing game assets? Does it work well with high poly models?
Blender has a pretty advanced UV layout algorithm builtin for all your texturing needs. This plugin would probably have problems with n-gons which the UV layout tools handle without too much problem.
I’ve dont something simple but similar to this with UV unwrapping in Blender directly. You can even export the UV map to SVG.
Re: Papercraft with Blender
#34Neat. I wonder if this could be adapted for sewing patterns. The open-source options I've seen out there seem to be lacking (abandoned, or compatibility issues), and the commercial options are very expensive.
Re: Papercraft with Blender
#35I was working on a python script in 2004 for Blender to work similar to Pepakura [1] when I was making stitch and glue kayaks in order to prototype them in paper first. As the author says, I wasted many a weekend making all sorts of paper models. Then I got sidetracked writing a photoclinometry script in Blender to CNC bas reliefs into maple planks in 2005. Pepakura was/is amazing! Was the current plugin based on it…
Do you have blog posts or other info on your kind of kayak design workflow? How did you join the maple boards? Were they just ribs and you put composite over it? There's a completely insane maker on youtube called Jamie Mantzel, he did some composite kayaks.
Re: Papercraft with Blender
#36This means cosplay is about to get a lot easier for a lot of people. No more taking weeks to prototype things out of difficult materials; now you can model a character, and have a painted cardboard costume ready to go over a long weekend!
I'm not involved with cosplay, but I do believe that this is already a common workflow. I know there's a papercraft plugin for Sketchup that let's you flatten objects, add glue tabs. Folding and gluing takes the majority of the time.
I didn't know that, that's awesome - wish I'd known when I was working on a halloween costume this fall :/
Re: Papercraft with Blender
#37Damnit HN, why must you repeatedly post things that are destined to steal all my free weekends. This seems pretty awesome; this might be a cheaper alternative to 3d printing for certain scenarios.
Friends of mine used papercrafting as a cheap alternative to plastic sci-fi spaceships for wedding table center pieces. I loved the low-cost of this crafting hobby and kept doing it almost 5 years later; I love assembling models and having a beautiful spaceships to show off afterward.
Can you share some of the designs you use?
Re: Papercraft with Blender
#38This is essentially what UV unwrapping is. Seems like a pretty neat auto-UV layout algo... Are people in the Blender community using this plugin for texturing game assets? Does it work well with high poly models?
With UV unwrapping you can stretch the pieces, you may even want that to allow for more detail in the texture for specific areas.
Re: Papercraft with Blender
#39Well, this is a serious regression from 3d printing :)
More seriously, this is genius. I can hardly imagine how challenging it must have been to build something that automatizes finding which parts should be glued and act as joints.
This could also have impact for all early age kids schools. Is there any way a teacher could easily generate a model from a few pictures and make it some papercraft for kids? Or if not, are there limitations on which models can be used, or is it possible to use a 3d scan? Just imagine the awe of kids who made a paper model of the school's pet or something. Also a good way to create some interest for DIY in them.
Re: Papercraft with Blender
#40Now he can apply paper mache and paint.