MakerBot Origami

Or, “Design Constraints and Creativity”

Origami is another of my hobbies and it is all about design constraints. ¹ The rules are simple² – one square sheet of paper only manipulated by folding. ³  Yet, within these rules it is theorized that a sufficiently skilled artisan can design and fold any arbitrary figure.  I find folding origami to be at once cathartic and contemplative. ⁴

Pondering the design constraints within origami reminded me of one of my own recent designs – the 3x2x1 Rubik’s style puzzle cube.  Quite apart from the medium or subject matter, I really liked the idea of a single print job resulting in parts that could be immediately hand-assembled without tools to form a useful object.  Then I thought – if the design constraints are one of the things I like about this design, what else is possible within these same constraints?

Thus, I propose a new style of “MakerBot Origami”:  One MakerBot print⁵ , multiple components⁶ , no tools or hardware⁷ .

What’s the coolest most awesome thing you can design within these constraints?

Update:  Cyrozap – sory fore mispellnig yoru mane.

1. I waffled on that title. [↩]
2. Modern origami rules, anyhow. [↩]
3. Designing an origami model is not about figuring a way to cheat those rules – rather a way to work within them to achieve a desired goal. [↩]
4. I recall one origami master referring to the folding of a particularly difficult and rewarding model as invigorating. [↩]
5. Or, as Cryozap Cyrozap calls them, “production file.” [↩]
6. Otherwise, people would be making whistles. [↩]
7. Thus, no bottle openers [↩]