Resources
On this page, I have a collection of tutorials and diagrams I've created over the years. I primarily use Inkscape and Figma to build these resources. If you have any suggestions or inquiries, please feel free to reach out to my origami email: kevin.wong@origamiusa.org āļø
This model was on the Spring 2023 issue of The Paper, the print origamiUSA magazine. Check it out here! The Paper
Tutorials
Do you want to start designing origami?Ā
The best way to start designing is to...
1) ...Play around with some paper. If you have folded origami for any amount of time, you should already have a basic artistic intuition of how paper folds up (think maybe a crane, or a frog base). Start from those bases, and play around with existing models to give them your spin. Maybe use the crane, for example. Play around with the head and the tail, fold out the wing differently, unfold a step, and see what personality you can bring to the model.Ā
2) Once you have simply played around the paper, fold some more pre-existing models. Look at the structure of the model and find out why the designer used that particular fold. Crease patterns are especially helpful for this.Ā
Why was a reverse fold used here? Why did we collapse the base in this way?Ā
Hint: most of all origami can be boiled down to 3 steps...
CollapseĀ
Thin the appendagesĀ
Final ShapingĀ
...and the final two steps can even be combined because they are aimed at the same thing: transform a base into a distinguishable shape.Ā
3) After you have done a fair amount of experimenting with paper and making variations of pre-existing models, you can start learning design methods others have developed over the years.Ā
I recommend looking at some of these resources, they go over basic design that may be helpful:
Boice Wong's crease pattern class here
Brandon Wong's design class here
Robert Lang's Origami Design Secrets (ODS). Very fundamental information in here. It is a great book to get a solid technical foundation in origami design :)Ā
Abrashi Origami School has some very good resources. If you need to look something up specific, using this is sometimes better than trying to search in the index of ODS!Ā Ā
If you need some inspiration, I go over my design process in this video...here
There are many, many more resources within the origami community. If you join the origami dan discord, people share insights and resources. It's the main hub of the entire online origami community.Ā
Have fun folding!
Additional Resources:
Inkscape: The design software I use to draw diagrams. You will need to download Java for the program to run properly.Ā
Gimp: Photo editing software, a good free service if you don't have Adobe!
Orihime: The crease pattern software I use. It's a little dated, but it serves the purposes I need. Oriedita is a more current software to use: Here
OrigamiUSA: Organization that hosts the majority of origami conventions in the US
CFC Diagrams: Good place to get a variety of origami diagrams
Origami Resource Center: The diagrams are hit or miss hereĀ
OUSA Diagrams: One of the best places to get solid origami diagrams, most are in a portable document format (pdf).
Origami-shop.com: One of the best online origami shops to get high-quality paper.Ā
Kraft Roll: Good practice paper and you can easily cut big paper.Ā
Best Way to Cut a Square: The best method hands down (I've tried a lot of them)
Crease Pattern Collection: Neorigami, an archived blog from the 2010's. He has good magazine-type content.
Crease Pattern Drive: Other Crease PatternsĀ
ā¹ ą£Ŗ ļ¹šļ¹šļ¹ā¹ ą£Ŗ Ė
