Playing With Paper (Paper Engineering) 17/10/11

Paper Engineering!

We were shown a short series of art work today in order to conjure up ideas for our project. During that time, I was shown a small booklet which consisted of multiple folds and stretched out into a long narrow sheet containing pictures of stones and mountains. I was immediately inspired by this piece of work and decided that I would like to present my project in the form of Paper Engineering. Paper Engineering is an art based around paper which is folded or cut up in some way to make it look more interesting. For example, the image you see above is made completely out of wall paper and cut into shapes that look like a deer heads. This was created by an artist named Lydia Crook who specialises in Paper Engineering. Although I do like her work, after some research, I came to the conclusion that I was more interested in leaflet and brochure folding styles. A current book that I am reading called Paper Engineering - 3D Design Techniques For A 2D Material, contained multiple designs and folding techniques that I thought I could practice and modify into my own style. 
Here, you can see the sort of folding technique I am trying to achieve. I believe that this sort of folding technique is simple and easy for anyone put back together. The only issue for me was that it may have been too simple. So, I decided that I would draw out a basic design and work with multiple shapes in order for my leaflet to look more interesting. I wanted it to be easy to fold out but also aesthetically pleasing to look at and easy to fold back. 

In this image, you can see that I have already cut out a long strip of paper that folds into the shape of a triangle. Unfortunately, I didn't get the chance to take a picture of the actual drawing before cutting it out. In the image, I had already cut out my multiple fold leaflet and folded it in order to see what it might look like once I design it using Adobe Illustrator. You can see that it looks slightly complex in the image but that is due to the fact that each bend is a triangle. 

Finally, in this image, you can see that my leaflet folds into a triangle shape. This was just an initial plan I drew up quickly in order to get an idea of what I would like my leaflet to look like. Once I have designed the final piece, I'll fill it with images of the graffiti I saw on my trip to Bristol City and it should hopefully turn out the way I plan.
I may try and experiment with a variety of other shapes but for now, I think that this triangle shaped leaflet will still be easy to produce and less time consuming.