We Wish You Happy Folding
Origami folding became popular all over the world. Everyone regardless of their age or nationality can plunge into its magical world. This hobby doesn't require any specialized equipment – all you need is a piece of paper and a flat surface, a convenient place for folding that paper. But origami can be acknowledged not only as a nice spare-time activity or enchanting form of art, it can also have a lot of benefits in other, non-entertainment, fields. This art can be used for educational purposes: for example, to improve motor skills, to develop patience and memory, and even in psychological area as an efficient stress reliever.
There are numerous ways of how you can learn to fold the origami figures but one of the most effective ways is through software dedicated to this craft. There are quite a few applications out there that will help you with this. One of such programs is Paper Folding 3D, a lightweight and easy-to-use application by Liang YuBin. For your origami pleasure, it offers a great variety of figures of different kind: wild and domestic, as well as, sea animals, pieces of furniture, means of transport, and so on. Every figure can be rotated in any direction on your screen as well as zoomed in and out. The diagram view allows you to playback an animation that shows each step for folding piece into a figure. This piece of software was designed for kids, as each model is very colourful and contains information about an animal or an object it resembles. The free version of Paper Folding 3D will allow you to fold only one or two models in each category, the other figures will become available when you register the software for 18.00 dollars.
One of the simplest origami figures – a small froggy
Another piece of software dedicated to the art of origami is Treemaker. Its designer, Robert J. Lang, is a world-known origami master and theorist. This application is quite different from the previous one, as it is much more sophisticated and doesn't contain any pictures of figures you can fold. The program will interest those who enjoy designing uncommon origami figures. The utility allows to create a pattern for a great number of origami bases. The application allows one to increase the level of complexity of their figures by changing its flaps' length and angles; it is a task that would be very labor intensive when done by hand. The application is cross-platform and free; and it has its source code available as well.
Like many programs, origami-related software is also quite popular on various mobile devices. You can find a great variety of them on Google Play or Mac App Store. These programs are usually good for people of different ages, for beginners and for experts alike, offering classic and non-trivial models. For example, you can find a few applications that will show you how to transform a spare one or more dollar bills into an animal, flower, a piece of clothes, etc. One of the kind is Dollar Origami Lite by NexStudios available for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad, that will allow you to fold about fifty origami figures from the dollar bills in your pocket right now.
Origami craft is not only the joy of paperfolding, it's a whole form of art that has a connection with the fields of mathematics, philosophy, and nature. No wonder this ancient art is still quite popular and modern technologies help to develop and spread it worldwide. It is also pretty cool that everyone is able to find an application to help them with this hobby and the one that fits them the best, be it for hobby or for science research.
You're absolutely right, we don't need such a wealth of information. It'd be so much better if we spent hours folding frogs and swans and in the end of it all got a generation of Justin-Bieber-ish teenagers who are perfect at folding frogs and swans and have know idea what Germany is.