Robot Skull Paper Toy

Back in 2007 Noah Scalin at skulladay.com released a papercraft skull with an articulated jaw. In 2010 Scalin re-imagined the papercraft skull in robot form. I think the robot skull is loads more fun than the original. ^^ Templates for both the original and the robot skull may be downloaded here. There is also a blank template available if you care to create a custom skull of your own.

San Francisco Street Car Paper Model

This San Francisco street car papercraft was created by Archidigm, a firm that provides training in computer-aided drafting. The process used to create the paper model involved importing digital photos of a street car into a drafting program (AutoCAD) where the features of the car were traced with lines. The resulting line drawing was then opened in Adobe Photoshop where color and shading were added. An outline of the steps to create the model (as well as a printable template for a green street car) may be found here.

Kingdom Hearts Papercraft: Cid Highwind's Goggles

I finally got around to finishing another Kingdom Hearts papercraft. This is a 1:1 scale paper model of Cid Highwind's goggles as they appear in the Kingdom Hearts II video game. Cid Highwind first appeared as a character in Final Fantasy VII. After FFVII, Cid appeared in several more video games, including both Kingdom Hearts I and II. Although his appearance differs from game to game, one constant of his costume is a pair of goggles perched on his forehead. As the template for the goggles consists of only one page of five parts, I give this papercraft a difficulty level of a mere 1 on a scale of 5. A download of the template is available here.

Pixar Papercraft: Carl's House Miniature

This miniature papercraft of Carl's house from the 2009 Disney Pixar movie Up is not your usual paper model. First, it is built with three different weights of cardboard and paper. Second, it is hand painted instead of making use of a computer printer for color. If you feel adventurous enough to attempt building one of these yourself, the creator of the house, Michal Miszta, has graciously provided a copy of his template here.

UPDATE 11/27/2011: The author of this papercraft no longer offers the template for the house, but additional photos of his build may be viewed here.

UPDATE 11/8/2014: The template is available again! The link in the original post above has been updated!

BattleTech Papercraft: Awesome Mech

Here is a great papercraft mech by Cantaris at the Mech3.org forum. I believe this papercraft was based on a 3D model from a video game, although I am not sure which one.(Anyone care to enlighten me? ^^) This mech's model type is called an "Awesome". It comes from the BattleTech universe which got its start in miniature gaming in the 80's and later came to include video games and an animated series. A download of the Pepakura PDO template (which includes a whopping 121 different skins!) is available here.

Star Wars Papercraft: Life Size Yoda

It seems more and more people are creating full scale paper models from video games. This life size papercraft of Master Yoda by Noturno Sukhoi is based on a 3D model from the Star Wars: Battlefront II video game. The character Yoda (as we all know ^^) first appeared in Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back. The finished model stands 23.6" (60 cm) tall. The template for the model is available in Pepakura PDO format only and may be downloaded here.

Circus Tent Papercraft Gift Box

The designer who brought us Teddy's Paper Theater now brings us colorful DIY circus tent gift boxes. My favorite part of the design is the box's underside which has an ingenious pattern created by the construction of the box itself. There are two box styles available: a circus tent (seen in the foreground) and a tower (seen just behind the circus tent box). Templates for the boxes may be downloaded here and here.

Heroscape Dice Bowl Papercraft

In the Heroscape miniatures board game by Hasbro, players may roll as many as 12 dice at a time to determine the outcome of a battle. To keep the numerous dice corralled between rolls, Heroscape enthusiast "AliasQTip" created this unique papercraft dice bowl. The images inside the bowl are meant to resemble a dungeon, while the outside resembles castle walls emblazoned with crests from the Heroscape game. A PDF template of the dice bowl is available at the Heroscapers.com website here. (In a previous post of mine here, you will find a Heroscape dice tower which matches the bowl)

Batman Papercraft: Dark Knight Cowl

This papercraft cowl duplicates the one worn by Batman in the 2008 movie, The Dark Knight. The template for the cowl consists of 89 pieces and is available in Pepakura PDO format only. Matthew Shane has made a download of the template available here.

Marvel Comics Papercraft: Thor

With a new Thor movie coming out later this year, it was only a matter of time before someone created a papercraft of Marvel Comics' god of thunder. This large paper model is based on a 3D model from the Marvel Ultimate Alliance video game and stands at a little over 21 inches (54 cm) tall. The designer and builder of the model is Mariano DG from imprime-recorta-pega.com. Over the past year Mariano has produced several other excellent papercraft models of Marvel Comics characters. I look forward to seeing more from him this year. A download which includes both PDF and PDO format templates for the Thor model is available here.

Cute Animal Papercraft Finger Puppets

Here are some cute animal finger puppets from the Japanese website "Terra Cotta". In addition to the cat, dog, penguin and duck shown here, there is also a "smiling" grey cat puppet available. The construction of these papercraft animal puppets is very simple and consists primarily of hollow paper cones and tubes. Look for the download links under the pictures of the puppets here.

Star Wars: The Clone Wars Papercraft - Jedi Holocron

A couple of months ago I mentioned I wanted to start designing some Star Wars papercraft. Last week I completed my first two designs! These simple 1:1 scale paper models are of the holocron and the Kyber memory crystal which the bounty hunter Cad Bane steals from the Jedi in the Star Wars: The Clone Wars animated television series. As the story line of the series reveals, the Kyber crystal contains information on every known Force-sensitive child in the Star Wars universe, but the information can only be accessed by inserting the crystal inside the holocron. The template for these two papercraft may be downloaded here.

Mechcommander 2 Papercraft: Raven

If you are in the mood to build a mecha papercraft but don't want to spend a lot of time, this Raven mecha may be just the thing for you. The Raven comes from Microsoft's 2001 game, Mechcommander 2. VLMarshall at the Mech3.org forum created the Raven's papercraft template which includes four different colored skins. Pictured is the red skin. A download of the template in Pepakura PDO format may be found here.

Micro Military Vehicle Paper Models

Detailed miniature papercraft fascinates me even though I don't have the patience to build it myself. Satoshi Yoshioka of Japan apparently has the patience I lack. ^^ Pictured above is Yoshioka's 1:72 scale BA-6 armored car model, one of seventeen historic military vehicle paper models offered free at his website here. Among the other micro papercraft models available are a M4A1 Sherman tank, a German Raupenschlepper Ost tracked truck, and an Israeli Merkava Mark III tank.

Official Ico Papercraft

The 2001 Playstation 2 video game Ico is considered by many to be not only a work of art, but also one of the best video games of all time. Later this year Ico and it's prequal Shadow of the Colossus are scheduled to be released for Playstation 3. The official Ico website offers five paper models from the game including models of the two main characters, Ico and Yorda. Click on the images in the lower right hand corner of the page here to download the templates.

Papercraft Wetland Animals

As a way of educating the public about wetland habitats, Ducks Unlimited Canada offers ten free 3D paper models of wetland animals. Pictured above is a painted turtle, a leopard frog, a largemouth bass and a yellow spotted salamander. Also available are models of a mallard duck, a great blue heron, a great horned owl, a beaver, a red fox, and a dragonfly. Templates for each of the animals are available here.