Buckminister Fuller Dymaxion Globe Papercraft

In 1943, Life Magazine featured an article on a new type of world map envisioned by inventor Buckminster Fuller. Fuller's map was called the "Dymaxion World". Once folded, the map forms a cubeoctahedron. Fuller's goal in creating the Dymaxion World was to create a map that, when flat, shows all the land masses as contiguous. A printable template for the globe may be found here. The finished papercraft is roughly 10" (25cm) in diameter.

Papercraft Antique Globe Christmas Ornaments

Not your typical ornaments, Paperpino miniaturized 200 year old globe gores by Italian globe maker Giovanni Maria Cassini to create ornate ball decorations for your Christmas tree. In the foreground is a 1792 globe of the celestial sphere showing star constellations. In the background is Cassini's 1790 globe of the Earth. Each of the balls is about 6" (15 cm) in diameter. The templates for the ornaments are located here.

Papercraft Mars Topographic Globe

The landing of NASA's Curiosity rover on Mars this month got me hankering to build a Mars papercraft. Here's my favorite model: a papercraft Mars topographic globe by Eotvos Lorand University Cosmic Materials Space Research Group in Budapest. There's lots to like about this model. First, it is available in a high resolution template that clearly shows the surface features of Mars. Second, there is extensive labeling of the surface features. Finally, the resting places of the first ten landers to make it to the surface of Mars are pinpointed, from the Soviet Mars 2 lander (1971) to NASA's Phoenix lander (2008). The blue tag in the image above is the location of the Spirit rover (2004) (Though not labeled, Curiosity's location is at the far left of the globe just below the equator). The template for the Mars globe was intended to be printed and wrapped around a sphere, but if you have decent papercrafting skills the creation of a hollow papercraft globe should be an easy task. The JPG globe gore template may be downloaded here.

Planets of the Solar System Papercraft

The Westphalian Public Observatory and Planetarium in Recklinghausen, Germany is offering free downloads of Solar System paper models on their website. In addition to a model of the Sun, downloads include the planets Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto. Included with the Earth model is a model of Earth's Moon and included with the Jupiter model are models of the largest of Jupiter's moons, Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto. Downloads of the PDF templates for these and other astronomical papercraft may be found here.

Astronomy Papercraft: Heart Globe Earth

Here's another fascinating glue-less Earth globe papercraft from Canadian designer David Swart. Starting with the geometric form of a Pentagonal Hexecontahedron, David added slotted tabs in a way that makes each of the globe's faces heart shaped. A template of the globe is available here. David's previous slide together creation was a globe puzzle.

Astronomy Papercraft - Globe Puzzle

This fascinating globe puzzle has been on my "to do" list for a long time, but I can't seem to find the time to build it. The puzzle is made out of 60 rectangular pieces which are slotted together and held in place with a small amount of tape to form a dodecahedron globe. The creator of the puzzle has a template and easy to follow instructions posted here. Using the same construction technique, the author has also created a "panorama sculpture" in which a panoramic photograph has been mapped onto the globe instead of an image of the Earth. The results are very cool. The panorama sculpture can be seen here.

Astronomy Paper Models #1

Here are three astronomy papercraft I built. Each one was made with heavyweight typing paper and double sided tape. The larger one in the middle was my first attempt at paper modeling. From left to right they are:

• Moon Icosahedron by Calvin J. Hamilton, USA, 1998
  Model can be found here.
• Polyhedron Skyglobe by Richard Powell, Great Britain, 1998
  Model can be found here.
• Earth Rhombicuboctahedron by Carlos A. Furuti, Brazil, 2004
  Model can be found here.

The hardest part of each of these models was getting the final side taped in place without crushing the model.