Planning Plausible Paper Prototypes? Pah...

Sooo.... paper.... we meet again...

I'm (certainly) a bit late on this project, but... its been a busy week, oh well...

Anyways, here are some quick concept ideas for some paper prototypes modeled using Rhino.

 (Simplified ring form, with gem silhouette)

To start off, I decided to try modeling a component of a ring project that I was doing for my JWLM 205 class, with the hope that I would use the Rhino model as a pattern for cutting the metal (which never happened, as I got too lazy to print it and eyeballed the whole thing, but oh well...)

The cylindrical portions of the ring band were unfolded using the UnrollSrf command, though how accurate they are in measurements, I'm not quite sure. They look fine so far...

The the good-old mind-brain somehow ended up slipping into cup territory, and I decided to model a handful of cup/goblet/chalice/bowl shapes (this is what happens when you work far too late at night...). I think they would be fun to try in metal (no I really don't).

 

 

(Chosen chalice: now with fancy tabs!)

(I had unfolded the cup design and 'decorated' the faces before realizing that I forgot to copy a folded model and refolding the sides to the proper angles would be a pain, so let's all pretend there is surface details on the folded cup model, shall we?)

For the last cup prototype, I decided to make a simplified form and use surface details to complicate it. I unfolded the form and made a fairly simple design, which would ideally be cut out and left open on a physical model.

To speed up the process of unfolding some of the cup/bowl shapes, I found it easier to just unfold once face, then rotate it around the base shape to form the unfolded cutting pattern. The stems on some of the goblet shapes were meant to be solid, so they were split from the bowl portion of the cup and unfolded separately, and are to be attached in the folding of the paper model (which works in theory; in practice, not so much...) 

But yes, I could see this being an extremely useful way to model hollow-formed objects and create cutting patterns for jewellery and other objects. I most certainly will be using this process in the future to cheaply prototype ideas and create the patterns for their manufacture.

Bonus shape:

(Pendant? Christmas ornament? Random object of a strange design? Your choice...)

I attempted to unroll/unfold a more organic shape with... truthfully, I'm not sure how much success...

The flattened shapes are quite inaccurate and would likely have geometrical issues if an attempt at folding a physical paper model was made... hmm.... I'll try this again... at some later date...