WCOG Meeting March 8, 2008

March was my first WCOG meeting, this year. I got off work at 2pm. The team works out until 3pm, but I smuggled my friend, Thea, anyway, and took her to the origami gathering. Her mom and younger brother met up with us, there. Not a huge turnout, and many were working on Won Park's koi out of what looked like Yami's kraft paper.

Thea's long been one of my favorite kids at the gym, and since I no longer work with team, I have not really been able to share time with her.

Don't know how well the music really fits, as is the case with all my music vids. I recently discovered cover songs on YouTube. I've always liked Bon Jovi's music, but haven't heard much of his recent stuff. Don't know how recent/distant this song is, but it's new to my ears. So I'm using it (the cover is by Bradly Akeman). Besides, I do cherish the memories of my time amongst friends.


Photos

Won Park Folds His Koi- Shaping the head and body

A while ago, I put up a video of Won Park folding the fins, as people have been stumped by how to fold the fins, from Marcio's diagrams.

Recently, it seems that completing the head has also been a point of difficulty. So here is Won at OUSA 2007, folding the head, and doing the final shaping of his koi.

Part One:


Part Two:



Part Three:



I had to divide the video up into 3 parts, due to 100MB limitations with uploads. It is not an instructional video; but hopefully it will offer up clues to some of the difficulties folders are having, relying solely on the diagrams and verbal descriptions of what to do. it should also give a window into what a meticulous, tedious folder Won is. He is an artist, and exacts great care in what he is working on.

Even with the most perfect diagrams, stepfolds, video instructions, one might not be able to fold Won's model as beautifully as Won. Because what is not so easy to convey, is the artistic interpretation, which is uniquely Won. A folder could be technically precise, yet still not come out with a koi that looks like Won's. The final results will depend a lot upon how good one is at sculpting and shaping.

Actually, when I think about it, if one follows the proper fold sequences and folded neatly, then the shaping isn't all that difficult. Won relayed to me, that what a lot of folders seem to be missing (based upon photos submitted by different folders of their koi), is in rounding the head on the bottom. If one folds the fins back sharply, and rounds out the bottom, by curving the bottom layers inward, as well as the body, it should hold a pretty good shape.....unless you subject the dollar to humidity or cold weather (for gifts, where permanence is important and where the recipient might not know how to do "touch ups", over time, Won does apply a bit of glue on the pleats to make the model last and hold its shape "permanently).

On a side note, I arrived at yesterday's WCOG meeting after work, and after a 3 month absence. Yami had brought a young friend who needed help on the koi, and when I got there, there was a whole table of folders doing the koi out of a large sheet of, I think, kraft paper. I was entertaining a young friend I brought with me (one of my gymnasts), and it made it difficult to get into the mindset of offering help to my fellow folders on the WP model. I found it disorienting out of regular paper, and it made me realize how much I relied upon the printed landmarks on the dollar to help me fold the koi. Also, I haven't folded one in a couple of months. Arriving late, and with my young charge, I just couldn't get my brain into gear. So I hope maybe these videos offer up some help.

Again: these aren't instructional videos, so just be happy that it's better than having nothing. I do hope that watching Won and how he folds, does shed some light on how to do his koi.

I'm all of a sudden, in the mood, to start folding them again.

Merry Christmas!

This video was taken November 24, 2007 at the Japanese Gardens in Van Nuys, Ca. It was their first origami festival.



One of my gymnasts came to the event (she even did a backhandspring for Joe); so that explains the non-origami-related family footage in the 2nd half of the video.



The second video is just spare footage, including a few clips from my earlier excursion-invites at the Gardens.

Photos can be seen here and here.

Chinese-American Museum Lantern Festival (2006)

For more pictures, click on the photo.

I was cleaning through my files, and found this half-baked project. It's dated February 18th, 2006. The Year of the Dog. There's nothing special in this video, that hasn't been seen in others; but it's memories for Yami, Joe, and myself.

Yami Yamauchi's Origami Panel at PMX 2007

This is the raw video footage from Yami's Panel demonstration at Pacific Asia Media Expo, November 11, 2007. I believe this is our 3rd year at this event. One of these days, I will make videos, covering the other two years. I also have clips of this year's, that I also might piece together.



One befuddled old lady at the Hilton (near LAX, where the event was held, as last year) walked up to our tables and told Joe and I, "You're the only normal ones here".

You get the idea?

And what? Joe, "normal"?

Joe always says he's too shy to give panel discussions and be on-stage (yet he draws the biggest audience around him all day long, entertaining people with his humor and origami at our booth). So Yami and I always do this. I think we get better, each time.

I wish I had the foresight to have someone video my segment, as that was fun too. (I seldom hand the camera over to Yami- you know how old people are with high tech stuff? Exactly!). But at least the "master" is preserved on film, in all his humor and glory.

Here are my photos. For those of you into cosplay, you can find more PMX vids at YouTube.




We had the pleasure of Larry Davis' company the final few hours on Sunday.

Happy 71st birthday, by the way, Yami!

Won Park Demonstrations

Apparently, people are having some difficulties in understanding how to fold the fins on Won Park's dollar koi.

I was going to try to upload a video of Won folding his model at OUSA, but it's just so damn long (he's a slow, meticulous folder); and I haven't found the patience to edit and condense it down to something viewable and easily uploadable.

For now, here is Won Park folding the fins to his koi fish:


Won Park Folds The Fins On His Dollar Koi

I apologize for the lack of explanation (remember: I was filming him folding it- not teaching it), any blurry moments, and had no control over his fingers being "in the way". Hopefully, as a supplemental to Marcio's diagrams, it will help.

As a bonus, I found in my files, this clip of Won Park demonstrating his jumping frog:

Nisei Week, Los Angeles, CA

I was not present on either weekend of Nisei Week this year. Management of vendors and artisans had changed hands, and it was a bit chaotic and uncertain; I ended up scheduling myself with other work, abandoning Yami and Joe to handle it. I filmed a few clips of their modest setup on one afternoon that I was able to make it to "J" Town, after work.



You can see photos here.

How to Make a Snappy Coke Bottle Container

This model has gained traction, thanks to Tricia Tait's introduction of it at OUSA 2007. I received one from her, with an origami "hacky sack" in it.

Based on some inquiry and interest on the Origami-L, I decided I'd make a tutorial video.

It really is a great little container. I love the snapping sound it makes when you open and close it.



Leyles Torres had made clear and concise diagrams as well, back in July. Consider this video as supplemental.

Here is Tricia Tait's explanation to the O-List on how she discovered the container:

I learned the Coke bottle container while attending an origami related event this past March in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil (celebration of the DoBras 3 year anniversary) I saw many members with colorful origami models in these clear, sturdy, and interesting looking containers. My friend from Brazil, Jaja Gryzbowski, commented that the group has been doing this for a number of years as an effort to recycle and protect models. They even had some special Coke containers in gold and also fuscia! I find the 1 and a halfliter bottles are especially nice for larger pieces.

The funny thing is that my 16 year old son, who drinks Pepsi, had taken to drinking Coke- just so that I'd have enough bottles to bring to teach at our convention this past June. (There go all my efforts to encourage him to drink healthy beverages, including water :-0) I'm not even sure that going out of the way to buy a beverage just to get the container is a good example of recyling! The bottles make great containers, though. I store a variety of items in these including vitamins for traveling.

Tricia

p.s. The 16.9 oz. bottle makes a bit of a deeper container than the 20 oz.
one because of where the curve is. Also beware- the 2 liter ones don't work at all since there isn't a curve at all. If you find the 1 1/2 liter size-
go for it!

Some of the 20 ounce coke containers have now changed (hopefully it's not permanent...I've seen one store receive the old bottles again....Cherry Coke, Diet Coke, Coke Zero, and Vanilla Coke still use the old bottles). Faye Goldman offers suggestions and verbal directions:

For all of you who recently learned how to make those neat holders out of the Coke bottles and were disappointed to see that the new coke bottles don't have the same 5 grooves in their sides, take heart! The old Sprite bottles still work. I have tried to estimating 6ths, on the new Coke bottles to see if that works. The 'waist' is higher, so it will mean a bigger holder. The six sides are narrower than the 5 sides, but it is acceptable. You must start off cutting the bottle in the middle of the label, not near the bottom.

For those who are totally lost here are the directions (for the Sprite/ Old Coke) to make a neat holder and recycle/reuse some plastic:

Find a Coke/Sprite bottle with the 'waist'. (the coke shape has a narrowing of the bottle.)
Cut through the label about 1/4 inch from the bottom of the label. Through away the top.
Make 5 cuts parallel with the sides of the bottle, using every other indent of the bottle. The Sprite bottles have dots, the old Coke bottles have valleys. DO NOT GO PAST THE NARROWEST PART OF THE WAIST. You can always cut down more. You can't 'uncut', Starting at the middle of each separation (it is also marked on the old bottles) make curved cuts forming a petal. When done correctly, these petals will lay over over the bottom of the bottle, forming a nice holder for a small oriami gift.

If Coca-Cola is seeing a sudden spike in their sales this year, perhaps it could be traced back to this fad amongst origamists....?

Classic Elegance and Beauty in Simplicity

One of the sweet advantages of living in Los Angeles is that it's a "happening place". And being in the same town as those in the entertainment industry, sometimes I receive origami projects.

Leaving things around at places you shop, can sometimes pay off, financially. I've often had places that I frequent, keep their origami gifts out on display, with my contact information.

Last weekend, a person was looking for someone to fold two vases of traditional origami flowers for a movie. She said my name kept popping up wherever she asked around. Catherine Ortiz still heads our Westcoast Guild, and recommended me. A store in Little Tokyo, Bun Ka Do, also told them to get a hold of me.

So, anyway, I got commissioned to fold 40 roses for a movie called "Repossession Mambo" starring Jude Law. According to my contact, The flowers will be in a funeral scene in a commercial they are watching on TV in the movie." We'll see if it actually makes it on screen.

This was a last minute, hectic project, and Sunday night I got 2 hours of sleep to finish by deadline (one problem I encountered was searching for the right paper when many stores close on Sundays at inconvenient hours).

What was rewarding for me, was rediscovering my deep appreciation for the elegant simplicity of such a classic model as the traditional lily.

Fun, two, three, Fold

For two months in a row, now, the WCOG has been a bit obsessed with flexicubes. It seems Yami returned from OUSA with a couple of flexicubes, one being the single piece Philip Noble model; the other being the modular version. Joe Hamamoto's been folding the multi-piece version while Yukie Partos has been folding the single sheet version, and teaching it to Guild members. Joe has been teaching his method of piecing together David Brill's double star flexicube (found in Brilliant Origami). He does something a bit different than the actual directions, adding in two extra hinges, I believe.

Can't get this silly song out of my head because of the oversaturation of that ipod commercial on tv. So I thought I'd use it in this video to exorcise me of the song.

I think I took a backward approach to solving my problem.


This is from our September 8th Westcoast Origami Guild meeting.

2007 WCOG pictures can be viewed here.

OUSA Convention After Action Report

My old Fisherknight yahoo album, where I kept festival and convention photos, made a forced migration over to shutterfly. It took me a while to figure out how to make my photos publically available for viewing. Convention photos from last weekend's OUSA can now be found here. Please bookmark it, as I will get around to making all of the old photos from the Fisherknight account available here, along with others I have not gotten around to uploading, from before.

As is the case each year, I spent a bulk of my time in the goldmine, vending to help offset my travel expenses. Bless the buyers!

I achieved maximum sleep deprivation. Arriving home Monday morning at 9am, my intentions were to go in to work at 3:30pm; I decided to "rest my eyes" as soon as I got home, for 30 minutes. The next thing I knew, when I opened my eyes it was 11:30pm!!!

Who needs sleep and shower when there is a year's worth of folding to be crammed into 2 days?

The "Won" Dollar Bill

Most of my energies were focused upon the single-minded purpose of learning the $ koi fish, koined, "the Won Dollar Koi" (by no one else, but myself). To that end, I succeeded; and while Marcio Noguchi has koi directions at the top of his list of Won Park models to diagram, Won and I talked about possibly uploading a video of the folding process.

I pretty much filmed Won for an hour-and-a-half with my digital camera, folding the koi; but I don't think the quality is good enough for the average folder to learn by. Plus, it's a lot of video to scale down and edit. (Then there's also the incriminating, crude banter going on in the background audio of the video, by Joseph Wu, Jason Ku, and Rob Hudson...I'm sure you good folks in the origami community do not want to ease-drop upon that bit of conversation, do you?).

Perhaps a combination of step-folds and video-clipping of the fold process....? I'll have to make sure Won is still ok with it.

For those curious about how Won embarked upon the creation of his $ koi, it started with a WCOG member, Pam Miike (who lurks on the O-List- I see you Pam!), spending time in Hawaii, and consequently, spending time having Won fold her stuff while she just watches. Not that long ago, they went out for noodles; and in the noodle shop, Won saw a painting of a koi. That was the inspiration, right there, for the next dollar model.

On the flight from Hawaii to NY, Won started designing a seahorse, that already looked good, even though it was just an unfinished prototype.

I believe it was 2002 when I first met Won at OUSA. It was my 2nd Convention. Joel Bauer had met him in Hawaii, and told him about the Convention. Before that, Won was pretty much an isolated folder, whose work was largely unknown.

Back then, one of the last things Won tried to teach me, at 4 O'Clock in the morning, was this napkin rose:



I think Won's version is one of the best simple napkin roses out there, and I've been wanting to fold it for the past 5 years. Now that I've seen it again, I can't believe how simple it actually is and that it's not much different than what I've already seen; I guess it's just his artistry that made it stand out, as somehow different from the rest.

I carried a 4 GB memory card with me, but didn't go to OUSA this year with the mindset to make a video. In afterthought, I regret having missed some opportunities: Chris Palmer demonstrating his famous flower tower....my cicada glider boomeranging around the hospitality room; Shrikant's storigami; Kuniko Yamamoto's hospitality room entertainment; Jinni Xu's impromptu magic show (she's perhaps the only other person besides myself who came away from Convention, able to fold the $ koi on her own- she was more determined than me!)....nevertheless, here is the meager I did capture:



I am a creature of habit, who likes his daily routine. I cannot abide being away from my work for very long. I do not like to travel, nor do I like to take vacations. So my Convention travels, for the last few years, have been extremely short, with me leaving by Monday morning, even though there are great classes that go on during Mondays, as well as the Monday night banquet. I feel a twinge of guilt, that some of my Convention friends, I barely said hi to, if even that. I see these people once a year, and with the best of intentions, being busy at the moment, I figure I'll spend time saying hi and folding with them later. I forget that amidst the whirlwind and cramming of Convention folding, it is extremely easy to run out of time, and before you know it, you are packing it in, homeward bound. Final goodbyes and first hullos are sometimes left unstated. It's with this in mind, that I do apologize to anyone who I failed to spend longer hours with, or who I failed to spend even one minute with. Convention often leaves me breathless, with so many activities going on all at once and so many that gets left unaccomplished....

Also blogging:
Origami desde Lerma
Origami Tessellations

Other OUSA Photos:
Andrew Hans
Brian Chan
Brian K. Webb
Daniel Scher
Goran
Joseph Wu
Julie Savard
lilzabubba
Origamishiv
Phillip West
Rob Hudson
Sipho Mabona
vipnyc

Lantern Festival at Chinese-American Museum, Los Angeles

This was our 3rd year at this event. Filmed back on March 3, 2007.

My reason for attending OUSA this year in June

After missing last year's convention (after attending about 4 or 5 straight conventions), I will be going this year, in large part because of the second coming of Won Park. Click on the photo to visit his Moneyfolder Yahoo Group.

How to fold an abstract flexible shape

Find more Paul Jackson videos here.

Hat tip: The Origami Forum

Joe Hamamoto: Retired, but working harder than ever!

This video is a very rough edit. I got lazy after all these recent vids, and decided to pretty much just string a bunch of raw footage together, making for a very long video. Because it went over the time limit (11 minutes) and file size, I could not upload it to my YouTube account; and my one LiveDigital account is now over quota. So I decided to use Google Video.

Joe is at his best in entertainment. He is rather creative in his presentations. What I love most is how much delight he brings to people. I love watching their reactions and hearing their laughter.

Joe is also extremely generous, always folding hundreds of jars and bags of giveaway origami to hand out at festivals.

"I am who I want to be and now I want to be someone who is sleeping." 

 - Ferruccio from the Italian film, "Life is Beautiful"

Joe Demonstrates 3 Kasahara Models

Joe brought 3 new models to show off at the Monterey Park Cherry Blossom Festival. He is often imaginative in presenting stories to go along with his favorite models, to entertain folks. I have footage for one more video from last weekend's festival in Monterey Park, featuring Joe...retired, but still hard at work in origami. I also hope to go back and edit together a video from our presence at the Chinese-American Museum in March. There was one guy in particular that Joe had fun entertaining; I missed some of their funniest exchanges, though. I gotta learn to keep that camera running...



The models can be found in The Art and Wonder of Origami.

Cherry Blossom Festival, Monterey Park, CA- Origami Demonstration Pt 1

The video runs under 10 minutes; but I probably talked for almost 20. I blended both days into one video.

My material isn't well-rehearsed. What I mostly talk about is how the art of origami honors the traditions of the past by not only preserving it, but evolving from it. So I show off some modern origami that some people might not be aware of, in terms of types of origami, and the evolution of new creations.

My aim is also to get more people excited and involved in enjoyment and appreciation for the art.

Part II, III, and IV are below this post, in respective order. Photos of the 10th annual Cherry Blossom Festival in Monterey Park, CA, can be viewed here.

Cherry Blossom Festival, Monterey Park, CA- Origami Demonstration Pt 2

Part II covers the magic of moneyfolds.

The demonstration was only supposed to last for about a half hour; so, not much time to cover the wide-range of billfolds. So I showed off only a few, leading up to asking someone from the audience for a dollar (which, normally, I will examine, then stuff into my pocket, asking someone else for another one).

The Robert Neale flapping butterfly (with John Andrisan's cosmetic modifications) only takes me a minute to fold. Maybe even less time than that. With the right buildup, there really is a kind of magic to it. I don't think the video represents my best presentation, but it's what I have; and what you, the viewers, are stuck with.

Again, as in Part I, I blended both days into one video, extracting what I could, and tried to make a seamless blend. Some parts were not recorded, as my cameramen stopped filming at certain points. Many thanks to both of them: Jimmy Taggart, who filmed on the first day (April 21st) and is a magician and fellow paperfolder at WCOG; and Art Fukomoto, who is a volunteer at the Festival.

Sorry for the low quality of the sound.

Cherry Blossom Festival Indoor Demonstration Part 3- Yami Yamauchi

Yami taught his banger, to be used at the end of the presentation in an origami contest. He also taught the transition into the moving mouth, which I did not film all of; so I discluded (made up word? Still makes sense to me...) it altogether in the final edit.

Yami also wanted to mention Lillian Oppenheimer in Sunday's demo, and her contributions to the evolution of origami, and pioneering in the States. I think we got our signals mixed up, and he meant for me to talk about it. Hopefully, there are some in the crowd who will be inspired to look further into origami than what we could share in 30 minutes.