6 ms·

Folding Paper Globes

162 points by BerislavLopac 7y ago

rgovostes 7y ago
I used to make these with a Photoshop plugin called Flexify and high-res imagery available from NASA. I'm surprised that it's still around, and not particularly expensive: http://www.flamingpear.com/flexify-2.html http://www.flamingpear.com/flexify-2.html
- lloydb 7y ago
  I wrote Flexify. It’s got tons of weird paper-model possibilities like sphericons and curved-fold origami. The whole list is here: http://www.flamingpear.com/flexify-output-modes.html http://www.flamingpear.com/flexify-output-modes.html
  - rgovostes 7y ago
    It's great! I e-mailed you asking about a standalone version. All of your plug-ins are pretty cool. As a kid it was fun to play with them, especially LunarCell and Glitterato, and get results that far exceeded my own artistic abilities. You were really ahead of the curve on procedural generation. You also once sent me the source code for Despair when I asked about updating it for then-modern systems, but I had no idea anything about C back then.
pacaro 7y ago
The dymaxion projection works well for this too
- quickthrower2 7y ago
  And the Waterman Butterfly https://xkcd.com/977/ https://xkcd.com/977/
  - djhn 7y ago
    Is there any code or published algorithm out there to transform a map into either of these?
    - ClashTheBunny 7y ago
      D3 does this amazingly well: https://github.com/d3/d3-geo-projection/blob/master/README.md#geoPolyhedralWaterman https://github.com/d3/d3-geo-projection/blob/master/README.m...
madhadron 7y ago
Am I the only one that would love to have an eInk globe that I can project arbitrary stuff on?
- dmix 7y ago
  As an art piece for your house?
- greggman2 7y ago
  not the same but FYI, there is a large globe display at the Museam of the Future in Tokyo. They have contents each year for interesting things to display on them. Unfortunately they only take video, nothing interactive. But still http://festival.j-mediaarts.jp/en/news/fpaward_entry/ http://festival.j-mediaarts.jp/en/news/fpaward_entry/
- jcoffland 7y ago
  It's not eInk but a spherical screen already exists: https://pufferfishdisplays.com/solution/puffersphere/ https://pufferfishdisplays.com/solution/puffersphere/
  - huhtenberg 7y ago
    https://vimeo.com/212582845 https://vimeo.com/212582845 - a skippable version of their video. It's all animated, no real world footage. Lots and lots of "real" videos of this display are marketing CGI renders, but here's the one from the actual trade show - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGPvfHI-yCE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGPvfHI-yCE
    - paxswill 7y ago
      My university had one in the science building and I played with it a bit. It was able to view various visualizations of data covering the globe (temperature I think might've been one, but I'm near positive weather was also available). They also had imagery of other planets loaded up, so you could spin Mars around to look at different spots. It's not a very bright display; it is just a projector after all. That video plays pretty well to its strengths in a darker trade show, but in a bright atrium it's much harder to use. It's a little hard to describe, but the "viewing angle" isn't fantastic either. The surface is harder to see than I expected as it gets closer to being perpendicular to your eyes (yeah, obviously, but it seems to lose contrast/brightness or something).
dmix 7y ago
No example photos of the completed globes? Edit: found some examples on their blog: https://mapscaping.com/blogs/geo-candy/diy-folding-paper-globe https://mapscaping.com/blogs/geo-candy/diy-folding-paper-glo...
- tobr 7y ago
  What kind of shape does the second-to-last one make?
  - ClashTheBunny 7y ago
    A spike ball: http://www.flamingpear.com/gallery65.html http://www.flamingpear.com/gallery65.html
hrktb 7y ago
One of the most interesting thing with paper globes is that the object becomes very familiar with kids. They understand it's inexpensive, won't shatter if they drop it so don't fear touching or moving it around, playing with it. They can participate in making, so it becomes more personal. And as there's no stand, it's easy to mess with the orientation. "upside-down" becomes arbitrary, even with text on it, you can discuss inclination, or how it can be seen from completely different perspectives. It's a very nice object to have around.
probablybroken 7y ago
The cubic earth made me laugh; I'm currently making a planetary terrain generator which uses a normalised cube to generate spherical terrain, so this was particularly close to home :)
marapuru 7y ago
Cool, just a little heads up that the print saying "Copyright © MapScaping.com -all rights reserrved - not for sale" contains a spelling error. Unless you are a pirate, sailing the foldable paper globes, reserved is spelled with 1 r :-)
wailashi 7y ago
This reminded me of another paper globe project, Le Paper Globe: http://joachimesque.com/globe/ http://joachimesque.com/globe/
mncharity 7y ago
For other planets/moons, there's also [1]. [1] Planetary Icosahedrons http://solarviews.com/eng/ico.htm http://solarviews.com/eng/ico.htm

162 points by BerislavLopac 7y ago

I used to make these with a Photoshop plugin called Flexify and high-res imagery available from NASA. I'm surprised that it's still around, and not particularly expensive: http://www.flamingpear.com/flexify-2.html http://www.flamingpear.com/flexify-2.html

lloydb 7y ago
I wrote Flexify. It’s got tons of weird paper-model possibilities like sphericons and curved-fold origami. The whole list is here: http://www.flamingpear.com/flexify-output-modes.html http://www.flamingpear.com/flexify-output-modes.html
- rgovostes 7y ago
  It's great! I e-mailed you asking about a standalone version. All of your plug-ins are pretty cool. As a kid it was fun to play with them, especially LunarCell and Glitterato, and get results that far exceeded my own artistic abilities. You were really ahead of the curve on procedural generation. You also once sent me the source code for Despair when I asked about updating it for then-modern systems, but I had no idea anything about C back then.

pacaro 7y ago

The dymaxion projection works well for this too

quickthrower2 7y ago
And the Waterman Butterfly https://xkcd.com/977/ https://xkcd.com/977/
- djhn 7y ago
  Is there any code or published algorithm out there to transform a map into either of these?
  - ClashTheBunny 7y ago
    D3 does this amazingly well: https://github.com/d3/d3-geo-projection/blob/master/README.md#geoPolyhedralWaterman https://github.com/d3/d3-geo-projection/blob/master/README.m...

madhadron 7y ago

Am I the only one that would love to have an eInk globe that I can project arbitrary stuff on?

dmix 7y ago
As an art piece for your house?
greggman2 7y ago
not the same but FYI, there is a large globe display at the Museam of the Future in Tokyo. They have contents each year for interesting things to display on them. Unfortunately they only take video, nothing interactive. But still http://festival.j-mediaarts.jp/en/news/fpaward_entry/ http://festival.j-mediaarts.jp/en/news/fpaward_entry/
jcoffland 7y ago
It's not eInk but a spherical screen already exists: https://pufferfishdisplays.com/solution/puffersphere/ https://pufferfishdisplays.com/solution/puffersphere/
- huhtenberg 7y ago
  https://vimeo.com/212582845 https://vimeo.com/212582845 - a skippable version of their video. It's all animated, no real world footage. Lots and lots of "real" videos of this display are marketing CGI renders, but here's the one from the actual trade show - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGPvfHI-yCE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGPvfHI-yCE
  - paxswill 7y ago
    My university had one in the science building and I played with it a bit. It was able to view various visualizations of data covering the globe (temperature I think might've been one, but I'm near positive weather was also available). They also had imagery of other planets loaded up, so you could spin Mars around to look at different spots. It's not a very bright display; it is just a projector after all. That video plays pretty well to its strengths in a darker trade show, but in a bright atrium it's much harder to use. It's a little hard to describe, but the "viewing angle" isn't fantastic either. The surface is harder to see than I expected as it gets closer to being perpendicular to your eyes (yeah, obviously, but it seems to lose contrast/brightness or something).

dmix 7y ago

No example photos of the completed globes? Edit: found some examples on their blog: https://mapscaping.com/blogs/geo-candy/diy-folding-paper-globe https://mapscaping.com/blogs/geo-candy/diy-folding-paper-glo...

tobr 7y ago
What kind of shape does the second-to-last one make?
- ClashTheBunny 7y ago
  A spike ball: http://www.flamingpear.com/gallery65.html http://www.flamingpear.com/gallery65.html

hrktb 7y ago

One of the most interesting thing with paper globes is that the object becomes very familiar with kids. They understand it's inexpensive, won't shatter if they drop it so don't fear touching or moving it around, playing with it. They can participate in making, so it becomes more personal. And as there's no stand, it's easy to mess with the orientation. "upside-down" becomes arbitrary, even with text on it, you can discuss inclination, or how it can be seen from completely different perspectives. It's a very nice object to have around.

probablybroken 7y ago

The cubic earth made me laugh; I'm currently making a planetary terrain generator which uses a normalised cube to generate spherical terrain, so this was particularly close to home :)

marapuru 7y ago

Cool, just a little heads up that the print saying "Copyright © MapScaping.com -all rights reserrved - not for sale" contains a spelling error. Unless you are a pirate, sailing the foldable paper globes, reserved is spelled with 1 r :-)

wailashi 7y ago

This reminded me of another paper globe project, Le Paper Globe: http://joachimesque.com/globe/ http://joachimesque.com/globe/

mncharity 7y ago

For other planets/moons, there's also [1]. [1] Planetary Icosahedrons http://solarviews.com/eng/ico.htm http://solarviews.com/eng/ico.htm