Why do you build card models

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RickTNRebel

New Member
I've been around REAL (1:1 scale) aircraft since I was 18 years old (1973...do the math!) Plastic models aren't built like real airplanes. Paper replicates the real aircraft build process to a greater degree. Maybe not as much as large scale RC aircraft, but when you take a look at the COSTS, paper offers the hobbyist the most flexability. I've noticed since joining several forums and on-line groups, that a LOT of paper modelers share a common "thread" (forum pun not intended but cool,huh?)...most practice EXTREME frugality...I really think that is great. You just don't see that a lot in the "Hobby Industry" worlds of Plastic and RC. It seems in those worlds, you're constantly being told you have to buy more "stuff". The paper guys that I have been following tend to be real problem solvers rather than the kind that just runs out and throws more money at their hobby! In the Marines (America's expeditionary force), we had a motto (we had lots of mottos): "Adapt, Improvise and Overcome". Paper model folks tend to apply this to their hobby. Because of that, I feel right at home!
 

barad

New Member
Old thread but a decent question.

Like most people never had the option of buying all the models I wanted so you develop a mind set of being frugal when buying. These days I have a bit more money to spend but because of the ingrained culture of only spending after very careful thought it means onyl a handful of models are bought. By then turning to paper I can get a feel for the model for minimal cost and then later if the big purchase is warranted I can.

Of course it also helps develop modeling skills in general and it doesn't matter if you stuff it up
 

ETOTONGKA

New Member
For one its fun, and I don't have to worry about spendig a fortune on paint and stuff, just download and forget (which I do sometimes) plus its enviromently friendly. I try to build ones I can get "play time" out of, such as a rocket or an airplane.
 

Experimental Designs

Papercraft Visionary
I'm waging a war with the treehuggers environmentalists bitching about me digging oil to make plastic model kits. The more paper models I build. The more trees I'll cut down. The more models I print, the more chemical wast I'll create. I'll show them. The fun part of paper modeling is just a byproduct.

You are officially my new best friend. Damn the hippies!!! (Yes I am a Hardliner Republican)

I grew up in a relatively affluent family. However, my dad saved up most of the money and decided to rent a one-bedroom house sign1 (we now live in a 3-bedroom condo!). My dad wouldn't buy me whatever toy I wanted, and I soon turned to card modeling as a way of getting free toys. I soon took to building things, and well, here I am! These days, I make models to distract myself from my depression as well as to fight off boredom.

I done the same thing although I did get some toys when I was a kid, not that I was spoiled they never had anything that I was interested in. So I wanted to design things of my own which came at a price. Everyone wanted to play with the things I made instead of playing with their own toys. I was very picky 9 year old at the time.

The main reasons I build card models for one they're relatively inexpensive, it passes the time when I'm bored. Secondly I like my own designs better than some established ones (not that I'm being arrogant, I'm just that friggin picky) and third I love playing wargames that me and friends create. We can have our own line of models built from the ground up instead of buying them off the market. I think lastly I like doing things with my hands. God gifted me with a talent to make things out of paper so it is one of my main hobbies other than wargaming in general. (It keeps me out of trouble) :cool:
 
Ik bouw modellen kaart als een manier van bestrijding van de steeds toenemende verveling, en mezelf afleiden van worden afgezien van mijn vrouw. Ik geniet ook van het eindresultaat. :)
 
Z

Zathros

Ik bouw modellen kaart als een manier van bestrijding van de steeds toenemende verveling, en mezelf afleiden van worden afgezien van mijn vrouw. Ik geniet ook van het eindresultaat. :)

I'm lucky, my wife is good to be around. She likes the models I make but I have been thinking about making that bodacious Elf maiden model and she's kind of looking at me a little weird. I've downloaded it. She is bodacious. So is the paper model!:mrgreen:

lineage-2-dark-elf-papercraft.jpg
 
I built many models as a kid. Every friday we would go to K-mart and I would spend my two dollar alowance on some kind of model, mostly air planes. I escpecially liked monogram, but I built dragsters, funny cars, and monsters from some of the old horror movies. You don't find models much any more in these type stores, you can find a few but not like in the 70's, now you have to have an ID to buy glue...if they even carry it. To find these mods now you have to go to hobby stores and the prices they want for them you'd think they were made of gold not plastic. Besides kids now days aren't interested in building something with their hands, you don't get instant gratification from model building, which is all there interested in.

I stumbled into card modeling completely by accedent about a year and a half ago. I took my daughters to Kennedy space center the first week out of school for summer, we live only 2 1/2 hrs away. It was the first time I'd been in eighteen years. Well I got the rocket fever, I came home and went to a hobby store and picked up 1/144 Sat V ( plastic of course), after building it I really wanted an LUT to display it on. So the internet search began, I started seeing all these paper model sites..I thought "oh please, you gotta be kidding me, PAPER models". As I started seeing all the sites and all the different things being built I was blown away. I tinkered around with some of the simpler rockets from JLeslie's site and then spent the fourty bucks on the paper craft LUT, what a model for a begginer to cut his teeth on.

Why do I build card mods? #1 I don't have to paint them, I suck at painting...any kind of painting, and #2 except for paper and ink there free.

THANKS AND GRATITUDE to all you designers out there, you helped a man keep his sanity during a two year unemployment stint.
 

Thales

New Member
I stumbled into card modeling because some of the subjects I wanted to build didn't exist in plastic or resin (or if they did, cost a ton). Paper also feels more like scratchbuilding as you have to create both the part and fit them together.

Then of course you can enlarge/shrink things as needed pretty easy on paper.

My favorite component of it though is if you screw a part up, you just print off another one and do it again until it is right.
 

paper hollywood

Active Member
This is a great thread and deserves to keep going. I just read every post with great interest. I differ from most here in that I enjoy building card models and plastic/resin model about equally, though for different reasons. Manufactured hard models have the obvious benefits of super detail, easy complex curves and durability. But they also require a considerable commitment of time and skills-- assembly, puttying, modifications, finishing and so on. I find it much easier to start and stop work on a card model. I like having the details already "painted" for me. I like the ingenuity that goes into design of many of them. But I think what I like the most is the magic of turning a flat stack of paper into an interesting 3D object. There is this interesting online culture of card model designers and builders that is unlike any hobby I've run across. One guy can design a cool model, upload it as a file to the web and soon hundreds of builders can enjoy building it. I love that sort of thing.

Wade
 

Cpt.Matt

New Member
Papermodelling is great. I like the Star Trek ships but the plastic kits or Resin kits are very expensive. With the paper models there are so many ways to build the models or to make a complete new design.
 

bgt01

Exemplary Confidant
therapy

It's fun to see these things come to life. And focusing on the model let's me tune out the world for awhile.
 

PemTech

New Member
Paper modeling allows me to pursue my favorite hobby, Rocketry, without spending a fortune on specialized parts. Like this flying, 300% upscale of Currells' paper Friede.
 

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paper hollywood

Active Member
Wow! Cool model and cool launch, PemTech. I'm totally impressed. I've not done model rocketry in 40 years or so, but it certainly looks like the Friede makes a good launcher. I'm guessing that's not plane old cardstock covering those flame resisting fins. I hope it made it to Venus OK and landed intact, because it's a great looking model. Wade
 

PemTech

New Member
Thanks guys.....
It is actually regular paper rubber cemented to posterboard, then cut out and assembled. No fire-resistant coatings or anything. She survived the this launch (on an F motor) without a scratch but lost a fin on the next flight(on a G motor). The next one will have reenforced fin tabs.
 

Vince

Member
My brother and I built many ship and airplane plastic models as a kid. As an adult, life got in the way, and I only built a few models over the last 30 years, my last one about 6 years ago. I love anything to do with space, and was surfing the net looking for space shuttle pics for my desktop screensaver, when I found Alfonso's AXM site. That was all it took. I built the Challenger with MLP and transporter crawler. That led to Leo Cherkashyn's Russian space model site, built the Buran/Energia, and now trying to scratch build the Grasshopper transporter. Also downloaded more models than I will probably ever build, but it's great to dream. Thank you to all the talented designers, tipsters and forum users sharing their talents with us.
 
This is why I build Papercraft. So I can have and enjoy those wonderful thing I otherwise could never find, and even if I could, I couldn't afford to buy.

Seriously, who WOULDN'T want an 18" SDF-1 on their shelf to enjoy every day? Again, Thanks to Thunderchild for his excellent design, without which i would be without many smiles and relived memories from my childhood.



A thing of beauty ;)

SDF-1 163.jpg
 
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