CURVULATOR (tm) DISCUSSION

INTRODUCTION -- (What this report is trying to do)

This report is designed to familiarize you with the CURVULATOR and show you some of the things you can make with it. The report is not in any way complete or comprehensive and it may very well be that some of you will know more about the Boxmaker Grande after using it for a few minutes than the writer and inventor does after working with it for months. The writer does not have a natural talent for recognizing and repeating the various shapes that arose when he tried different things. In fact, he has, in the past, been tested on his ability to ability to recognize what 3-dimensional shapes can be folded from various flat patterns that show all the fold lines: he scored at the lowest 20th percentile. So chances are 4 to 1 that you are a better folder and pattern maker than he does.

FOLDING FLAT PAPER INTO CURVY SHAPES ????

Cylinders and tubes are two basic ways to make curvy shapes.

Most of us can easily imagine a sheet of flat paper wrapped, formed or rolled into a tube or cylinder -- we often see examples of it in our daily lives. Paper drinking straws are one example. Toilet paper and  paper towels and gift wrapping paper are usually wrapped around such tubes. These tubes are usually wrapped from a narrow, long strip of paper that is wrapped diagonally around a center mandrel, with the overlapping sheets being held together with some sort of glue. The ends are usually trimmed at right angles to the axis of the tube. If additional strips of paper are joined together at their ends, it is possible to make a tube of any length.

It is also possible to roll a tube in another way as many children do when making a play telescope or a megaphone (cone) from a sheet of paper. When making a tube in this way, the length of the tube is generally limited to the length of the paper you start with.
 

OTHER  PAPER SURFACES WITH COMPLEX CURVES

It is hard for some of us to imagine how a flat sheet of paper or cardstock can be made into a curved surface that curves in more than one way --- we just do not see many examples of such shapes in our daily lives. We intuitively feel that it is impossible, for instance, to cover a ball (a sphere) with a sheet of paper -- or even with many sheets of paper. And that is probably true if we insist that the paper must not be creased or bent or folded in some way. But if we allow creasing, bending and folding and a somewhat uneven surface --- it is quite possible to make surfaces that curve in more than one way. We will be showing you how to make such surfaces. It turns out that there are many ways to cover a ball with paper -- or even to make a ball out of paper. We won't be going that far here with our projects but I suspect some of you will figure out a good way to make a neat reproducible ball out of cardstock.

Since the subject of making curved shapes with paper and cardstock has not been explored much, most of the material I will be writing here deals with my own experience just playing around with the prototype of the CURVULATOR you have evidently purchased. There are no reference sources.

There may be many errors -- if you find any, please let us know at the "contact" address..

WHAT THE CURVULATOR KIT CONTAINS
1) The overlay template --- this is a clear plastic plate with 13 curves: each curve being a section of a circle with a given radius.
2) A scoring tool  ---  this is a hand held tool with a rounded edge.
3) Some sample cardsock

HOW SCORING WORKS --- TRY THIS
1) Put a piece of cardstock over any flat surface.
2) Put the overlay template over the cardstock and poke the scoring tool through any of the circular curves so it makes an indented mark in the cardstock. That indented mark weakens the cardstock at that point.
3) If you push on the scoring tool while you force it against the cardstock and, at the same time, draw the scoring tool across the cardstock you will make an idented curve on the cardsock. That indented line is called a "score". If the score goes to two edges of the sheet (or another fold line), you will be able to force the surface of the cardstock into a curved shape. Because the scored line is curved, the fold line is curved and the cardstock on both sides of the fold no longer lie on flat planes.
4) Now make a score, using the largest radius curve, from one edge of the cardstock to another. You should find that you can then pick up the cardstock and easily bend the cardstock into a curved shape.
5) Try this scoring with different thicknesses of cardstock --- note how you have to handle the scoring tool differently with different thicknesses of cardstock. With thick stock, you have to bear down; while if you press too hard with thinner stock, you will break through the material.
6) You can now try making single scores in any pattern on the cardstock -- try some of those described here to see what the resulting folds and surfaces are like. Use the 8" diameter scoring slot for each score and an 8" square piece of cardstock. Start with a cardstock --- about .012" to .014" thick -- which is about the thickness of a business card and somehat thinner than cereal box material. While beginning, make only one score on any given piece of cardstock
a) across a corner (concave) --that is from one cardstock edge to an adjacent edge
b) from one diagonal corner of the cardstock to the other diagonal corner
c) within an edge -- both ends of score run off the same edge
d) across a corner (convex)
e) as (c) above but closer and further from the edge
7) Try the same thing as above 3a to 3e -- but with smaller diameters and then with larger diameters.
8) Now try two, three and four scores parallel scores as described above in 3a to 3e --- stick with one radius for each set. Then try the same patterns with different radii. Experiment by folding so the various fold lines look like valleys from your point of view or mountains. Is it easy to fold adjacent folds so they are both valleys --- or is it easier to alternately fold mountains and valleys? The drawing below shows 6 parallellines from one edge to an opposite edge.See figure 1 below
9) Experiment by making adjacent lines either parallel or not parallel. You might try mixing straight lines with curved lines.
10) Try the same thing as above as far as practical starting with triangular shapes of cardstock.
11) You can also start with circles and other geometric cardstock shapes -- ellipses, parallelograms, rhomboids, rectangles, pentagons and such.  Or you can even use free form shapes -- or shapes found in nature --- such as leaves, petals and bananas --- when scored lengthwise -- they can be formed into interesting shapes. See figure 2 below
12) And you can, of course, score other than circular shapes -- but since the CURVULATOR has only sections of circles --- you may find it easiest to stick with circles.
13) You can link sections of circles (with or without straight lines) as shown to get different effects -- try some of these scores on test sheets of cardstock and see what you come up with. See figure 3 below

Figure 1 Bottom edge of card seems to have disappeared? Make believe it is there.	Figure 2 -- Banana, Leaf and Pear	Figure 3 -- Joined sections of circles

You can make boxes like these out of cardstock scored with the CURVULATOR.