Reading and collapsing Boxpleated Crease patterns from the perspective of paperforger

 General overview and intro to bp

 Elias stretch
 Middle flaps
 Main middle
 Divided middle
 Complex middle**, shaping into lvl shifters
 How to read them
 collapse them
 cp example

All models in origami consist of flaps, and there are 3 types: Corner, middle and edge. There are
many techniques to fold these flaps such as sinks, crimps and strange collapses. In boxpleating, these
flaps are easy to read due to there only being 45 degree angles with less convolution. the simplest of
cases of the 3 flaps are shown in figure 1. The names come from where the tip of the flap is
positioned; the corner, edge or the middle.

corner edge Middle

In simpler boxpleat models, you only require 1 core technique to collapse crease patterns; the Elias
stretch. The elias stretch is a simple type of collapse, however it can be applied in many different
situations. The example situation of the stretch is seen in figure 2 where 1 flap is split into 2. To do
this, an accordion fold perpendicular to the split needs to be made first. The accordion is “fanned
out” and is collapsed accordingly.
This is basically how edge and corner flaps are collapsed, but what about middle flaps? Within a cp,
middle flaps are commonly seen as diamonds. These diamonds can be easily collapsed by doing 2
Elias stretches at the same time. (figure 3)

(accordion
with a
mountain
in the
middle)

This is the case for the most basic of cases, however, these are practically useless within the context
of a full cp. Within a cp, these 3 types of flaps are modified and combined in order to position and
lengthen the flaps properly. Because of the limitations of boxpleating, the number of ways a corner,
middle and edge flap is limited and will fall into certain categories: branched flap, main flap and
complex flap.

Firstly, a “main” flap for now can simply be thought of any corner, edge or middle flap. From a main
flap, branched and complex flaps can be made.

A branched flap is made from splitting a main flap into 2 or more flaps. These can be made from
edge flaps (branched edge flap / BE flap) and middle flaps (branched middle flap / BM flap). As seen
in figure 4, BE flaps are collapsed as multiple elias stretches which are combined together while BM
flap is collapsing 2 BE flaps simultaneously.

CP of a main middle flap with 1 Tree structure Folded Simulation of the

branch branched flap

A branched flap can be branched as many times as necessary as well, making double or triple
branched flaps. This can get especially confusing in middle flaps in particular. For example in figure 5,
a main middle flap has many branches coming out. These kinds of triple BE flaps are used a lot in my
personal designs, and can sometimes be annoying to collapse.

The best way to collapse them is to first collapse the main flaps before doing the branches.
This is much simpler than trying to collapse everything at once.

[EXAMPLE]

CP Fan out the MM Fan out the 1st Repeat until all
flap and collapse. branch in order branches are
to collapse the done.
2nd branch

A complex flap is the same as a branched flap, however having more branches which I would say are
“irregular”. Flaps with only 1 unit long branches aren’t used much as actual flaps (maybe for fingers
or small spikes) but as level shifters, transitions, pleats for detailing and other similar devices.
Instead of calling these branches, I created the complex flap category. (shortened to CE for complex
edge flap and CM for complex middle) An example of this “complex flap” can be seen in the scorpion
tail in figure 6. To collapse ____.... I know that to call this an elias stretch is a stretch, but the main
technique of collapsing remains the same.

Now is the fun part; actually reading the cp and figuring out how to collapse it. For this example I will
be using Bodo’s Pteranodon skeleton. It does look scary at first, however when broken down into
MM and BM flaps, it should be relatively simple to collapse.

The first step is to find all of the main flaps and ignore all of the branched flaps. Then, figure out how
to collapse the main flaps by themselves.

To do this, first make sure that there are no 45 degree lines which end in the middle of the paper, as
this will not collapse flat. Now, decide the direction of accordion fold. This will be done by seeing
which direction has the most creases. In this cp it is vertical, so the accordion fold will be done using
the vertical creases.

Now, the main flaps can be collapsed. Starting from the middle, begin elias stretching each of the
MM flaps and turning the necessary vertical accordions into horizontal accordions.

From here, the BM flaps can be collapsed by fanning out one of the MM flaps and elias stretching
once again, similar to figure 4 shown before. This is repeated for all of the MM flaps which have
those branches.

This should result in a completed base. This cp in particular does not have any flaps which I would
call “complex”, but in cps which do, complex flaps would be collapsed first since they have the
smallest and difficult details.
This method makes it relatively simple to read boxpleated cps and will be able to collapse the
majority of models. Understanding this method fully can help with designing models as well.
However, there is a downside of neglecting important and basic design theory such as rivers and
packing if this method is used exclusively. (something which I have done) Good luck for those who
attempt to use this method and I hope it helped those who are attempting to collapse boxpleated
models for the first time.

____________________________________________________

I have not seen and naming conventions, making me invent the terminologies which I invented:
Main flap, branched flap and complex flap.

One of the rules in boxpleating is that a 45 degree line must continue until it “runs off” the paper. It
cannot stop suddenly in the middle of the paper, otherwise it cannot be collapsed into a flat base.
Most of the time when highlighting main flaps issues with lines stopping in the middle of the paper
will not happen.

Boxpleating is a style of design which is used to design custom bases with a high precision of length,
number and position of appendages. It is commonly used for more complex subjects with high
amounts of detail and numerous appendages such as beetles and humanoids.

My method for reading and collapsing BP has been developed through intuition and freefolding, and
as a result is not based on much theory.