Food Living Outside Play Technology Workshop

Papercraft skull with glowing eyes

by krummrey on September 28, 2014

Table of Contents

Papercraft skull with glowing eyes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Intro: Papercraft skull with glowing eyes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Step 1: Reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Step 2: Building it in Blender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Step 3: Reducing detail . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

Step 4: Building it by hand the traditional way . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

Step 5: Building it, alternative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

File Downloads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Step 6: Bonus: Use a Cricut Explore to cut out and score the parts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Step 7: Bonus: Size the parts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Step 8: Bonus: Cut, score and draw . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Step 9: Assembly - The eyes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Step 10: Making it glow . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Step 11: Symmetry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Step 12: Work your way to the back . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Step 13: Done . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Step 14: Bonus 2. The Joule-Thief . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Step 15: Thank you . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Related Instructables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Advertisements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Comments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/
Intro: Papercraft skull with glowing eyes
This Halloween I wanted more than a carved out pumpkin. I wanted something scarier. A skull with red glowing eyes. So off to google I went to find, download and build
one. There must be plenty of templates out there. Everyone loves skulls. That's what I thought, turns out I couldn't find one that had the amount of detail I wanted and
was freely available.

I did find a lot of cute paperboys though. :) Sticking two red lights onto them wouldn't have been what I was looking for.

So I went ahead and built one just the way I wanted it:

Step 1: Reference
To be honest, I don't have a skull laying around here, so to get some reference I got a 3D-model of one on thingiverse. Again, I was surprised how many skulls there are,
but also how far down I had to go to find one that suited my needs.

The model seems anatomically correct. With all the holes and cavities and separated jaw. I didn't care for correctness, the jawbone doesn't have to move. I also wanted
something that was fairly easy to build. Alle the holes, bridges and cavities would have made it extremely hard to assemble.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/
Step 2: Building it in Blender
At first I tried to used the method I build the deer and moose with. Starting with the original model I reduced and reduced the number of points. But the model was too
complex. Below 500 points things were falling apart.

So I switched to blender to build it by hand. Showing how to use blender is beyond this tutorial. There are plenty of resources on and off the web that help you to get
going. I started with a course at the Volkshochschule Hamburg and goggled my way from there.

Even though I tried to keep the number of points down, I ended up with well over 300 points in my initial try. Eager to see how it would look, I unfolded it using pepakura
and built my first prototype.

It turned out pretty good. It had it's quirks though. The cavities were too deep, I messed up the jawbone on side and I felt it still had too mach detail.

Image Notes
1. 160 Vertices

Image Notes
1. 337 Vertices

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/
Step 3: Reducing detail
Five Iterations later I had reduced the number of points by more than half while retaining most of the original shape. At least so I think ;)

Image Notes
1. 156 Vertices
Less than half of the first model.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/
Step 4: Building it by hand the traditional way
So now it's time to build it.

I made templates for A3 paper that you can print out. You'll need 3 pages of card stock. I used 300 gr. but less will do. Normal 80gr. copy paper is probably a little too
light. If you put the effort of cutting and glueing into it, you should take the time to get the right paper.

A quick reminder on how to build with these kind of templates:

cut out the parts

score and fold the dotted lines
match sides by their numbers e.g. (25 to 25)
glue together

There is no special order in which these have to be glued. I have started with the eyes and built the face first. Later on you'll close the skull and it will be harder to reach
the flaps and glue them.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/
Step 5: Building it, alternative
I find the matching of numbers fairly hard. I takes one edge to match a part. So I made a second template:

Each part is named

All edges that have matches on the same part are marked with triangles
One edge that needs to be connected to another part is marked with a circle and a line to the matching edge on the other part. Where the matching part is on an
other page the name of the part is next to the circle
Most parts of one side of the skull are on one page

Let me know if you like this better than the number matching.

File Downloads

Schaedel-5-ganz-1.svg (44 KB)

[NOTE: When saving, if you see .tmp as the file ext, rename it to 'Schaedel-5-ganz-1.svg']

Schaedel-5-ganz-2.svg (44 KB)

[NOTE: When saving, if you see .tmp as the file ext, rename it to 'Schaedel-5-ganz-2.svg']

Schaedel-5-ganz-3.svg (35 KB)

[NOTE: When saving, if you see .tmp as the file ext, rename it to 'Schaedel-5-ganz-3.svg']
Step 6: Bonus: Use a Cricut Explore to cut out and score the parts
I was fortunate enough to win a Cricut Explore with the paper craft contest here on Instructables.

If you don't have a Cricut Explore or any other personal paper cutter skip the next few steps to add the LEDs

So here's how you load the SVGs into Design Space and set up all the layers.

Start with a new workspace and load one of the SVGs using the VECTOR UPLOAD.

Once you've loaded the SVG into your personal parts repository don't forget to mark it

You should now see a tiny black box and a few parts sticking out at the bottom.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/
Step 7: Bonus: Size the parts
Design Space does not load the SVGs at their original size. Until that is fixed I include a 12x12 inch box with all my SVGs. Since you can't cut anything wider than 11.5
inches, that box will always be the widest element. Scaling the SVG up to 12 inch and moving it to the upper left corner by setting the x and y position to zero will get
everything to it's correct size.

Now ungroup everything and delete the last layer to get rid of the 12x12 box. We don't need it anymore.

This project is meant to be built on A3 card stock. You will need to have a 24x12 inch cutting mat.

You can resize everything a little to fit smaller paper sizes. I made the glueing tabs fairly large so that they should still be big enough after scaling everything down.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/
 Image Notes
1. set to 12

2. set both to 0

Step 8: Bonus: Cut, score and draw

Now you have a bunch of layers. Play around with them, turn their visibility on and off to see what they contain. You may want to decide not to use one of them.

Time to set them up: We don't want all of them to be cut. Just one of them. The outline it the bottom most layer. So leave that the way it is.

The next one up are the score lines. Set that to scoring it you have the scoring stylus. If you don't you can set it to drawing. That way you'll know where to fold the paper
later on.

The third one from the bottom are the valley folds. I draw them in, so i know which way to bend the folds later on. Valley folds are marked, mountain folds are not. Most of
the folds are mountains.

Then comes a layer with the part names. It's easier to assemble if you know which part is what. It makes finding things a lot easier.

Then a layer for all edges that connect to another edge on the same part. Before I glue all the parts together I glue all the edges that need to join on the parts themselves.

Finally hints on how to connect the parts. There are either lines to the connecting part on the same page, or the connecting parts are written next to the little circle on the
edge.

Before you start to cut them make sure you attach all layers.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/
 Image Notes
1. The valley Folds
DRAW
2. Part names
DRAW
3. Matching Edges on other part
DRAW
4. Edges to connect on same part
DRAW
5. Scoring lines
SCORE
6. Outline of the parts
CUT

Step 9: Assembly - The eyes

Start with the eyes. If you want to add the LEDs, now is the time to do so. make to little holes for the pins sticking out in the back. Orientation doesn't matter.

Glue the LED in place and glue together all the self connecting edges.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/
Step 10: Making it glow
If you want to power the LEDs with a 3 volt lithium battery, now would be a good time to do it.

An excellent tutorial on this simple technique has been written by James Bond's very own Q. ;
LED-Throwies

I will offer a second, more environment friendly solution at the end of this tutorial.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/
Step 11: Symmetry
Continue to build both sides of the face, join them and attach the lower jaw.

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/
Step 12: Work your way to the back
Continue to work your way back now. Finding the right part should be easy now that there a just a few left. It is getting tighter. You're closing the skull bit by bit.

I choose not to close it all the way with the bottom plate. It's up to you if you want to be able to reach in or have it closed all around.

Step 13: Done

You're done!

Of course you don't have to light it up with LEDs. You can build one and use it in your next Hamlet play... To be or not to be... ;) Or you can use gold spray and feel like
an Atztek ruler...

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/
Step 14: Bonus 2. The Joule-Thief
Using Lithium cells for the LEDs is by far the easiest way to the the thing to light up.

However there is an other way that you might want to consider. The Joule-Thief. It's a little board that takes old used and empty batteries and suck that last bit of energy
out of them. Most of the batteries you throw out aren't empty, they just can't deliver the voltage they should. The Joule-Thief uses that little energy that's left which is
plenty to drive the two LEDs we have.

I've built one in my local hacker space the Attraktor and made an instructable:
http://www.instructables.com/id/REMIX-Single-Sided-Joule-Thief/

Mine has been running at full brightness for days now with a battery from the trash. :)

Step 15: Thank you

You've made it all the way here? Wow, congratulations. This must be the longest instruct able I've written so far.

I want thank everyone that has been part of this project.

You can thank me by sharing the link to this instructable and voting for me.

Jan

Related Instructables

DIY Candlelit Hack a Solar

Sugar Skull skull hanging Yard Light into Pressure plate
Halloween Skull
Flameless chandelier, a Creepy Skull Dollar Store switch for
Party Favour Halloween
Votives by Halloween prop Yard Light for Skull Strobe
box by Kiteman decorations by
pizzidave by jzuwala motts around $10 by Light by M3G
gkmerkel compufobia

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/
Advertisements

Comments
9 comments Add Comment

MsSweetSatisfaction says: Sep 28, 2014. 11:46 AM REPLY

This is so cool looking. I love the different methodologies you gave to make the paper skull. Nice job, thanks for sharing!

krummrey says: Sep 29, 2014. 1:25 AM REPLY

Just sharing the templates wouldn't have been very educational, wouldn't it? I love to see how other artists work, there's always something to be learned.
Hopefully someone learns something out of this. :)

jsrubianoch says: Sep 28, 2014. 9:47 AM REPLY

Awesome, keep up the good work!

krummrey says: Sep 29, 2014. 1:23 AM REPLY

Trying my best... ;)

jcannizzo says: Sep 28, 2014. 1:22 PM REPLY

Another way to do this would have been to 3D scan a skull, then import it into Pepakura.

krummrey says: Sep 29, 2014. 1:23 AM REPLY

A 3D-Scan would probably have way too many points. It would make a good reference object thought.

crispernakisan says: Sep 28, 2014. 1:26 PM REPLY

Wow... this is pretty impressive. I plan to give it a go... I'll let you know how it turns out!

krummrey says: Sep 29, 2014. 1:22 AM REPLY

Please do. I curious to know if the plans without the number make sense.

Uncle Kudzu says: Sep 28, 2014. 12:43 PM REPLY

Very, very cool! Thanks so much for sharing!

http://www.instructables.com/id/Papercraft-skull-with-glowing-eyes/