The Origami Forum

Hi all, I'm wanting to design a bird of prey but I can't decide on how to fold/shape the wings to make it realistic, I already know a few techniques on how to form wings but wanted to know your favourite wings.

I've started a kind of wing study, but it hasn't really gone anywhere. But maybe I can explain what I've done in the past:
Crease one diagonal and then bisect one side, pinching on the opposite edge. From there, crease perpendicular to the main diagonal and pinch there. (The crease should be divided into something like 1+sqrt2:sqrt2.)
From that intersection, make a crease at about a 60deg angle with the long side of the diagonal. Bisect and thin the excess paper around the angle, then crimp the angle in half.
Then take that crimp and sink the edge in some division (i.e., 6ths, so you have a bunch of rotational pleats). Spread the pleats to form the wings and then crimp to imitate feathers.

The whole process is hard to explain in words, so sorry if it's not clear.

I'm afraid I don't understand, could you maybe upload photos?

I'm not sure if I have time to refold it right now, but it's basically the same structure that Brian Chan uses in his flying insects, only slightly modified to fit a birdlike wing better.

I'm no expert on bird wings, but I'm still fairly proud of the wings I made on my gryphon.
These are "at rest" wings rather than "in flight" wings, so they may not be appropriate for a lot of situations, but I think they give a pretty nice impression of a feathered wing folded up.



And here's the under-side, to give you some idea of how it was folded.

Those wings have a good shape, but they lack the impression of feathers. I'd suggest either crimping or simply creasing a bunch of folds from the wing's shoulder to the trailing edge. That would make it a lot more realistic.

Baltorigamist wrote:Those wings have a good shape, but they lack the impression of feathers. I'd suggest either crimping or simply creasing a bunch of folds from the wing's shoulder to the trailing edge. That would make it a lot more realistic.

Yes, you're right about that. A fairly easy fix for the next time I fold one.

I'm going to fold a "feathered" wing with all the feathers folded individually (for the wing study I mentioned earlier).
I've decided to try a pegacorn to take a break from my insect kick, and of course they provide ample opportunity for a good wing structure. I'll let you guys know how it turns out.

First thing that comes to mind is Nguyen Hun Cuong's eagle. Or one of the owl models by Katsuta Kyohei. If I remeber correctly there are diagrams for both models in one of the collection books, but I never folded them myself.

Baltorigamist: that sounds good, keep us posted and good luck!
Roodborst: Nguyen huong cuong's eagle is one of my favourites too, and it is one of the main inspirations to this. I want to develop my own technique though.

Pleats seem to be the popular way to create outspread wings.

Here is a wing test that Satoshi Kamiya folded, it uses a scale-tesselation type pattern similar to the Ryu-Zin:
http://folders.jp/b/box/parts.html

Here is Brian Chan's flying grasshopper that has pleated wings, one of the insects as talked about earlier:
http://web.mit.edu/chosetec/www/origami/grasshopper/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/64192382@N02/

This guy/ or girl has some birds and angels with amazing wings. Extraordinary models in general actually.

Thanks for the link roosborst, your right, the wings on that flickr are amazing.

Having issues with the pegacorn, sorry.