The Origami Forum

So yesterday and today I tried folding a stick insect by Manuel sirgo (Diagram link edited out) and according to the picture it should end up looking like this


I did succeed in following the diagrams all the way through, but my stick insect looks a lot less... elegant? (I'll post a picture this afternoon to this thread). I feel like my paper was too thick, idk how thick it was but I've never had a problem with paper thickness before. I think it's just regular origami paper, I mean it's good paper but just not that thin. Maybe it also was too small (15x15 cm). It just felt like I couldn't shape the model as much as I wanted.
So, is it true that a thinner and bigger paper would be better for this model? Or am I wrongly blaming my tools while actually my skill level may be the reason for the insect not coming out great.

Firstly, in the future, please do not link to illegal diagrams.

To answer your post, some people use mulberry paper or double tissue for folding insects. That requires you to soak the paper in methylcellulose first; and there's a thread on that stickied in this forum.
Larger paper would also give you a better result. 15cm is way too small for this model unless you're really experienced and/or you have VERY thin paper.

If you don't have experience with MC, foil may be a good alternative, at least for test-folding it.

First of I have to say that your fold doesn't look so bad to me, but yes, paper size and thickness help a lot with models like that.
Apart from the already mentioned double tissue (there's a good video by Sara Adams explaining how to make it at https://www.happyfolding.com/instructions-double_tissue ), I can also recommend Japanese Calligraphy paper, although that only comes in white and would have to be painted.

The insect looks great! However, I would reccomend thin foil or tissue foil for an insect like that. The paper should be a little bigger, too.

nice one i love it but how to make this

Unfortunately the diagrams seem to be only in a few old convention books (from 2004). I don’t believe any of them are still in print.