Archive for the ‘software’ Category
New Version of Tess, Alex Bateman’s origami tessellation software January 23rd, 2007
Alex Bateman has released a new version of his landmark software, Tess.
Tess allows you to create all sorts of tilings, and modifications of those tilings- so you can explore possibilities without having to fold it all out in paper, first! Also, this new version provides PDF export capability, which is a major plus for windows users.
Tess is a Perl application, and will run on any Perl-capable system with a bit of tweaking. (This means you, Linux/FreeBSD/MacOSX users.) Or, if you’re running windows, you can download a standalone version, which will run on it’s own without requiring any Perl resources. Both of these are available to download from Alex’s website.
Download the latest version of Tess!
Posted in creative commons, diagrams, geometry, math, o-list postings, origami, origami tessellations, software | Comments (6)
2006 Tessellation Contest April 4th, 2006
Before you get your hopes up, this isn’t about origami- so all 10 of you out there who fold origami tessellations can put your paper down.
Pedagoguery Software has an annual art contest for users of their Tess tessellation creation software; this year’s contest page can be found at the following link.
http://www.peda.com/tess/contest.html
Here’s last year’s winner:
Koi, by Odebo Babiuk
Another nice one from 2004’s contest:
Pinwheel 1AB, by Denise Smith
Here’s the full contest info from their website:
Once a year, we run our Tessellation contest. One prize-winning entry from each year is shown on the right; click on one to see all from that year.
We are now accepting entries for our 2006 contest! To enter
download and install Tess,
register Tess (if unregistered) using “Contest” for both name and code,
explore and experiment, and
send in your entries and accompanying information by email to peda@peda.com.
No purchase necessary.2006 Prizes
Grand Prize
$200,
a set of die-cast polyhedra models,
a site license for Tess for a school of the winner’s choice, and
an individual license for Tess.First Prize
$75,
a set of die-cast polyhedra models, and
an individual license for Tess.Second Prize
$25,
a set of die-cast polyhedra models, and
an individual license for Tess.Runner-up Prizes
a set of die-cast polyhedra models and
an individual license for Tess.Outstanding Entries
an individual license for Tess.
Monetary prizes are in US dollars.
2006 Rules
Each entry must be in the form of a Tess file.
Each entry must be given a title and be accompanied by the contestant’s name, email address, postal address, and age (if the contestant is 18 or over, specifying “adult” is fine). For contestants under the age of 18, a letter of consent must be given by a parent or legal guardian of the contestant. Contestants are encouraged to include a short description of their entry.
Entries can be emailed to peda@peda.com.
Entries must be received by May 16, 2006.
A maximum of three entries from each contestant will be considered.
The winners will be announced on May 25, 2006.
The contest is not open to employees, or members of their immediate families, of Pedagoguery Software or its associates.
Judging will be performed by employees of Pedagoguery Software.
By sending in an entry, the contestant certifies the work is their own original work.
By sending in an entry, the contestant is giving Pedagoguery Software a perpetual, non-exclusive, royalty-free right to use that entry in any way. Whenever an entry is used, a credit will be given to the contestant unless the contestant requests otherwise.
Posted in art, design, geometry, software | Comments (2)
links for 2006-03-06
March 5th, 2006
-
This is exactly what I was looking for- a voronoi tessellation applet that allows you to move the points around and see how shapes change and interact in realtime. It also shows you the DeLaunay triangulations for each point, which are critical to use as
-
information on Voronoi tessellations that are more “normalized”, and are more useful for my purposes. some interesting concepts here to exploit.
Posted in geometry, math, software, weblinks | Comments (0)
links for 2006-03-03
March 2nd, 2006
-
another spiffy Voronoi tessellation applet, this time built with the magnificent Processing framework. Thanks, Alex, for providing the source for this!
-
a big collection of origami bookmarks on del.icio.us. Thanks Iko!
Posted in geometry, origami, software, weblinks | Comments (0)
links for 2006-02-22
February 21st, 2006
-
origami blog pulling in posts from many other origami blogs in Japan.
-
Exactly what it says! a free software calculator for Phi.
Sorry for the dupe link- whatever I post to my del.icio.us bookmarks gets posted here. I try to avoid the duplication, but sometimes it happens. In this case, I didn’t want to forget the location of the Phiculator! -Eric
Posted in origami, software, weblinks | Comments (0)
Phiculator! February 21st, 2006
James Mellers created this wonderful calculator for Phi.
It allows you to calculate the proportion for any given number to Phi, so you can find the Golden Ratio for any given number you choose! Much fun, and very Phi-tastic.
It’s a free download for Windows, Mac, and anything else that can play Flash.
Thanks for the great little tool, James!
via Make: Blog
Posted in design, geometry, math, software | Comments (0)
Origami on the Go 2.0 December 22nd, 2005
I found this while digging around on the net- it’s called Origami on the Go 2.0, and is theoretically some kind of freeware app for the Palm handheld. I don’t have a Palm, being more chained to the MS product line for work reasons, so I can’t test this- perhaps there is an intrepid reader out there who can download this (purportedly free) application and give it a test run? I’d be interested to hear from you about it, if you do.
you can get it from here:
[via]
Posted in diagrams, origami, software | Comments (4)
New triangular grid PDF docs available for download December 12th, 2005
Here are two PDF documents, with square regions that have a triangular grid array on them. The grid is formed the same way that you would create one via precreasing, so it’s relatively similar to what you would see on a sheet of origami paper.
The first one has a very large grid; the second one has a fine, small grid. both are useful, just for different things.
These are newer versions, with the opacity of the grid lines turned down to only 20%; so hopefully if you draw on them with pencil or pen, your drawing will show up much more easily. The PDFs retain the layering and editing information, so if you also have a vector graphics program capable of editing such documents then feel free to tweak these to your heart’s content.
Released by Eric Gjerde
Under a Creative Commons
Attribution-NonCommercial license.
Some Rights Reserved.
www.origamitessellations.com
Posted in creative commons, diagrams, geometry, my work, origami, origami tessellations, paper, software | Comments (0)
figuring out things with ORIPA December 12th, 2005
I have been playing with an origami pattern design tool called ORIPA, made by Jun Mitani (his blog here).
Once I figured out how to get it properly running on my Mac, it was pretty easy to figure out. here’s a handy tip for that. it needs latest java release 1.5.0; the mac still uses 1.4.2 by default, so you have to call the 1.5.0 version specifically to execute the runtime. I did this by stashing the jar file (the packed program file) in my origami directory, and created this shell script:
#!/bin/sh
/System/Library/Frameworks/JavaVM.framework/Versions/1.5/Commands/java -jar ~/origami/oripa012.jar
which I saved as /usr/local/bin/oripa on my machine; although you could just as easily save it to your desktop as a clickable icon.
anyhow, that bit of stuff aside, I was having problems getting it to properly fold some of my hexagonal design right- but I had seen other files which were more complex and folded quite well. So I uploaded some simple examples to the upload board for ORIPA, and I saw today that Mitani-san had written some information on his blog about how to fix the problem.
here’s his commentary from yesterday; it’s probably quite a bit more helpful if you run it through babelfish first.
basically, I was starting with this pattern:
and it was getting stuck. that was because there were several lines in wrong places, and 2 lines that had essentially 0 length- they were throwing things off. He suggested opening it up in a text editor and changing the coordinates of those lines so they can be properly deleted, which then allows it to fold properly.
It did so for him, and once I tried the same thing it worked for me also.
I’m not sure I can properly express how absolutely cool this program is- it lets you plot out all your crease lines and then not only can you export it as DXF (for import into tools like FreeHand or Illustrator) but you can hit the button and see the final folded rendition of your piece!
I’m working on a larger (permanent) page for this site on how to use it, and some english links for the various bits needed to make it run, but by all means check it out if you are so inclined. the download page is here; you’ll need to grab the oripa012.jar file, and for Windows you’ll need the latest version of the Sun Java Runtime Environment. You can grab the english version here; you’ll want the link titled “Download JRE 5.0 Update 6″ and then pick either the “Windows Offline Installation, Multi-language” or “Windows Online Installation, Multi-language”, depending on what kind of internet connection you’re using.
once you have that installed, it’s just a matter of double-clicking on the “oripa012.jar” file on your desktop to run it. it’s all in japanese, of course, so it takes some fiddling to use, but there aren’t a ton of options and the tools have relatively self-explanatory buttons. I hope to get a more comprehensive writeup done later for this wonderful program.
UPDATE: Mitani-san has released a localized english version of ORIPA! Here’s the English Language Page; ORIPA version 0.16 is the latest at this time, and is in english. -Eric (2005/02/16)
Posted in diagrams, geometry, math, my work, origami, origami tessellations, software | Comments (7)
Paper Mosaics (Alex Bateman’s Origami Tessellations) June 2nd, 2005
First off, let me post a link to Alex’s new site- it’s www.papermosaics.co.uk. Not only does he have some great material there, but he also created a software program that generates tessellations- and it’s released under the GPL! (that means free forever, and allows derivative works that also must remain free). That’s an excellent thing, and really warms my heart. I’m a huge open source junkie and I always like to see people release things for free rather than trying to lock them up forever.
Which leads me to my next point- Alex has an e-book available at his website, which he graciously provided a gratis copy of (thanks Alex!) It’s 3 pounds (which is about $5.40 US currently) and is a very nicely put together document, with a number of good introductory folds and lots of photos. I’m going to give some of them a go once I get a chance to put them on some thin paper.
I’ve been trying to put together some simple PDF documents with diagrams and photos for a few months now, and it’s HARD. I think it’s great that Alex is trying to get a little something for his work here, and I encourage any of you interested in tessellations to check it out. It’s a way to not only get a little more insight into his thinking and designs, but to also support his hard work in releasing software and folding goodies for you folks to play with.
I only hope the docs I end up releasing come out half as good. I’ll be happy!
Posted in geometry, o-list postings, origami, origami tessellations, software | Comments (0)