Surface and contour-preserving origamic architecture paper pop-ups

• Published in: IEEE transactions on visualization and computer graphics Vol. 20; no. 2; pp. 276 - 288
• Main Authors: Le, Sang N., Su-Jun Leow, Tuong-Vu Le-Nguyen, Ruiz, Conrado, Kok-Lim Low
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States IEEE 01.02.2014; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Algorithm design and analysis; Algorithms; Computational modeling; Computer architecture; computer art; Layout; paper architecture; papercraft; pop-up foldability; pop-up stability; Shape; shape abstraction; Solid modeling; Stability analysis; surface segmentation
• ISSN: 1077-2626; 1941-0506
• DOI: 10.1109/TVCG.2013.108

Origamic architecture (OA) is a form of papercraft that involves cutting and folding a single sheet of paper to produce a 3D pop-up, and is commonly used to depict architectural structures. Because of the strict geometric and physical constraints, OA design requires considerable skill and effort. In this paper, we present a method to automatically generate an OA design that closely depicts an input 3D model. Our algorithm is guided by a novel set of geometric conditions to guarantee the foldability and stability of the generated pop-ups. The generality of the conditions allows our algorithm to generate valid pop-up structures that are previously not accounted for by other algorithms. Our method takes a novel image-domain approach to convert the input model to an OA design. It performs surface segmentation of the input model in the image domain, and carefully represents each surface with a set of parallel patches. Patches are then modified to make the entire structure foldable and stable. Visual and quantitative comparisons of results have shown our algorithm to be significantly better than the existing methods in the preservation of contours, surfaces, and volume. The designs have also been shown to more closely resemble those created by real artists.