Peter Engel (3) (1959–)

Certainly interesting, but insanely complicated. The directions were probably follow-able, but I was far to intimidated to even pick up a square of paper to try. I also was a little put off by the soft, highly textured paper- I understand that Engel likes that softer look, but I guess I prefer origami with hard creases. Who even knew I had an opinion that strong about folded paper? Well worth a look, but the directions are for pros.

I've always told myself that I should really read the text at the beginning of this book describing the creative process used in devising new origami models. I'm sure it is fascinating. The models themselves are really nice. There's a relatively straightforward hummingbird that looks incredibly realistic, and some fantastic models that are a bit more complicated. I can remember buying foil-backed paper and cutting it into 18-inch squares in order to make squids and octopi from this book. The show more designs for both contain incredible detail, down to octagonal sink-folded eyes and an ink jet for the octopus. There's also a pretty sweet knight on horseback made from a single sheet of paper. You should definitely figure out a way to obtain squares of paper that are bigger than ten inches for a lot of these models. They're tough to do with small paper. There's some designs to use with dollar bills too; my favorite is a dollar bill bow tie with a sink fold in the middle. The designs are, for the most part, pretty advanced, and might not be appropriate for the novice paperfolder. I'm currently trying to figure out what I did with this book, because I'd like to make the squid and octopus models again. show less

How could I resist to a colibri, a scorpion, and there are fractals in the introduction. Time will tell if I am able to reproduce those superb models.

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