This is a post round up news and releases in the Origami world – well things that caught my eye, anyway, and which I found interesting.

Calendar 2012 – La Justa de las Gárgolas: This is one great Origami themed calendar which is available in Nicolas Terry’s shop, and what’s more, is that it’s a free e-book which is available for download! This calendar is made with the colaboration of the various artists who participated in the recently held competition by Eric Madrigal in honor of Monsieur Eric Joisel. The images in the calendar is from this online competition / Joust and is in color. The designs are truly awesome with works from various Origami artists showcased for each month of the year. This is a great calendar to have for all you Origami Enthusiasts.

Oribana Calendars : These are designed by Katrin and Yuri Shumakov and are easy to make and very simple in concept. They double up as pencil & pen holders for your desk in addition to being a desk calendar.

Convention: 29th CDO 2011: Garibi Ilan has done a good write up on the CDO convention held this year. Special at this convention was a Origami themed fashion show with all ‘garments’ made out of paper! There was a well stocked Origami shop at the convention, too with all the latest origami books and papers. Another great display at the convention was Paul Hassenforder’s ceiling to floor tessellations – truly amazing!

Addendum Revista “4 Esquinas N°7″ : Christmas Special: This is a Christmas Special e-book of the popular 4 Esquinas magazine. It contains diagrams and color images of the finished model of David Martinez’s Double Star or Estrella Doble. This is a fabulous design for the Christmas Season and uses a hexagon shaped paper to create the star.

Also included in this magazine is a mention of the new Competition / Joust hosted by Eric Madrigal. This time – for the year 2012 – it will be held in honor of Tomoko Fuse – for her immense contribution to the Origami World. You can visit Eric Madrigal’s Special blog post about this competition for more details. There are multiple categories in the competition and the rules, details and timelines are all included in this blog post.

Meenakshi Mukerji’s Exquisite Modular Origami: Meenakshi Mukerji has come out with yet another book, based on modular designs. So if you are into modulars and a fan of her work, this is definitely a book you should get your hands on. Her designs have a distinct aesthetic look to it and the best part is that her folding sequence is quite easy to follow and simple.

Hoàng Tiến Quyết’s Santa Claus: This brilliant origami designer has drawn up the diagrams to his ingenious model – Santa Claus. He has shared photo diagrams of the folding sequence on the Vietnam Origami Group forum.

Oriland Magic Star: This is a new book by Katrin and Yuri Shumakov and is a book on action models. To be more precise, it is more of action star models. It makes use of both strips of paper as well as square sheets of paper to fold these pretty stars. The authors say its intermediate level designs and can be folded by experienced folders.

An Origami Book (Design by David Brill)

An Origami Book Mark

This is one very simple model from David Brill. You can make a ‘box’ spined book or a simple bound book.

What you need:
A square sheet of paper, single – side colored. This can be of any size of your choice. I have used a 6″ square sheet of Origami Paper here.

A Single – side colored paper is required, as the “white” side serves as the pages of the book once the model is completed.

How to fold this model:
YouTube.com has got some really good contributors for this model. I have found this video by Marigami pretty helpful.

Tips:
1. Avoid using thick paper (in case you aren’t using Origami paper) as this will make it difficult for you to fold the model.
2. Avoid using flimsy wrapping paper, too as this will not fold and form well.
3. You can make a book mark using this (as shown) or even a bookcase by folding a dozen of these books and stacking them on a bookcase. This video by Marigami ,will help you fold an Origami Bookcase: