Papercraft Template Tips

Have you ever been interested in making your own papercraft patterns, but weren't sure where to start?  We've collected some suggestions and tips from several group members to help anyone who'd like to make their own.




We'll start by talking about the most controversial program: MS Paint.

Paint is the default image editing program for Windows, so anyone with a Windows computer should have it.  It's easy to use and really common, so many people who can't afford more advanced programs use Paint instead.  Paint gets a lot of flak, though, because many of the papercrafts made with it are lower quality than those made with higher-end programs.  This is absolutely not Paint's fault.  If you want to use Paint for papercrafts, go ahead, but if you want them to look good, you have to take your time.  Making a template in Paint takes just as much effort as making one in any other program.  Take the time to make sure it looks good, and you'll be just as successful as any other good papercraft maker.

And now for some other programs

Of course, everyone knows about Adobe software:

Photoshop for image files
Illustrator for vector files

Adobe software, of course, is extremely expensive, but popular.  There are other options for paid software as well, but these two come up most often.

If you want a higher-end program but don't want to spend a lot of money, try:

GIMP for image files
Inkscape for vector files

Or, again, there are various other free options out there.
*Note: if you're planning on downloading any program online, especially a free download, make sure you do your research beforehand to make sure it's safe and reliable!  Viruses are bad.




Before we begin, I'd like to talk about the two types of files mentioned previously:
image and vector files.

All the templates that get uploaded to deviantART are image files.  Image files, obviously, are files that store data to display an image.  Essentially, the file stores data that tells the computer what colours to display and where to display them.  They're also compatible with a huge variety of programs: any program that has the function to display images can read image files.  The most popular image filetypes for papercraft templates are .jpg and .png.  More on that later.

Vector files are a bit different.  Vector files store information in a way that they can be zoomed in and out without losing quality.  When you zoom in on an image file, eventually it becomes pixelated, but vectors stay smooth no matter how far zoomed in you are.  This means that drawing vector files uses different controls than drawing image files.  Most internet browsers can display vector files, but normally you would export a vectored papercraft template as an image file when you're done so that it can be printed easily.

Really, the biggest difference between vectors and images is the amount of resizing you can do on an image: it's easy to make a vectored papercraft bigger or smaller, while an image can only be resized so much before losing a lot of quality.




When making papercrafts, it's generally acceptable to "borrow" pieces of other templates in order to make your own.  Most papercraft makers won't start from scratch every time.  Instead they'll find one or more templates that have parts similar to ones they need, and then build off of that.  The amount of borrowing depends on the individual: some people will borrow as much as they can, while others only use the most basic pieces and make everything else themselves.  However, if you're going to borrow to make your own template, make sure you do it properly.

Firstly, make sure you give credit!  This usually comes last, but it's the most important part, so we'll start here.  If you use a piece of someone else's template, no matter how small, make sure you write down the names of the people whose templates you borrowed.  If you're using a template you got off deviantART, it's easy, since the name and creator of the deviation are automatically put into the title of the downloaded file.  Just keep the original filename and you'll be fine.

When you upload your completed file to deviantART, make sure you put those names into the description so everyone can see.  It's respectful to the people who made those pieces, and it's always nice to know who inspired you.

So, you've found a template you like, but there are a few things you should double-check before beginning.  You want to make sure the base template is the right quality: too low and it'll be pixelated and blurry, and that's not pretty.  (There's a difference between pixelated and nice and pixelated and blurry; it’s called compression and I'll talk more about it later.)  You'll probably want to check and make sure the template was designed well, too: that the lines are neat and straight and there aren't any weird overlaps or missing pieces.  If you're going to combine more than one papercraft, make sure all the pieces are the right size and resize or redraw some of them if you need to.

For the recolouring and redrawing itself, everyone has their own techniques.  Select tools are really useful for quickly getting large areas, and line and shape tools can also be useful for redrawing or recolouring.  Make sure you zoom in and out to get everything, and if you have a program that supports layers, use them.  Layers are great for keeping everything neat and organized.

If you don't want to use someone else's template, or can't find one that you like, but don't want to start from scratch, you can also use bases to make papercrafts.  Bases are blank templates created specifically for other people to use to make papercrafts.  They'll often contain all the most basic parts of a papercraft, and sometimes additional parts, all simplified as much as possible and only a few important details (like faces) to allow a lot of customization.  There are some bases available in the Resources folder of this group's gallery, and more in other parts of dA.  You can also combine bases and templates, as long as they're the right size.




Whatever program you’re using, it probably has its own filetype for saving works in progress: Photoshop has .psd, GIMP has .xcf, and so on.  When your papercraft is finished, you’ll want to export it into an image file so anyone can view and print it.  The two most common image files, as stated above, are .jpg and .png.  I won’t get into the specific details of each, but they both save image information in different ways.  There is no huge drawback to using .jpg, but most people I have asked prefer .png files.  .png files support transparency, which is not quite as important for papercrafts, and they are also less likely to have compression issues.

Compression is the funny blurry pixelated look you get when you zoom in on lower resolution .jpg files.  Normally compression is not a huge issue, but if a file compresses badly, or if it's very small, it could get noticeably pixelated or discoloured.  .png files are much less likely to have these compression issues, and the lines will stay neater.  Again, there’s nothing terrible about using .jpg images, it all depends on how much you care about compression, and how good your program's export function is.  If you've never checked before, and if your program supports it, I suggest exporting both .jpg and .png versions of a papercraft and looking for significant differences in quality.

Before you upload your finished papercraft to deviantArt or anywhere else, I highly recommend printing it out and testbuilding it.  This is especially important if you don't have a lot of experience making papercrafts, if you combined multiple templates, or if you heavily modified something or made parts from scratch.  It's also useful for finding out if a part is hard to put together, so that you can make a guide for other people who might need help.  It doesn't have to be a good quality printout, but it's important to know that your template is buildable!  If pieces are too small or too big, fit together wrong, or are otherwise unbuildable, then your template is essentially useless.  Testbuild your papercraft, then fix any parts that don't work properly.  Print those parts again if you need to, and make sure everything works.  Once you know your template is ready, then you can post it up knowing that it's a well made papercraft!


That’s all I have to say about the general ideas of papercraft template design.  A lot of this information comes from my own personal experiences: if you have something you’d like to add, or if you disagree with anything I said, feel free to comment!




Rinmikurin
PikaBlade78
Tyulyen
all contributed suggestions which I added to this post!