Destiny Ghost Papercraft

A papercraft Ghost from Destiny. Can be used as a desk ornament, or maybe pop a light in it and hang it off your Christmas Tree!

You can try your hand at resizing it to make it bigger (for your head?) or smaller, or even re-colour it to your own taste.

You will need:

• White A4 Paper or Card stock
• Transparent sweet wrapper or cellophane of your own colour choice (blue coconut from quality street works well) or alternatively, a piece of scrap paper of your own colour choice (to affix behind the ‘iris’ and display through).
• Paper compatible adhesive (Glue stick PVA or Wood Glue etc) or double sided tape.
• Cutting Mat Scissors or Scalpel Ruler
• Ability to print PDF files on to A4 (colour preferable).

Optional:

• Adobe Illustrator CS4 or above (I may be able to supply older version of the file if requested?
• Craft Robo and illustrator plugin or alternative (this is a light duty paper cutting machine – the cuts / folds are in the Adobe file templates but you can use the PDF files and manually cut as well).
• Foam pads for adding depth to the iris assembly.

As with all instructables, enter at your own risk! This is a relatively safe model to build and use, but a few simple safety precautions:

• Be careful with scissors and scalpels – they bite!
• Do not use lights that get hot with paper models – they may burn.
• Use an LED and a button battery if you plan to light your model up. Personally, I will be putting mine on my tree and running one of my low power Christmas tree LED’s into the back of it.
• If using glue that produces fumes of any kind – remember ventilation. PVA and Pritt Stick should be OK though :)

I have included several files as follows:

Adobe Illustrator CS4 files – if you have illustrator, you can edit the files to create your own colour pallet, or to resize etc. In addition, the files contain 3 layers – a CUT, FOLD and PRINT layer. The CUT and FOLD layers are set not to print, and are useful of you happen to have a plotter type cutting machine and relevant plugin for Illustrator. For example, I use a Craft Robo cutting machine with the illustrator plugin (Print the image, then set the plotter to cut the CUT layer and lightly perforate the FOLD layer).

If you don’t have a machine to do this, you can still edit the colours and set the cut and fold lines to a colour of your choice so they’re visible to assist with manual cutting (scissors or scalpel).

If you don’t have either a cutting machine or illustrator, you can print the supplied PDF files, which have the cut and fold lines included – I have tried to keep these lines as thin as possible whilst still being visible, to assist with accuracy but also be non-intrusive on the finished model.

Edit your colours if required. For the purpose of clarity (and not having any colour ink at time of writing), I have built my demo model on white card without any colours.

Print your design on to any paper or card stock (choosing either the illustrator or PDF files). Note that if you are using a cutting machine, to use stock of appropriate thickness. Note that you may need more than one copy of certain sheets – I have included the number of copies you need on each sheet. Carefully cut out all the pieces of the model, taking note of the fold lines and cut lines.

If manually cutting, you will need to very lightly score the fold lines using a scalpel or similar and a ruler, being careful not to cut all the way through (or cut yourself).

The rear circle has an optional hole if you want to insert a wire.

Pre-fold all the pieces to give you an idea of how they all fit together and to make the assembly easier. Have a practice to ensure you are happy with how each piece goes and the order in which to assemble them before moving on to the adhesive stage.

Using your adhesive of choice (I prefer using a basic white PVA glue – I find double sided tape is good for instant stick but tends to peel apart over time), assemble the pieces, ensuring all tabs are affixed on the inside for neatness.

You can assemble the pieces in any order, but I prefer to assemble as follows:

The front 2 pieces (making front main piece).

The rear two pieces (making rear main piece – identical to the front piece).

Note the thicker section which runs horizontally for both front and back pieces.

The iris assembly (including the window piece, which can be coloured paper or a transparency if intending to light from behind).

You can add spacers, such as foam pads, thicker card or folded card scraps, in between each layer of the iris to give depth.

Please note that the outermost ring has notches cut into it to assist in attaching it to the front main piece – note the orientation of the iris and ensure this is attached correctly (the notches should form a square, not a diamond)!

Once glue is dry, attach the iris assembly to the front piece (from the inside). This is done by adding a small drop of glue to each notch and then holding in place for a minute or so, until the glue is strong enough to hold the iris in place.

In the same manner, attach the rear circle to the rear main piece (includes optional hole for inserting light) – again, this is notched to aid assembly.

Wait for everything to dry!

Attach the four diamond shaped pieces to the front main piece (making the main body).

Note that that back piece is yet to be attached.

Wait for glue to dry.

Finally, attach the rear main piece to the main body – this part is tricky, so take your time.

I find it best to attach one of the four arms and wait for it to dry. Then attach the opposite arm, and wait for it to dry. Finally, attach the 3rd and 4th arms, allowing to dry in between.

You can now add a light inside. In the images, I've added a string of battery powered LEDs (most are hidden by a tea towel, with only 3 or 4 inside the Ghost to show off the effect - you may wish to add a colour changer etc, or even make a bedside lamp for a Destiny fan! I think it looks quite impressive like this.

You can also add the little flaps if you wish - I've seen some models with these. I added these later and can be seen on one of the lit photos.

That’s it – you’re done. Have fun and please vote for my entry!

Added SVG Files upon request