Papercraft Low-Poly Bird

This instructable will show you how to make this papercraft bird. Just download either pdf file and follow the steps. It will take a few hours but you can do it in one day. If you are new to papercraft, I linked a tutorial below that should be helpful. Enjoy!

• A printer
• Paper (3-5 sheets)
• Scissors
• Glue
• Ruler (optional)

I used A4 paper sheets to make this bird but you can use any size, it will just give you a different sized bird as a result. With A4 paper the bird should be approximately 15 cm high when sitting.

In my coloured version I used slightly thicker paper (135 g/m^2) which my printer could still print on but normal printing paper (70-80 g/m^2) also works fine. My white prototype is made from this. It is a bit easier to fold, however the flaps tend to be visible when light shines through the bird as you can see in the picture below.

Printing on black paper worked better than expected for me. If you can't read the numbers, just check in the pdf file.

Of course you can choose different colours. Feel free to experiment and please put a picture in the comments if you do.

As for the glue I guess everyone has their own favourite. I prefer "UHU Alleskleber" because it dries very fast. Of course you also need a pair of scissors and optionally a ruler for folding.

You should have printed the attached pdf by now; Either the single colour or the multi colour version. They are both the same except that the single colour version should save you some paper.

If you have never done any papercraft, have a look at a tutorial first. I am not going into the basics here. This one by krummrey looks nice.

First cut out all pieces along the black, solid lines.

Then fold at the dotted lines. Placing a ruler on the line can help to get straighter folds faster.

But careful: folds can be a bit confusing and are opposite to the linked tutorial (sorry). Remember: the printed side (lines and numbers) should end up on the inside of the model, so you can't see anything on the bird. Therefore most folds in this model will be valley folds!

Some flaps (especially at the beak and the feet) might be too big to fit when you want to glue them to the opposite part with the same number. Just cut them smaller at a sharper angle (pepakura is great, but can't correct this as far as I know).

I advise you to start with the head, then make the tail and the feet, as these are the most difficult/smallest parts. End with the body. Remember: gluing the last flap will be hardest as you have no way to have your fingers inside to hold the flap. Therefore the last one should be an easier/bigger well accessible one.

Optionally you can glue little stones or metal pieces inside the feet to prevent it from falling over due to wind.

I hope you like my papercraft project. If you make it, I would be glad if you shared a picture in the comments. I would also love to see different colour combinations. If you find any bugs in the template please also let me know so I can fix them.

And last but not least: credit where credit is due!

I need to thank krummrey for his great tutorial on making papercraft objects. His moose was my first major papercraft project. Do check him out if you don't know him already.

Then there is guardabosqu that inspired me to make this bird. They have a big variety of incredible papercraft and lots of amazing birds. Unfortunately they do not publish any templates and only sell four of their models and that only in Argentina...

Also I want to thank Thingiverse user 'YahooJAPAN' for his bird model that I used in the process.

Hope you have fun making this.

This is my first instructable. I never published any of my craft work, therefore I entered it in the "Beyond the Comfort Zone" Contest. If you like it, please vote.