Denemo

Hi, everyone. I have just started having fun with origami approximately a month ago, haven't created much during this time, but I have read a lot of tutorials on the internet and slowly started doing my first arts. Haven't really gotten anywhere yet, but I feel like I'm slowly geting the idea of how it works. I have papers in different sizes and I have noticed, that the bigger it is, the easier it is for me fold. Those bigger ones are actually extremely easy to fold, while the small ones, on which most of the tutorials are based are really hard. I have pretty big hands and I am tall in general, not sure if it affects my ability to fold small papers somehow, but I feel like I'm doing so much better with bigger pieces.

Is this normal? Or is due to my size, that I encounter certain problems with smaller paper? For now I have only tried picking up easier projects, like a 5-pointed star, lotus and a leaf. Frankly, I couldn't get them even half-done, not to mention any others, more advanced arts, and I read that those are pretty simple and quite easy to make for inexperienced, beginner-level users. Besides, all those tutorials on various website as well as youtube videos are made on smaller paper, while I prefer the bigger one and I can't really grasp how to do it on the bigger, seems weird. Any advice I could get? Thanks

Leonard

Well, the thing is, that firstly - the projects you have picked for yourself are not as easy as you may think. Both Lotus and the Leaf are of at least intermediate level, at least in order to be able to make them properly. Both Lotus and Leaf are pretty much detailed, I would say leaf is much more, but making a nice looking Lotus surely isn't a piece of cake either. 5-pointed star is easier, true, but still I wouldn't exactly recommend it to total beginners. You can have a look at my thread with various tutorials and you should get a better idea on what to build as an beginner. I would actually recommend to start with a 'Chick', it's probably one of the most basic origami arts there are, and I have wrote a short, but hopefully understandable for beginners guide. Supplement it with pictures and a video, and you should be able to make your first Chick without any problems.

Coffeegirl

Hey, I actually experienced the same problem and after reading the internet I have came to the same conclusion as Leonard. I'm a beginner as well, although maybe a little bit more experienced than you and I also thought, that using a bigger paper is just simply easier as it just basically naturally folds, but once you will get to try something done, you will notice that the structe isn't nearly as stable as it is when you use a smaller paper, hence it's so much harder to get all those elements to work. Leonard explained everything pretty well, but I will also chip in and add, that you should focus on even easier arts than Leaf or Lotus. I have actually done Lotus and have to admit, that it's not that easy as some may think. Took me quite some time to learn how to do it. Never tried Leaf though, but seems like it can be a lot of fun - a lot of detailing here, which is something that I'm pretty good at hah, so I should definitely like it. But for the very easy projects you have Chick, frog, boat or a cat - I have been praciting on them quite a bit first before I jumped to more advanced projects. Of course all these animals can be done in many different ways, and some of the tutorials you find over the end are probably very advanced, so try to stick to those simple ones. You can even type "origami for kids" in Google and just pick whatever kids do. I mean, don't let your ego win, firstly you have to start from the very basics and make your way up, just like with everything. And starting with projects meant for kids is not a shame at all, I did start with those and I'm sure many others did as well :)

Good luck!

Leonard

Well, I forgot about helping you out with the most important actully - paper size. I believe anything above 40+cm is kind of unpractical, unless you aim for a very specific or complex design, that requires you to use a bigger paper. Most people actually use smaller pieces and so do those that make those tutorial videos or are writing instructions. Why? Because it's much easier for 80% of origami arts to be made with a small paper rather than a big one. Basically, the only advantage of a bigger paper is that it folds easier, but anything else is much harder, which is most likely the reason why you couldn't get done the projected mentioned above. It's not because you have too big hands, although if you have overly big hands, then origami can be indeed difficult.

Technically, people with smaller hands should be better at those kind of manual stuff, hence so many Asians are skilled in drawing and origami, but I don't particularly find it true. Unless like I said - your hands are actually too big, but most likely it's the size of your paper, you should swap to a smalelr one and learn how to create from a smaller one before you will scale your way up to the bigger paper. Bigger paper only folds easier, but creating a Lotus for example with a big paper is much more difficult.

Anyway, keep trying and let us know how did it go for you on a smaller paper.