Myself & Origami 

 
I have been folding since 1968. It started as a challenge in the class to see who can keep coming up with a lot of different models. Although I did not win, I pestered my parents and my grandparents for more. I went to the town library and found Robert Harbin's "Secrets of Origami". I made sketches of favourite models from the book which is quite a lot.
The first book I bought is also from Robert Harbin just titled "Origami" and subsequently followed by "Origami 2", "Origami 3" and "Origami 4". When I attended University, I borrowed "Creative Origami" by Kunihiko Kasakara and "World of Origami" by Isao Honda.

When I begin to work, I started going to bookstores and buying origami books and ordering origami books throught the bookstore. I joined British Origami Society in 1981 (I think) and contacted Francis Ow. Together we held our first origami exhibition and through the exhibition came into contact more origami enthusiasts. Together we have more origami exhibitions and demonstrations. I contacted the People Association who looks after handicraft in Community Centres in Singapore and was able to get origami introduced. Although eventually, I do not teach in these Community Centres, my other friends were able to conduct courses and spread origami in Singapore. Many of their own students have in turn conduct origami courses.

Practically every year in the 80s and early 90s,  I will get together with Francis Ow, Chan Yew Meng, Poon Kin Fook and others to participate in the People Association Hobbycraft Fair. I am no longer as active as I was as my energy is now invested mainly in my family. My son and daughter is also interested in origami and my daughter will eventually follow me to all origami activities.

Currently in Singapore, the ones that I know of who are still actively folding at some time or other, besides myself, include Francis Ow, Chan Yew Meng, Paul Ee, Robert Choy, Albert Sng, Ronald Koh, Poon Kin Fook, Leong Cheng Chit, Brigitte Wong and Aw Kum Seng. Those who could fold but are no longer part of the group include Walter Tan, Cheryl and Sanny Ang. There were also others who could fold but never join us in any activities.
 
It is interesting to note that all of us have our own area of expertise and interest in origami and we compliment one another beautifully.

My interest lies in folding animals and generally living things.

I prefer simple but effective models, the simpler the better. I do not shy away from multi-part models or the use of cutting or glue although I would avoid it if I could. Unlike others, I prefer cutting and gluing over complicated models, of course, not too much cutting or gluing. My preference for the simple and making do with the minimum shows in the way I design my webpages. Any browser of any version will have no trouble accessing my webpages. I like those 1 step models or 2 step models or models of this nature with very minimum folds unlike today's preference for complicated models.

Currently interest in origami is much more than when I and my friends first started but unfortunately interest is usually lost after a while. There are plenty of origami books in Singapore and they are snapped up very quickly. Every now and then, origami activities are organised here and there by someone else not related to the group but unfortunately the standard of the models leave much to be desired. This lead to the tendency to continually mark origami as "child's play".

Origami in Singapore had a revival in 1999 when Francis, myself and Yew Meng met up with Cheng Chit, Albert Sng, Ronald Koh and Teik Seong. Together we were able to hold more demonstrations and exhibitions, and the group got larger as a result. The group met and Cheng Chit was selected as a leader to lead the group. Under his leadership, the group got a lot of exposure. These activities were listed in the Singapore Origami Web. I acted as the first webmaster of SOW, setting it up and reporting diligently on the activities in Singapore until I resigned as webmaster on August 2001. Nowadays I prefer to take a back seat and help out on smaller projects.

The Origami world is now considerably more advance due to the efforts of people like Akira Yoshizawa, Robert Harbin, Lillian Oppenheimer and many, many others. The main advancement (in my opinion) which lead to the current proliferation of origami is the ability to standardised, the ability to record creations in a standard way for others to understand, for others to learn and improve. This standardisation (again in my opinion) is due to Akira Yoshizawa who provided the standards and Robert Harbin who popularised it.

Origami

The crane is traditional. It comes from a traditional base known as the Bird Base (Step 13 below). From this bird base many kinds of animals can be derived. There are in fact many traditional bases or starting points. These include Preliminary Base (Step 9 below), Frog Base (or Lily Base), Water Bomb Base, etc. These terms are generally recognised and may vary with Japanese origami experts.

The following is a creation of Francis Ow. It is unfortunate that one of Francis's achievements in having a book on Paper Hearts will lead to plagiarism. His works is so much admired that it has appeared in Taiwan books which copy his works whole scale and sweetened it for commercial release. These books have appeared in Singapore. His works has even become instructions to entice customers to purchase paper and fold his creation. An example is below, instruction on Francis Ow's Double Hearts:


 
Francis Ow's book

For those young at heart, loves heart, loves with all their heart, and definitely not for the heartless!
 

Francis Ow's webpages can be accessed at http://web.singnet.com.sg/~owrigami/

What is Origami ? (Written by HS Lim)
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