The year was 1290 . A crowd had gathered around a clearing, where broken down pillars marked the presence of an ancient temple, now long gone. A young boy, just 14 years old, leaned against one of those pillars, deep in thought. Then, he began speaking, and the crowd fell silent, listening to his every word. He spoke without any notes, translating the Bhagavat Gita, from Sanskrit, which only the pundits knew, to the language everyone in the village knew and spoke – a variety of Prakrit which developed into the Marathi language. Even as he spoke, one of the men in the audience realized how momentous this event was, and how important this composition would be. He began writing down the words the young boy spoke, and this composition was named by its author and composer, the Bhavartha Deepika – the enlightening meaning (of the Bhagavat Gita). Now, the ancient, holy text, was no longer restricted to the pundits, but accessible to all, understood easily by them, composed as it was, in their...
Buildings – just the thought of making lots of buildings makes Samhith all excited! When we started our navaratri preparations, he realized that his blocks wouldn’t be enough to make all the things he wanted in his town – stations, shops, houses, buildings, etc. etc. etc……… As usual, his solution was simple – “Let’s buy more blocks!” he said!!!!! After a lot of argument, I had to put my foot down and explain that his quota of building blocks for the year was done, and I wasn’t buying any more till his next birthday! But then he was so upset that I assured him that I would help him make good houses with paper, and set to work. It would have been easier buying ready-made stuff, but then, it wouldn’t really be the same, would it?
Thus began a whole lot of work for me – beginning with days of searching on the internet (to which I turn for anything and everything these days…), which yielded absolutely stunning results! I found not only some interesting sites which gave me ideas to make my town, but also lots and lots of sites with ready to print paper models of houses – which I only had to print and fix together!
Here are a few…. If you have kids or want to become a kid yourself, go ahead and try some of them out…… they are just too beautiful!
Most of these sites have ready-to-print patterns, colours and patterns all done, which yield the best results, but there are a few which give us the chance of colouring in ourselves, which is what I chose, so as to give Samhith the pleasure of doing his bit of work…….
So, here are my top 10 sites for making paper models -
This is one of the first sites I came across. It reminded me of a paper-cut-out farm I had when I was a kid (a gift from my aunt in the US
This site has some wonderful stuff – right from making your farm, village and town to castles! Just the place for us! Most of my patterns have been taken from this site, and the best part is that they are all blank templates and we can colour them as we wish! And soon, I shall share our work with you!!
3. Paper Toys
This site has some amazing paper fold-ups – ranging from some of the most beautiful buildings in the world to vehicles and even dolls, and everything is absolutely free!
However, one point about these models is that they are extremely detailed and hence quite complex. Definitely not child’s play!
This one is a treasure-house of paper fold-ups, listing sites with free models of everything from modes of transports to castles, railroads to famous landmarks, villages to skyscrapers. The sites are well classified and it is very convenient!
This site has some wonderful miniature models of houses, shops and churches, ideal for model railroads or a model village like ours.
This is the personal page of Martin Gumhold from Germany
This one has a very pretty little barn, complete with animals and fodder. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to take a good colour printout and hence couldn’t use this one. Maybe next time!
This is another good site for barns and stuff, which even has tips for getting the wall and roof textures absolutely right!!!
This site has some great houses, all for free, but the whole site is in Chinese… but who cares, the patterns are all I need!
And finally, this one has a whole lot of stuff! This was where we found our station. It is supposed to be a bus stand, but who knows, by the time we are done, it might be a railway station!
These are certainly not the only sites on paper-models, but these were the most useful ones for me. There are lots and lots more sites which have interesting patterns, and all you have to do is - search!!!!!
Well, that brings me to an end to another part of this series. My background is done, my printouts for the houses and other buildings are ready. All we now have to do is colour them in, cut them out and fix them up! Sounds easy? Think again! This has been the easy part. Now we have to sit down and get to work! With just two more days in hand, it’s high time I get to work and get things ready! I shall soon be back with the results... Till then, have a nice day!!!!
WOW!! I am blown away, went to each site and had a good long look :) if I had known these things , I would have done them myself! This is no plastic! its paper and degradable and we can recycle it! Thats more than enough reason to do them and its very very interesting to do, I can see the potential work involved, but I guess it would be really fun doing it :)
ReplyDeleteVisiting your posts everyday is a treat :) I am going to treasure this post for long time to come, when I make my golu this is what I am going to do
Kudos to yourself and Samhit! You must have searched so much! and glad you did , now you can tell others and guide them :) Samhit would be really proud to show his master of art creations to his friends and I can forsee a big crowed at your home inspecting and murmering to themselves how much you have done and how much they seem beautiful