MetaFilter posts tagged with cardboard

A Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwich of a Computer Case

filthy light thief — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 13:49:55 -0800

The use of cardboard for things other than packaging is not new to the blue, from detailed artwork to furnature (and even re-making the Tron light cycle scene), and now computer cases. Brenden Macaluso's design is not the first, with a Japanese design from 2005 (the original site is down, but Archive.org has a backup, with more versions archived), and other kludged fixes for an existing case missing parts. Recompute wasn't the only cardboard case in the 2009 Greener Gadgets design competition. The other was Cardboardcase, by Francesco Biasci and Martina Becattini, which is a more of a traditional computer case form. On the DIY side, Instructables provides plans for a DIY cardboard laptop case. Recompute is inspired by the amount of computer hardware being recycled at the end of the product's lifecycle. The video section of the related website has additional associated clips. According to an interview with Macaluso, the design wasn't initially limited to cardboard as a material, but as he researched the components he found that cardboard had some bonus features, such as a greater tolerance for heat (cardboard has a higher fire and ignition point -- 258°C and 427°C, respectively -- where plastics begin to melt at about 120°C - source), and the corrugation ventilates the entire structure. The processor has its own cooling fan built in and the power supply and mother board are isolated from each other to keep heat from one affecting the other (source).

More Than a Box

netbros — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 17:07:44 -0800

Jonathan Ro-Schofield is Jonny Cardboard, an artist and window display designer whose developmental medium is, yes, cardboard. Sure, anyone can fold a box, but can you make incredible sculptures or storefront display-designs and props? Perhaps Jonny Cardboard can cater your wedding cakes. For more fine cardboard art, check out: Alex Uribe Junior Jacquet Chris Gilmour (previously) Mark Langan Dag Weiser

Meubles en carton

clavicle — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 16:00:45 -0800

Cardboard furniture: cheap and convenient. Or astounding. How much weight can a piece of cardboard really bear? This guy (video in French) and these people can show you. They're cartonnistes -- who knew there were so many people building cardboard furniture in France that they have a word for it? Accomplished cartonniste Eric Guiomar founded the Compagnie Bleuzen, which gives occasional cardboard furniture workshops and sells an instructional DVD. You can also find him on YouTube and Instructables. Association Récréation, a group in Brest dedicated to making art from reused and recycled materials, has a blog of cardboard furniture made in its workshops. I love this coffee table: shaped like a nautilus shell with a little drawer at its mouth and covered in used coffee filters. How they do it: this Instructable from Guiomar shows internal struts inside a cylindrical cardboard stool, which seem to be the cartonnistes' preferred way to give their furniture structural integrity. Leo Kempf's approach is a little different; inspired by Frank Gehry's wiggle chair, he glues layers of identical cardboard cutouts together, sometimes with plywood spacers, to take advantage of the strength of the corrugation inside. Will Holman does a little of both. A little more pedestrian but still useful is this laptop stand, and I bet this collapsible cardboard futon is...well, at least as comfortable as a regular futon. (Previously, origami-style cardboard chairs for kids.)

2222 Holes

Tube — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 23:31:24 -0800

Jared Tarbell is a computer artist whose Gallery of Computation has been previously featured on Metafilter . Several years ago he began working with the Epilog Mini 24 laser cutter, cutting out flat cardboard pieces and assembling them into complex geometric shapes. His Flickr set “lased” documents his work. Recently he made the transition to a more traditional artistic medium; oiled walnut , for his stunning piece 2222 holes.

The Making of Tron

SpacemanStix — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 21:37:32 -0800

Although the movie Tron was groundbreaking due to its unprecedented and extensive use of CGI in 1982, after pre-production, it only took four months to shoot and nine months to complete all of the special effects. From Computer Animation Primer published in 1984, we learn a bit about the technical process, which seems amusingly tedious by today's animation standards. For example: "The process of making TRON required artist-designers to interact with programmer-technicians, and this presented some interesting problems. The TRON atists were at Disney studios in Los Angeles, and the programmers were at Mathematics Applications Group, Inc. (MAGI) in New York.... Modems were used to send low-resolution motion tests to the director at Disney before committing the images to film. For example, after MAGI received the storyboards for the vehicular animation from Disney, they took these crude images and plotted them in three views using combinatorial geometry on a 40 x 60 inch Talos digitizing table. They then made flowcharts of the speed and tables of the moving objects for the camera path. The results then went back to Disney for corrections in pacing, staging, and animation." Here's an interesting background look at the development of the movie, from inception to conclusion, and including a postmortem: "Science fiction films that are heavily visual are often a tough sell. When George Lucas tried to set up Star Wars, he had a hard time drumming up any interest because it was completely unintelligible in treatment form. The Wachowski Brothers reportedly had to create extensive graphic novel style storyboards for The Matrix before Warner Brothers really got it. When Lisberger and company went out to sell Tron, they were ready. 'We had hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars invested in the project when we went to Disney,' he said. 'We had it storyboarded, we had designs, we had budgets, we had staff, we had schedules, we had sample reels - I mean, we had everything but money.'" If this makes you feel at all nostalgic, perhaps you'll enjoy being reintroduced to some of the merchandising that came out at the time, including the motion picture soundtrack on cassette, collecting cards, and the Intellivision videogame. And just for fun, here's a fan re-making of the Tron light cycle scene using cardboard.

Eagle Ager

geos — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 16:30:44 -0800

E a g l e A g e r

The Lords of Cardboard

Rhaomi — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 16:57:14 -0800

Off Planet Films makes stuff with cardboard. Crafted by hand on a minuscule budget, the award-winning animations of the small Tasmanian studio have titillated crowds from Hobart to Sundance. Thankfully one no longer has to attend a festival to catch their work, as most of their films are now available on video sites across the interwebs (as well as on their main site). Some highlights:

Tortures for Flies - A series of shorts exploring the magical world of insect genocide.

Wolf Boy - A nerd-turned-werewolf rampages through the hinterland in this fluidly animated music video for Tasmanian band "The Phibes".

The Physique of the Christ - The story of Easter... on steroids. (mildly NSFW)

Dracenstein - From the creators: "A mad scientist's life turns pear-shaped after accidentally installing a vampire brain in his monster creation. Filmed mostly in real-time using our 2D cardboard puppetry technique, a couple of scenes were still shot single frame. We experimented in 'Dracenstein' to see if we could pull-off a comedic fight scene using the puppets. Nothing deep is intended in this particular film, its just popcorn entertainment. Entirely handmade in Tasmania by Off Planet Films on a shoestring budget of under $50 (fuel, food, cardboard and the occasional aspirin.)"

My One and Only - From the creators: "Made in 24 hours for the Launceston "Take That" short film festival, in which the film was required to include the following elements:

- a lollipop (provided)
- set in Launceston in the year 2058
- one specific genre selection (comedy)
- the word "quintessential"
- the Launceston City Council Town Hall steps
- G rated restriction

The competition began at 9:00 am 12th January 2008. We shot the Town Hall steps first, arriving home at 9:45am. Storyboards and script were completed by noon. Sound narration recorded by 12:30pm. Puppets drawn, coloured and cut out throughout the afternoon and night, until 2:00am. Filming commenced & was completed at 5:30am. Edited until 8:00am. Music and foley was added until 8:35am. Film was then rendered and submitted before the deadline. (phew!!) ... It was a very close call for us to finish. The first screening and awards ceremony was held at the Launceston School of Art at 2:00pm on the 13th.... and to our surprise our film was awarded first place!"

Off Planet also publishes independent comics, one of which doubles as a cartoon series called Inspector Crikey. There's a lot more to be found on their archives page, and most of their stuff is mirrored on their official YouTube account. Like what they do? Then why not purchase a DVD? Ignoring the fact that they ship from Australia, and that most of the films are available free on their site anyway...

Tiny buildings made of paper.

dobbs — Tue, 25 Dec 2007 18:33:33 -0800

Tiny Buildings - "a collection of tiny buildings handcrafted from business cards, packaging and other nice papers."

Cardboard Tube Fighting League

otherwordlyglow — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 15:35:57 -0800

TubeDuel The CTFL was created out of a desperate need to better train and arm citizens with cardboard tubes. The goal of the CTFL is to provide organized cardboard tube based events that help spread cardboard awareness.

Creative Cardboard

Orb — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 05:48:29 -0800

The Cardboard art of Chris Gilmour.

Thinking out of the box.

paulsc — Sun, 29 Apr 2007 08:13:43 -0800

Foldschool offers free downloadable PDF patterns you can use to make children's furniture and "fun objects" out of 4mm corrugated cardboard. via

Attack of the Clones

kika — Tue, 05 Dec 2006 10:51:48 -0800

Dutch artist Bert Simons, suffering from a mid-life crisis, decided to clone himself to become immortal. By means of state-of-the-art computer multiplication techniques he found a way for you to build your own Bert clone! (1.2 MB PDF) He is currently in the process to clone a female specimen. (NSFW: cardboard nudity) [via]

Two-Dimensional Parents

mr_crash_davis — Thu, 31 Aug 2006 09:22:16 -0800

Kids, was your Mom or Dad sent to Iraq? Need some help coping with the separation anxiety? Never fear, it's the Maine National Guard to the rescue!

You want an office? You got an office.

FlamingBore — Tue, 08 Aug 2006 21:55:57 -0800

Payback is a B**** Someone played one too many practical jokes and/or pranks on some IT guys who had too much time on their hands. Impressive results ensue.