CeraCera Design Notes

New Model Design Dairy - Elephant - Part 1

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 14:06:00 +0000

Elephants have been a symbol of wisdom, strength, stability, loyalty, intelligence and many other positive attributes. It is also a symbol of good luck with it's trunk in upright position that some homes display a pair of elephants.

Started design work on elephant automata to add on to our series of Lucky Automata range ( lucky cat, lucky dog, lucky star ).

Picture show the 2nd model that we made after correcting sizes & shapes of some of the parts.

The elephant automata model is to knee with the back legs and raise its head and trunk at the same time. It will require 2 CAMs to drive to drive the various part of the body.

Once the elephant body & head design are done, will move on to work on the back legs (which need to kneel) and the mechanism ............ (to be continued)

Making Automata Box Part 2

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 07:37:00 +0000

Using double-sided tape and color paper, we cover the white foam and touch-up on the box .

Take note of the circular hole that was cutout earlier to allow extension of the handle. We use a wooden stick.

The box is now completed and we might need to add labeling to it.

THis is the picture of GoldFish automata inside the box together with Dream Butterfly & KuFu Mei Mei.

May be we will try to make a cylinder box for the next model.....
Hope you like this box making post and give us any suggestion or comment.

Thanks.
Ren

Making Automata display box

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 07:06:00 +0000

CeraCera will be invited for a small exhibition in an art & design activity and we are to showcase some of the models of our choice.

The first thing that come to mind is the need to design and make casing to house the fragile Paper Automata models. The casing will need to be transparent , able to protect the model and at the same time, allow visitor to turn the handle and view the automata action. So we start our journey in search for a suitable casing. After checking in the market, there is no such casing off the shelve and we decided to make it ourselve...........

Step One :
We found the thick plastic sheet from the local art&craft shop which is transparent and hard. We grab some.....including the foam sheet (1.2cm thick).

Need to consider how big the box need to be , including room for the automata motion that will probably beyond the base box.... plus some room on top to make it look nicer :-).

After the dimenion is fixed, we start cutting the plastic sheet. See figure below.

Next , cut out from the foam sheet and color paper, glue the color paper to the foam using double-sided tape.

Noticed that we cut out a circular hole from the plastic sheet, this is to allow rotation of the handle to take place.

Step 2 :

We secured the automata model to the foam using bluetac , double-sided tape, glue etc... to ensure the model is firmly, very firmly , attached to the base. This is important so that the automata is firm when any one turn the handle as they are not able to hold the model after putting it inside the box.

See the box before touch-up and additional color paper :

To be continued............

Star behind the KOI model

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 10:25:00 +0000

Idea & star behind the KOI Model

There was a pond next to our studio which has been a source of inspiration of our KOI model. The pond has quite a number of Koi fish and it is really a joy just to watch them swimming around. We decided to design a KOI model after observing them for a number a days making sure the movment /automata mechanism are similar. We also need to be sure that we can design a paper model/sculpture that show the beauty of a KOI.

Designing a beautiful and realistic looking KOI paper model was the difficult part compare to the automata mechanism (but we prefer to have a real-looking model rather than a sketch model of a KOI). About 5 to 6 revision change on the paper model itself to achieve that.

We have been coming back to the pond several time to observe the head, body, tail, dimension ration, scale, color of the Koi. Thanks to this pond !

This is the pond and can you recognise the star behind our model?

This is one of the discarded earlier Koi paper model:

KOI

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 13:11:00 +0000

We have just completed a new automata model : KOI . It has been quite a while as we received feedback and suggestion to have a Koi Fish automata after we released our goldfish. We are fascinated by this very graceful fish that symbolish courage, wealth & prosperity in some countries. After observing this fish , we modified the existing goldfish to creat this KOI model. We have since made about 5 revision change in order to create a realistic anf beautiful KOI fish.

The earlier models either look too fat or not graceful enough.
We love this koi and we hope you like it too.

More images at our website www.ceracera.com

CeraCera NEW Models ....Almost ready.

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 13:16:00 +0000

We having been working on about 6 ~ 7 new models concurrently in the past few mths..... It has never been so fun before as all the new design /concept/ideas were floating in our minds all day long...... intoxicated with Automata Magic. Nevertheless, we sincerely hope our automata will make people happy .... especially during this financial crisis .

These are three of the models that were completed and undering final checking. We have re-designed the cover pages .

GoldFish - We re-design the popular GoldFish and is currently designing another one for Koi-lover (Koi model ).

KungFu Mei - "Mei" in Chinese mean young sister and we love this model. Turn the handle, the KungFu Mei will start practicing .

Dream Butterfly - This is the butterfly that appears in our dream. We completed this model quite some time back and finally done up the final version.

We will be publishing design notes of these models in the next few blog entries and hopefully adding some animation and pictures in the blog.

Happy New Year!

Happy Automata - Dream Butterfly part II

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 06:38:00 +0000

After doing some www search on butterfly, we have eventually found the one that we like and and the look alike of our dream butterfly.

The concept of the mechanism drawing was completed and prototype building started. Modified and redrawn the various pieces along the way, the photo show the 3rd revision of the draft and mock up. The star mark on the box is the location that we plan to have the flowers & leaves.

These 2 images give you the idea of the movement when the butterfly flapping her wings.

Some fine tuning needed to smoothen the movement and depict the graceful butterfly flap.

Summer break

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Sat, 24 May 2008 14:37:00 +0000

Just realise the animation of the Aquashark did not work in the previous post. Thus, we post it here again and hope it works.

Looks like we might not be able to complete the Aquashar instruction on time before the planned summer holiday break. We will be away for 2 wks for holiday and probably continue our work after we are back. Hope to capture more automata ideas along the way.

Enjoy.

CeraCera - the Automata People
We simply love designing Automata and can never have enough of it!
We even dream Automata!

Dream Butterfly

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Fri, 23 May 2008 00:22:00 +0000

In a hot summer afternoon last week, I dozed off while working on the instruction manual for the AquaShark ZZZ, zzz, ZZZ, zzz...... In a dreamy state, I saw a beautiful butterfly resting on a huge chrysanthemum. The butterfly was flapping her wings and I could feel the cool breeze in this hot afternoon. It was a blissful experience.

Butterfly is beautiful. Eureka!

We will love to have a butterfly Automata and this will be our next project. The challenge is on the mechanism because the wings are simply a thin sheet of paper and there is not room to house the mechanism. But we have figured out the concept and will probably put it into drawing shortly.
We love it and I think we will really enjoy designing this butterfly in the dream.

We call this model " DREAM BUTTERFLY ".

Do you love Butterfly?
Do you love Paper Automata?
Then you will love a Butterfly Automata.

CeraCera - the Automata People
We simply love designing Automata and can never have enough of it!
We even dream Automata!

AquaShark is coming!

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Mon, 19 May 2008 11:02:00 +0000

Final adjustment done and we have just finished the animation of the aquashark model. Show here for yore review and hope you like it. Turn the handle , see the shark swimming in the ocean looking for its food. Shark !Shark!

New model - JAW!

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Thu, 08 May 2008 14:13:00 +0000

We have finally completed the shark . Putting the final model together and it works just fine. Turn the handle , the shark start swimming swiftly looking for it's food deep in the ocean. We will need to put together the instruction , arranging all the pieces into a package.... Hi, stopping looking at the shark swimming, get back to work on the instruction manual.......

New Automata Design in the pipeline - SHARK!

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 23:37:00 +0000

We have started a new automata design on a swimming Shark. Just completed some initial draft and working on modifying and smoothening the mechanism. It has been a struggle between whether to have a more realistic shark look or a more cartoon/funny look. Any way, we prefer the more realistic look . By the way , we were just wondering whether JAWs is a copy-right name or we can also use it to name our automata?

Re-launch of Ancient Official model as 2-in-1 kit

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 13:55:00 +0000

We have fixed one bug in the lenth of the arm pusher and put this model back for release. At the same time, re-introducing it as a 2-in-1 model. Beside the standard full-color kit, it come with additional blank model kit that allow self-coloring with your own choice of color. It saves on color printing ink and allows creativity. You can also add wording etc on to the model. Hope this will make paper automata more fun and enjoyable!

2-in-1 Model

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 13:46:00 +0000

As we received feedback from some users about their wish to have the models with their own choice of color as well as to save on color printing ink, we would like to try the new 2-in-1 model which include additional un-colored model. We sincerely hope this effort will help to meet some of the requirement and bring more fun to paper automata making.

This is the picture of our hand-colored Ancient Official model that we planned to re-release after we have fixed one of the bug in the design. Color pencils were used. Hope you like it.

Preview on our new model II

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 14:20:00 +0000

We have put up the image and page on this model pianist. http://www.ceracera.com/pianist.html. Have not decided whether to release this model for download as it might not be suitable for beginner, we will see.

These are some of the images,

Preview of our new model Pianist

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Sun, 11 Nov 2007 07:03:00 +0000

Finally, we finished this new model and put together the pianist as show in the picture here.
Added support to the base box to make the model easier to hold & turn the handle. Just 2 wonderful bars make the whole model fell very much more robust. We love the motion of the Pianist playing the piano when we turn the handle. It will be perfect if it can actually play sound as well. We will post more picture of this model in the later post. The picture below shows the support bar attached to the base box and an angle view of the cams inside the base box. Hope you like this MoonLight Sonata..........

We are back to designing Automata ....

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Wed, 13 Jun 2007 10:26:00 +0000

Yes, it has been a long time since we last release the model SwimMata. We are back to the drawing board again....... Hurray! Designing Automata is our passion and we are just simply addicted and can never let go...... We were once ready to drop the whole thing about designing and releasing Paper Automata due to some reasons. But the postive feedback and msg from people fascinated with our automata simply keep us going. ...... Until the day we realise designing automata itself is a FUN process (some time painful) that is both exciting and challenging.

We started prototyping our next model named The Pianist. The picture show the 4th revision which did not work too well. We wanted the wave-like motion when one's fingers moving on the keyboard while playing MoonLight Sonata.

After chaning the entire mechanism, we managed to get some right moment and is now fine tuning the postion. Should be able to make it work with the 5th revision. Enjoy........

YogaMata - One of our failed automata model

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Sun, 31 Dec 2006 13:24:00 +0000

Just like there is daylight and night, we have good design and failed design. Actually, there are many designs that we have discarded since day one but have decided to capture them in our blog. This is a model that we named YoGaMata that is a paper model that did yoga pose. We spent 3 weeks in the past month on this design. The picture show the mechanism has a problem of tilting the model to one side. This is because the pivot was designed to lift the model on one side instead of in the center of the body. Any way, we are not really happy with this one and have decided to KIV our orginally planned YogaMata series.

Desiging SwimMata

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 16:00:00 +0000

As we were slowly picking up automata design, it took us about 3-4wks and 6 revision before coming out with a satisfactory model. The pictures show some of the parts that we put together during rev 3 and 4.
Paper clips , pins and any other simple parts as weight to fine tune the mechanism. This was about 2 revisions before the final model.

New Automata model - SwimMata

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 16:00:00 +0000

Yes, it has been a long time since we stopped designing automata due to the various problems that we faced. We received many msgs telling us the models we design are fascinating and impressive. There are also people sending encouraging msgs to us. We have since picked up fr where we left and completed the swimmer model. That was after about 5-6 revision before we have the model working.
Turn the handle and enjoy swimming in the blue ocean.
We are at the final stage of writing instruction manual and will release the model soon.
We would also like to thank all the people that send us very encouraging msgs, thank you.

New model swimming

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Mon, 26 Sep 2005 15:18:00 +0000

Back to the drawing board after delaying new design for quite a while. In the process, we discard (or put a side a few new design due to unsatisfactory result & movement. We enjoy each design process and failed models will continue staying in our heart. We will come back and fine tune these models again one day. This is the fascinating part of designing Automata models.

One of the models that we put aside some time ago is the swimmer. Swimming movement has always been an automata that we love to design. The coordination and rhythmic movement of hands & legs when swimming is just so fascinating.
We are glad to come back to this model and managed to fine tune and make the parts work. currently doing modification and hope to be release this new model soon. Happy swimming !
The picture show the swimming legs that we are trying to improve!

Happy Automata Series

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Thu, 26 May 2005 10:41:00 +0000

We set out to design a new series of automata that make people happy. The first model is Happy Tune which is at the final stage of packaging design. We hope to design automata that will help to make any one turning the handle to feel happy. Any Yes, we are delighted to say we feel happy designing happy tune and the moment we turn the handel........ If you happy and you clap your handes....... If you happy and you nob your head...... If you happy and you sing a song (when was the last time you actually sing?)

Happy Automata serier - New Model Happy Tune

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Sat, 21 May 2005 03:26:00 +0000

After launching our new printed kit site, we are now back to the drawing board. Work has begun on our next automata series - HAPPY AUTOMATA . (thanks for the very warm response on our Auspicious Automata Series, Thanks!). We hope to design and release a new series of Happy Automata that will make you feel..... Happy!
Currently working on the first Happy Automata- Happy tune. A cute little girl clapping hands while singing a happy tune!
The model has been completed and we are working on the animatin as well as the introduction manaul. Hope to release it soon.
The picture show the completed new model in our studio. Enjoy!

New website Automata Magic and printed kit

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Sat, 23 Apr 2005 17:55:00 +0000

We have been working on our new site and has released it under the Automata Magic slogan. The new site also offer printed kit instead of digital download. We hope this will help to reach out to more people who would prefer to receive via air post the printed automata kit.
Finally, the new site go live!

Another Lucky ---- Dog

noreply@blogger.com (CeraCera.com) — Sun, 06 Feb 2005 17:21:00 +0000

Every one likes the auspicious Automata and we received request from Dog lover to have a lucky dog automata. We would like to make your wish come true. CeraCera is now putting together a lucky dog automata as a companion to our lucky cat. Hope to release this model in the next new product introduction.