A quick tour

Most people may have heard of 'papermodels' or 'cut out and glue models'. But these terms don't do justice to the quality and detailing of modern cardmodel kits. In fact the detailing is so good that you will often hear the question 'That is made of PAPER?'. Most people can't even tell the difference from a plastic model.
What evolved from little cut-out models on the backside of cereal boxes has grown into a separate branch of scale-modelling. What didn't change is the pure fascination of creating a three-dimensional object from a two-dimensional sheet of paper.
Cardmodelling has got a lot of advantages that make it especially easy for beginners:
 

• simple tools: at the beginning scissors, a cutter knive and white glue will do
• cheap: a lot of free models on the internet, commercial kits starting from a few bucks
• suitable for every age, as long as a knive can be handled savely
• no painting like plastic models: everything is printed
• no painting + solvent free glue = high WAF* and living room proof

*WAF = wife acceptence factor
and the advantages for the experienced modeller are
 

• unlimited possibilities to add details and enhancements
• The inevitable urge to collect doesn't need a lot of storage space
• It's possible to create your own models on the computer with CAD-software

The spectrum of cardmodel kits nowadays covers almost every aspect. Starting from architecture over vehicles and ships to aviation almost everything is modelled in paper. Everything you can imagine: A simple house with only a few parts, a F-16 plane made from 700 parts where the undercarriage alone is made of a few dozen parts. Birds, cars, trucks and ships. Especially ships often have a parts count of a few thousand. The size of the models ranges from a few miilimeters for the gunsight of a plane to 6 feet tall for a Saturn V rocket. The upcoming internet did put a new quality into our hobby. Cardmodels are the ideal (well, actually the only) models for the distribution by download over the internet. Most of them are found in pdf-format which makes printing a piece of cake. This way beginners have the opportunity to reprint parts that didn't come out as wanted. This technique is also used by the 'Pros' and is even applied to bought kits. These are scanned just to be on the save side. One can practice parts before actually cutting the real kit or just redo, recolour or correct the fit of parts. If you are a newbie you will find most certainly some helpful information on this site. Or you can just try your hands on one of my models.