Papercraft Unfold

This tool converts a STL/OFF/PLY/OBJ into binary STL Format. The STL then gets unfolded (flattened) to make a papercraft model.

It utilizes https://github.com/osresearch/papercraft and https://github.com/admesh/admesh

Avoid importing STL files with a lot of surfaces. Larger files require intense computing power. It's better to use simplified low-poly models (with a decent amount of triangles). See Simplification and remeshing of STL parts

3D STL preview	Papercraft Unfold output

Usage

Manual steps

PaperCraft Unfold tool compilation on Windows (and Linux)

The folowing steps how to compile unfold binary which is used for the upper mentioned Inkscape plugin.

Start Cygwin (Windows) or use your regular bash shell (Linux)

On Linux we can easily compile using gcc and make. For Windows executable we can use cygwin with installed gcc and make libraries.

Compile

cd /c/
git clone https://github.com/osresearch/papercraft
cd papercraft
make
cp C:\Babun\.babun\cygwin\bin /c/papercraft/
explorer .

Papercraft Unfold supports option to generate labels for edges. We can make separate compilations to have both variants. (variable: static int draw_labels = 0;)

Start cmd shell

cd C:\papercraft
unfold < Bunny-LowPoly.stl > bunny.svg
#or explicitely with extension .exe
unfold.exe < Bunny-LowPoly.stl > bunny.svg

Check output and compare with input

Bunny-LowPoly.stl	unfold < Bunny-LowPoly.stl > bunny.svg	bunny.svg