BB-8 / BB-9E
BB-8 is Poe Dameron’s trusty astromech companion. Like all astromechs, his primary role in a starfighter is navigation and dealing with secondary tasks freeing the pilot to concentrate on the situation at hand. During dogfights these droids could handle power and shield distribution, minor repairs, and combat coordination.
This particular little droid has an almost childlike innocence, yet is fiercely loyal to Poe. So much in fact that when Poe was about to be captured by the First Order, he entrusted BB-8 with the map to Luke Skywalker’s hidden location, and counted on him to bring it back to the resistance base.
When The Force Awakens was announced, I was ecstatic. At last… a new Star Wars Movie! My heroes would be back, new stories, new characters… and most important of all…. New Star Wars origami models to create! (ok, maybe not most important of all) One of the first new images I came across was BB-8. The trouble is, anything with curves, or even worse shaped like a ball, is very difficult to create in origami. But I accepted the challenge. I came up with a lot of different designs. Some three dimensional, some using 2 sheets of paper, some more abstract, but I wasn’t pleased with any of them.
I settled on a flat design that isn’t too hard, can stand up, and I think looks elegant.
You can try one of my favorite rejected versions yourself. Take a sheet of paper and crumple it into a ball. Take a second slightly smaller sheet and crumple that one, mash the bottom flat, and place it on top of the first ball. Ta-Da! Instant BB-8.
