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Computational Origami and David Huffman
geeber writes "Here is an article about David Huffman's work in the mathematics of computational origami at the New York Times (soul sucking registration required). According to the article, computational origami, "also known as technical folding, or origami sekkei, draws on fields that include computational geometry, number theory, coding theory and linear algebra." David Huffman is also the inventor of Huffman coding used in MP3s and was mentioned prieviously here."
"Let's sue HIM too!!!" -RIAA
Huffman coding was one of the first codings used to compress data LONG LONG time ago, in a galaxy far far away where MP3's were billions of years yet to come in the future.
It is real cool to see such pioneering people still involved in new things.
Since he died in '99 he has become less involved.
Also, origami is not actually a new thing.
What Huffman was interested in was curved folds and stress points. Maybe it should be called Extreme Origami.
Nope, not origami... interesting models, but by cutting the paper, gluing, etc. They have gone beyond the limits of traditional origami into just "paper craft" as the website says.
There are also some nice pictures of Huffman's origami here. The pictures also show Huffman himself doing the folding.
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For what it is worth, as the article submitter, I wrote in the submission a simple "(reg. required)." Apparently CmdrTaco thought "(soul sucking registration required)" was far more informative, and edited it thusly. Which really annoys the crap out of me. Way to be professional.
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If this interests you, be sure to check out Erik Demaine's work at MIT, Issei Yoshino's Super Complex Origami, HOYJO Takashi, Biruta Kresling's Keikki Bamboo folds, Robert Lang's Design Secrets of Origami, Robert Hull's Origami^3 compilation. Not all computational origami looks mathematical but the methods for getting to and end are clearly designed from step one. Quite frankly I understand very little of the math, but I can appreciate the elegance of an efficient fold.