Well, I finally finished that 1:270 paper model of the Nebulon-B frigate! The finished size of this monster is 1.111 meters, and will consume 54 pages of cardstock, not to mention ink and whatever material you intend to use to reinforce the spine (there is no way this thing will be able to support its own weight). If you don't want the enormous 1:270 version, I made a slightly more manageable 1:350 scale version which is not in scale but will still have plenty of table presence. That one is 85 cm long and takes 35 pages.

These models are available in two formats. PDF should be familiar to all of you, but the PDO model will require the Pepakura viewer, which is free and available here: http://www.tamasoft.co.jp/pepakura-en/download/viewer.html The viewer will allow you to manipulate the CG model and find where the parts go, and so it serves as a sort of "instruction manual" for the model. You can simply click on a part and it will be highlighted on the model itself. Pretty cool, huh?

Here are a couple pics of the model developments so you can see them.

1:270 scale version:

1:350 scale version:

Here are the download links:

1:270 PDO model: http://www.mediafire.com/download/goqf67lfqf8fd0z/Nebulon-B_Frigate_1-270.pdo

1:270 PDF: http://www.mediafire.com/view/drdnff2hxw5ltmy/Nebulon-B_Frigate_1-270.pdf

1:350 PDO model: http://www.mediafire.com/download/miyle8hqf8veaw5/Nebulon-B_Frigate_1-350.pdo

1:350 PDF: http://www.mediafire.com/view/2g86j9mq2az014l/Nebulon-B_Frigate_1-350.pdf

This..

This..

This is EPIC, sir. Absolutely EPIC. I bow before you, unworthy.

[Wayne and Garth] "We're not worthy!"

This is incredible. Thank you very much for sharing.

So I'm wondering. Would we need to take this to a Kinkos, or could we print this off in a standard printer?

Pretty much any printer will work. You'll need to print it on heavy-duty cardstock paper (90-110 lb) for it to support itself in either scale, but pretty much all printers are designed to take it. I would advise against printing it on a laser printer. As sharp as the images it produces are, they are pretty fragile and won't last as long as a model printed on inkjet.

I heavily recommend reinforcing it on the inside with strips of cardboard to keep the various sections from collapsing as you handle the model.

Pretty much any printer will work.

I've done some papercraft so far and one little protip is: Do all of it on the same printer! You'd think you can't see a difference if you some of it "here" and some "there" but you will

I agree. I've got a Star Destroyer I'm building in paper, and I had already built the hull, but somehow I lost the pages for the upper decks of the superstructure and the bridge. I just figured I'd print it on my inkjet printer after I had printed the other parts on a laser printer. But the laser printed parts have a reddish hue while the inkjet ones have a blueish hue. It's really distracting, and I've completely stalled because of it.

Awesome! I like that this fills out the basic dimensions of the ship, but leaves lots of room for detailing. This one's going to take many months, but should be a lot of fun to build. I fully expect FFG to come out with a $100 version of their own, but just being able to sit this bad boy on the table will be fun too.

For detailing, there are a lot of awesome pics of the studio model here:

http://www.modelermagic.com/?p=2034