Welcome, PaperModelers.com people! Legend has it, user 8ThMonth found this page long ago, and has gotten many good links from it. That's just lovely! Let's move along then.

This page is designed to give you Japanese paper model-related words for use in internet text searches. Any unicode-compatible browser (IE 5.0 and up) should be capable of displaying the Japanese text on this page.

Okay folks, let's find some Japanese (and Chinese) Paper Models, shall we?

Some general pronunciation notes (skip this part if you want):

Japanese vowels are pronounced the same as Spanish vowels. A="ought," I="eat" U="soup," E="eggs," and O="open." Easier than it looks.

You will notice that the words kaadomoderu and peepaakurafuto have extended vowel sounds (the horizontal line in the Japanese text). Thus the "pee" in peepaa is not pronounced like the "pee" in "peeping tom," but more like "pay." Peepaa in Japanese sounds kind of like the Aussie pronunciation of "paper."

The best way I've found to describe the pronunciation of the Japanese "r" sound is as a light "d" sound mixed with an "r". In other words, you don't say it so hard as to sound like a "d", but it shouldn't sound like "arrrrrrr" (matey)

Anyhow, good luck with that. On with the show.

Search Terms:

Okay, here are terms you can copy and paste into your favorite search engine, in order of search worthiness: Note: you may need to fiddle with your browser's encoding settings to properly display Google results, etc. In IE, go to View > Encoding > Japanese > Auto-detect.

1. ペーパークラフト [Google me] peepaakurafuto "paper craft" (this one is easy to spot with a little practice)
2. 紙模型 [Google me] kamimokei "paper modeling/models" BONUS! This one works in Chinese too - have fun! :)
3. 紙工作 [Google me] kamikousaku "paper construction"
4. カードモデル [Google me] kaadomoderu "card model(s)" (there are no plural forms of the nouns on this page—that makes our work easier) Note: I have seen kaadomoderu used exactly twice in referring to our hobby. This one isn't usually going to find you what you are looking for, but I've included it in case more Japanese start using it. Right now they use it to say, in essence, "okay, some English speakers call it 'card modeling', not paper craft."

Other helpful terms:

These terms can be useful if you are looking for assembly instructions.

作り方 tsukurikata "assembly method" (lit. "way to make")

組み立て kumitate "assembly/construction"

方法 houhou "method"

説明 setsumei "explanation"

Now, don't expect to be able to walk up to a Japanese person and be understood when you ask them if they're familiar with "peepaakurafuto" or "kamimokei."Our hobby may be more common in Japan than in some other countries, but it is still by no means mainstream.

I once asked some employees at a Japanese bookstore if they had any papercraft books or books on paper modeling. The idea of paper craft wasn't completely foreign to them ("you mean things like origami or finger puppets, right?"), but when I mentioned paper modeling, boy were they surprised ("you mean people actually build models out of paper?!"). I've had similar experiences with other Japanese friends. So this isn't some sort of huge thing over there.

Hope all this helps! Have fun. And don't forget to post photos of your finished builds.

-Marc