Portal’s P-body in paper

2011-07-24

Ok, so this is another somewhat nerdy papercraft, matching the Frankenturrets I did some time ago. It’s P-body, one of the two coop mode robots featured in Portal 2.

This one was a bit tricky, as I had to compromise between the level of detail and complexity of the assembly. Therefore, it’s not entirely faithful to the original, but I’d say it’s close enough. On the up side, assembly is not without challenge, but very doable. One huge compromise I made was the portal gun. It’s not held by P-Body, but it’s attached to his right arm – ugh, I know. But anything more realistic would have made things really complicated.

P-body doesn’t lend itself very well to papercrafting – a spheroid body and long thin extremities aren’t exactly papercraft staples. Thus, I was quite surprised to find that this model is actually quite stable. If you do it right, it should stand firmly on its feet and will resist moderate attempts to tip it over.

You may wonder where ATLAS is, P-body’s trusted friend. Well, here is bad news: ATLAS is even more difficult, being more or less a perfect sphere. And although it may seem as if P-Body’s parts can be reused for ATLAS, in reality I would have to design most if not all parts from scratch.

Now, considering that I have very limited time for such pranks, chances of an ATLAS model are slim, very slim. At least for the forseeable future.

In the meantime, enjoy P-Body. Here is the template. It comes in two pages and results in a model of about 15cm height:

Page 1 (PDF)

Page 2 (PDF)

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Comments

  1. Pingback: Papercraft Portal’s P-body by Digitprop | Paper Toy | Papercraft, Paper Toys & Paper Arts

  2. chris,

    Nice work planning on building this as my fisrt papercraft experiment…how’d you get rid of the dotted lines on the body? Am I missing something or are you using white paint?

    1. admin,

      Good point. I didn’t use white paint. Actually I use a cutting plotter (such as this one) which can cut the templates but also score the folding lines. Before printing the templates, I remove the dotted lines, in this way the models end up without dotted lines. Unfortunately this is only possible if you have access to a cutting plotter.

      Otherwise, covering up the lines with white paint is indeed a good option. Use a thin (no. 2 or 3) brush and regular opaque white, or a white Edding marker.

  3. Kathy,

    I’ve been working on Portal papercrafts for nearly a week now making Wheatly, GLaDOS, a couple companion cubes, a turret, and a cubee of Chell herself.
    A friend of mine suggested me this link so I plan on making P-body and two Frankenturrets today. Thanks for the awesome design. ^-^

  4. crookedstar,

    very cool!! i bet atlas looks cool, too! GLaDOS’ facility is so perfect itself, why didnt she make atlas a perfect sphere??! lolol <3 portal, awesome time killer! Cool!!!

  5. Pingback: Portal 2: P-body Papercraft | PaperCraftSquare - Free Papercrafts, Paper Models, Paper Toys Download

  6. Zagthaar,

    I made one for my husband for Valentine’s Day; he was astonished and delighted. A couple of Frankenturrets will definitely have to join the crew when his birthday comes around.

  7. Nettcod,

    I made one! It was the most challenging papercraft I’ve made yet. I like to consider it practice for something much harder I’m gonna make. Anyway I’m pretty happy with the results. Look forward to making some other papercrafts on this site.

  8. InfiniTTTy,

    Very cool! Nice work!

    I’m looking forward to making the Frankehturret also!

  9. Pingback: Portal 2: P-body Papercraft | Entertainment Blogs

  10. Pingback: Portal 2: P-body Papercraft | Anime Kensei

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