Nailing the Bunny

Abstract

Grab some whiteboard, hammer some nails into it, and connect the nails to form the visualization of a 3D mesh. This is about as minimal as things can get. My goal was to physically recreate this 2D mesh representation of the familiar 3D bunny.

I present here the short story of how this project turned out.

Design

Launch Houdini and remesh the bunny to a low polygon mesh to stay sane during this project. Then delete all faces/points/edges that are not facing the camera. Then project it onto the plane and copy some nails into the mesh points. The virtual creation of this project was really straightforward and simple.

Virtual Setup

Once all the nails were hammered in, I could connect each of them using lines. Originally, I was set to use a thin black string for this. I quickly noticed that that would take way too much time. So instead, I drew the lines with a black fine liner.

The virtual version of the project rendered.

A banana, and the Mathon bear processed by the same method.

Finding the Right Mesh

I also attempted to remesh according to different criteria. After all, the density of triangles influences our perception of depth. In the end, the natural 3D remeshing of similar triangle sizes (in 3D) gave the best results.

Various versions of the bunny with different remeshing techniques. Left: all triangles similar size in 3D. Middle: curvature dependent. Right: similar triangle size in 2D.

Mapping and Building

Next comes the dreaded physical part. In order to get the mapping well on a board I had, I simply used a projector.

Projecting the image on the left using a simple projector and then drawing the dots with a pencil.

Then we connect each line. Interestingly, following the exact line instructions was very important. I once connected the wrong lines, and then it became really confusing to the viewer as to what was happening to the geometry in that area.
Originally, I had intended to use a black string and wrap it around the nails. This turned out to be too difficult, and thus I stuck to drawing each line.

Connecting all the nails using black lines.

Final Result

Why?

Why not?