One of the more interesting optical illusions I’ve seen through the years are the Gathering for Gardner Dragons. These paper dragons appear to follow you as you move around the room. It is a very fun and interesting project for kids and adults alike! I’ve decided to post a couple .pdf downloads, along with individual photos of each dragon so you can make your own!

Below are two YouTube videos so you can see how they work. I’d like to point out that before you try to build your own with the files I’ve provided, that you need to see how the head is constructed. The head is basically built upside down from how you’d typically build it, so pay close attention to that, otherwise it won’t work. The second video below shows the head construction in detail. If you fast forward to 2:25, you can see how to build the head.

I do not own, and have not modified the dragons below in any way. They are © Binary Arts, and all I did was to create a .pdf to combine the 6 different colored dragons I found on the Internet several years ago. Download at the link below (stored on my site):

If you just want an individual dragon, here is a gallery of all the dragons from the .pdf above:

Next is an additional group of dragons I found that do not contain the Gardner info. They seem to work about the same as the others, and look similar other than the lack of ears. They do not have the assembly instructions of the Gardners, so you may want to make one of the Gardner versions first to get acquainted with it before you build one of these. In this file are 3 different color options. Download the .pdf file at the link below (stored on my site):

If you just want an individual dragon, here is a gallery of all the dragons from the .pdf above: