Submitted by B Walker
Spirographs are just darn cool to look at. Trippy, yet fun for the whole family! They even look good on plain old notebook paper:
Photo via Midlifeperspective.com
Here’s an even fancier Spirograph drawing (done by the pros in the original Spirograph How To booklet):
Photo via Journal of Antiques.com
Beautiful, isn’t it? The super-colorful ones kind of remind me of tropical fish, in that they’re very soothing to look at. I know, I’m not right in the head.
Speaking of not being quite right, here’s a REALLY BAD idea:
Photo via Core77.com
Man, that’s gotta hurt. And I hope that’s not the finished product on the right, because a Spirograph tattoo with no color would be a shame.
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Copy & paste this:
i never knew when to stop with my spirograph… i always ended up with a big solid blob
I end up with a big, solid blob, too, when I…. did…. other stuff.
*snert*
ai knoz whut u meanz!1!
I never had enough colored pens/pencils to make any cool designs. They always eneded up just a smeared pencil mess.
I gotta say, though, I’ve never seen a spirograph tattoo before!
I loved those pens that had like marbleized colors inside, or the pick-a-color pens where you pressed down on a lever and a new color would come out. The marbleized pens and pencils rocked, except when you would get a pukey mix of colors like green and purple…
I love green and purple together… unless it’s lime green…
I found this website that has a SpiroGraph program on it… you can download it too (I’ve yet to figure how to use the download, though)
http://www.math.psu.edu/dlittle/java/parametricequations/spirograph/SpiroGraph1.0/index.html
I love green and purple together… unless it’s lime green…
I found this website that has a SpiroGraph program on it… you can download it too (I’ve yet to figure how to use the download, though)
math.psu.edu/
dlittle/
java/
parametricequations/
spirograph/
SpiroGraph1.0/
index.html
(I have no idea how to post this link w/o it getting filtered out)
Hi tigr
Did you find out how to make that program work? I downloaded but I haven’t got a clue!!
Cheers
ana
I loved this toy. When I was a young adult, I bought myself a new set. love that thing! I was able to make most of the pictures. I have them saved somewhere…..
I still have my original stored somewhere. It was one of my favourite toys.
i loved spirograph! sometimes i would slip while using it and ruin it. that would always piss me off. haha
I love these things! I rememeber making so many designs when I was little.
woah, how do these work??? i’m 18, this is beyond my years XD
pity, looks neat…
Part of the toy is missing in this picture. There were also various sized wheels that went either inside the ring or outside. You lined up the top of the wheel with the top of the ring and then push the wheel around the inside of the ring with your pen. The different sized wheels actually produced the different patterns.
Only problem I ever had was I’d get halfway through and the wheel would slip out of the teeth and ruin the whole thing. It was always a huge thrill to actually finish one without your pen sliding across the pattern.
I suppose it’d be even better on your back.
Tattoo guy says “Oops! I messed up.” Fail.
I think this is a modern (that is, not as good) version. The have the one piece with multiple holes instead of the various sized rings, and the stick, remember the stick!
I was really young when spirograph was popular, but I had my brother’s hand-me-down one and I grew up on it. I hated when the pen slid and messed everything up.
18 isn’t too young. I had one of these.. still do in my dorm. my roommate likes to play with it.
haha yeah I’m 18 now and it was my favorite thing when I was little! 18 isn’t too young at all.
I’m 18 and I played with one of these..
i’m 18 too and i loved playing with it when i was a kid..
and i found a spirograph on deviantart!
http://girlflash.deviantart.com/art/SpiroDraw-108323319
have fun!
One of my favorite toys. I never could get
an Etch-a-Sketch to work the way I wanted, but these
were easy & fun to use. I wonder why they aren’t around
any more? Too low-tech? Surely no one managed to
get hurt playing with one! I remember tearing through
my paper, tho. LOL
This is so weird. I don’t check this site every day. Today I did and it’s about Spirograph! On my way to work this morning I was thinking about Spirograph. I was remembering how I really wanted one back when they were popular, but never got one. Then thinking, if I had gotten one, what would I have done with all the pictures I would have made. I couldn’t come up with an answer and decided it was probably for the best that I never got one.
…I never actually had one. Thanks for reminding me that my friends got to make cool designs and I didn’t. =(
Emily & Simone,
It never is fun to be left out. . . I know the feeling and *BIG HUGS* to both of you.
I loved this toy as a child. In later years I bought it for my own kids, but *I* was the one always playing with it! (They were more into video games)
I *loved* Spirograph. It was the only thing that made me good at drawing.
If you have Opera, there is a Spirograph widget.
srsly? how does that work?
Um… the binder paper one isn’t a photo. It’s a painting.
My kids have the “new” Spirograph and it is not anywhere near as good. The old version had green stickpins that you had to use to secure the thing to some cardboard so it wouldn’t slide around while you were trying to draw with it. Also it had a long, thin piece that let you make cool oblong designs, and a football-shaped one, and some other neat shapes. The new one is molded plastic so it never slips, and the pieces are all round. Plus there are no PINS! Sharp pointy objects are a safety hazard! Gah. The pins were half the fun, you could just make pinhole designs.
*sigh* I miss the good ol’ days with dangerous toys.
My grandmother got me one & I was pretty sure it was the greatest gift she’d ever given me.
I hated when it slipped though but I didn’t want to use the little grip thing the had for them because it ruined the paper and the work of art that I planned on sticking on my wall. Or my mom’s or dad’s office.
I would kill for a spriograph now-i miss them so.
Spirographs were great. I’m really tempted to go and buy one off e-bay now; there’s some Denys Fisher originals on there…
I had that and SpiroFOIL, too. Same thing, but you did the designs on little sheets of foil. Then you could paint them.
There’s a super cool Widget for the Opera internet browser that is a spirograph.
Java spirograph! have fun peoples!
http://wordsmith.org/anu/java/spirograph.html
I want one so bad.
Spirograph is the most epic win EVAR!
I just turned 56, and I STILL have my Spirograph! Original box and the corrugated cardboard that you pinned the paper to. Date on the instruction book is 1967.
I could never get it to work right.
Totally loved my Spirograph!
Unless my ex threw it out, I’ve still got it somewhere. And I’m in my 50′s!
Too bad they created a new version that’s not as good. What can I say? The pins were important. Take them away and you take away a lot of the capabilities.
Was definitely a pain when the disk slipped inside the wheel or around the straights… after a while, I learned how to back it up.
I loved this thing. I think I still have mine from whenever I was a little kid. I used to create the most creative designs on this thing and always hated when it slipped.
Great post Im looking forward to following your future posts. I will subscribe to your rss feed if you have one too. Keep up the good work!!
Hubby says some of the pieces were great for turning into Ninja throwing stars.
Dude, I LOVED my spirograph. I had the deluxe kit and would grind holes in my paper by tracing over the same lines over and over again. The only thing that pissed me off was those little football-shaped pieces…I could never get them to work right! They would always slip off of the track and would mess up the whole drawing.
I loved this as a kid. Got 2 of them for Christmas over the years as a kid.
fantastic toy for kids.
I saw a version of this at Hastings a few weeks ago. Brought back memories…
Does anyone know where to find a spirograph kit that works as well as the old one? I had one as a kid and loved it too. Spent hours doodling with that thing… now I have a niece who is an art-lover and would really like to get her one. The reviews on the newer versions are really really bad…
Why do they always have to go a wreck a perfectly great toy by “improving” it?
I never got one either – I felt like I was the only person who didn’t own one and felt like I was the loner who never had cool new stuff *sigh* but I got a awesome, danger filled playground and my kids probably won’t get that.
My dad had bought me the super spyrograph back when they came out, and played with it more than i did, so i never got to use it much. I don’t know what ever became of it, but I found a complete regular spyrograph in a thrift store and paid mabe $4 for it. I got frustrated when the pen slipped, or the design was so detailed that the pen just chewed through the design. Either way, it was ruined. I wish they just came back out with them, because they cost a small fortune to find and buy one on Ebay, etc. I’m just glad I have one, even if I never get it out and play with it.