Designer Diary - Bumfuzzled #13 - Skyline Oasis
Out of all the design approaches that often serve as starting points for my designs, the impetus for Bumfuzzled #13 was the subject matter of a floating sky island. Whenever I have subject matter in mind, I have a rough idea of what I'm aiming for, but I never know how it's going to come out until I put my pencil to paper. My drawing hand is very bad at drawing exactly what I have in mind, so it's always a bit of a surprise what comes out!
Here was the rough first sketch, where I simply laid out an overall vision without much detail:
This draft was much more abstract than I'd had in mind, and had much more pillowy sky vs. the urban structures than I'd anticipated, but hey, I liked how it looked, so I kept going! And those drips? I have no idea where that came from, but I thought they looked cool, like an ethereal icing connecting the city to the clouds below.
Adding the Details
I tend to be much more focused on getting work done than documenting the process, so I'll use photos of the finished puzzle to highlight some design choices.
I often enjoy incorporating inner voids (usually called drop-outs in the wooden puzzle community), as well as a bit of misdirection here and there. This little bit accomplishes both, as it adds some drippy bits in an unexpected location, and also an aesthetically-pleasing void in an area of puzzle you might not expect to see one.
The city skyline is rather subtle and abstract, but I had fun pulling off a futuristic look in this minimalistic style. It was also a nice challenge to keep it all fairly well connected, with that top cloud both being both a pretty touch and functional to the integrity of the puzzle! The top challenge of designing art as puzzles is always striking that balance.
This section is probably my favorite detail. It was a rather bland section of puzzle, and there also needed to be a way of connecting the various color sections (again, that art vs. functional puzzle problem!). I could have taken the easy route of just adding a few little tabs that held the sections together, but that's not how I roll if I can help it.
I came up with the idea of these "stitch" pieces, that both add a pop of color and visual interest, while being very functional at stitching those puzzle sections together in an unusual way.
They also create an interesting little mini puzzle. You might notice that some of my designs feel like two or three puzzles that all integrate, as I love switching up connector types, cut patterns, etc, requiring different solve strategies and techniques that force people to think outside of their normal puzzling habits. In this case, since the only distinguishing feature is the length of the stitch, the area needs to be completed leaving the stitch locations as voids before knowing which stitch fits each void. Tricky business!
Putting it All Together!
After several iterations of adding detail and refining the overall design, finally ending in chopping up large sections of puzzle into smaller pieces, here was the final sketch, followed by that sketch turned into the final puzzle:
I often enjoy incorporating inner voids (usually called drop-outs in the wooden puzzle community), as well as a bit of misdirection here and there. This little bit accomplishes both, as it adds some drippy bits in an unexpected location, and also an aesthetically-pleasing void in an area of puzzle you might not expect to see one.
The city skyline is rather subtle and abstract, but I had fun pulling off a futuristic look in this minimalistic style. It was also a nice challenge to keep it all fairly well connected, with that top cloud both being both a pretty touch and functional to the integrity of the puzzle! The top challenge of designing art as puzzles is always striking that balance.
This section is probably my favorite detail. It was a rather bland section of puzzle, and there also needed to be a way of connecting the various color sections (again, that art vs. functional puzzle problem!). I could have taken the easy route of just adding a few little tabs that held the sections together, but that's not how I roll if I can help it.
I came up with the idea of these "stitch" pieces, that both add a pop of color and visual interest, while being very functional at stitching those puzzle sections together in an unusual way.
They also create an interesting little mini puzzle. You might notice that some of my designs feel like two or three puzzles that all integrate, as I love switching up connector types, cut patterns, etc, requiring different solve strategies and techniques that force people to think outside of their normal puzzling habits. In this case, since the only distinguishing feature is the length of the stitch, the area needs to be completed leaving the stitch locations as voids before knowing which stitch fits each void. Tricky business!
Putting it All Together!
After several iterations of adding detail and refining the overall design, finally ending in chopping up large sections of puzzle into smaller pieces, here was the final sketch, followed by that sketch turned into the final puzzle:
I hope you have as much fun with this puzzle as I had designing and testing it!
Love and blessings in Jesus Christ,
Chad
Leave a comment
Please note, comments must be approved before they are published