Warped-Grid Jig-Saw Puzzles

George W. Hart

I've been experimenting with laser-cut jig-saw puzzles. Above is a 100-piece example, about 12 inches square.
One unusual feature of this design is that it is easiest to solve starting at the center, rather than the edges.
The snowflake image is hand-colored with wood stain, based on a photograph by Kenneth Libbrecht.
The warping of the underlying square grid is inspired by op-art paintings by Victor Vasarely.

Here is another 100-piece example, with a different warping of the underlying grid.

This is hand-colored with an image based on one of Ernst Haeckel's
drawings of siphonophorae from his book "Artforms in Nature".

For information on the method and more examples, see this video
and this short draft paper for the G4G-14 Conference.

(But there are interesting aspects of the generation algorithm
to eliminate 2x2 blocks that I should write up someday...)

My G4G-14 exchange items are small (8 cm, 25-piece) laser-cut wood puzzles with the bubble transformation.
(I sanded the smoke marks off the one shown at left above; I didn't sand the G4G ones.)

After receiving some nice feedback about the small puzzles I made for G4G-14,
I decided to make some new versions as my exchange gifts for for G4G-15.
These are larger, with more complex pieces, and sanded for a nicer presentation.
There are ten different warpings, of which six are shown above.