Product Line	Description
Wood Dances	"Major works"
Compulsories	Small jigsaw puzzles with a set of "compulsory" requirements (just as the Compulsory Ice Dancing sport has prescribed elements). One class has been defined, a 9" x 3" Compulsory performance with five cutting tracks. Think of these as a form of Jigsaw Puzzle Haiku!
Shape Puzzlettes	Small wooden shapes, no picture, cut into a few pieces. Shape Puzzlettes are customizable, in both shape and cutting style.

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Wood Dances

Moved to another location on the Internet, details some day.

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Compulsories

Compulsories #14 and 15

The idea for Compulsories came to me in the fall on 2003, after testing some puzzle blades. I was cutting particularly intricate patterns as I was interested in seeing how the different blades I had on hand performed when pushed to the limit. A visitor to my shop in late 2003 noticed a couple of my test pieces and wanted to buy one. As I had grown attached to them, and because they contained some imperfections, I offered to make a new one, and thus a new product line was born!

Before I made the first "performance", I thought about what I was going to do and was reminded of the Compulsory Ice Dancing sport in the Winter Olympics. In this sport, the dancer is free to dance to the music as s/he pleases, however, during the dance routine, eight specific movements must be performed, thus the name "Compulsory". I then decided that I would define a Compulsory form of puzzle art!

So far I have defined one Compulsory, formally named the 9" x 3" Compulsory. The following rules are compulsory!

Arena

- Rectangular board, wood, 9" x 3"

Saw

- Five cuts. A cut is completed when a section of wood is divided into two pieces. 5 cuts means 6 pieces.
- The distance of each cut may be as long or as short as desired.
- The cuts may be located anywhere on the board
- A cut may loop back to itself, ending the cut
- Dead-end cuts are not permitted (no backtracking of the blade)
- No patterns may be used to guide the cutting in the form of overlays or drawing on the wood
- Once a cut begins, the saw has to remain in motion, unless a blade breaks
- If a blade breaks, the replacement blade must be threaded to the same location as the break, a closing cut from another direction is not permitted
- It is OK to pause the movement of the work during a cut, but the saw continues to run
- There is no limit to the elapsed time between cuts, but the cutter should (not compulsory) remain positioned in front of the saw for the duration of the performance.

Movements

Compulsories are not as tightly bound as the Olympic Compulsory Ice Dances! The cutting is freeform with some strongly suggested movements.

- At least one very tight gear curl
- An interlude with parallel lines
- At least one very fancy curl
- Some basic Swirl Curl movements (sway curl, mushroom reversal, bow-tie, etc.)
- Strong emphasis on flow-cutting; may be thought of as "puzzle cutting feng shui"
- Odd-numbered bubble runs (usually 3 or 5 bubbles).

It is up to me to decide which movements I will include in any one performance. At least some of the strongly suggested movements must appear. So far, most movements have appeared in each performance, along with a bunch of less frequent ones and some totally ad-hoc new movements.

Compulsories 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 (top to bottom) - All coated with Tung Oil

In August 2004, I made my first "painted" Compulsory. This one was made from an earlier work I had abandoned, but kept in my shop. When working on a Pelican sculpture, I decided to resurrect the work and apply some of the sculpture colors to the Compulsory. The result was fantastic and the work became Compulsory #12. It was sold on September 11, 2004 at Concord, MA at a gathering of puzzle cutters.

Compulsory #12 - with one of the best Whirly Gears (black, center) ever!
Life Pulse prelude

Compulsory #16
Made on February 17, 2008

Compulsory 16 - Study

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