Custom Puzzle Craft - John's Puzzle Journal

September 2, 2010

Thursday 9:44 am - Today I added a page for puzzle #840 Iterated V Pattern, updated Latest Puzzles and updated the Gallery Puzzle Log. So I'm caught up with puzzle pictures. Meanwhile I have just about completed settling in. This Sunday the members of Mixed Media will be meeting to decide the future. Kim has announced she is leaving, this combined with the passing of Bob leaves Mixed Media with just six members, only two of whom have been active in recent months.

There have been zero thunderstorms in the mountains since I last posted pictures, not even a small puff of a cloud; we may be done for the season.

August 30, 2010

Monday 12:54 pm - Still in the post-move-putting-things-away phase. I came across my price list for the puzzles I brought to the 2000 Puzzle Parley in Katona, NY. A couple corrections to my presentation in Salem, MA are in order. In my presentation I said that my first Creative style puzzle, #54 Imperial Silver Dragon was made and sold as 100PP #7 after the Parley. This puzzle had the first appearance of The Observer and my first "Egg" piece. Turns out I made the puzzle before the 2000 Parley and offered it for sale there! Also true for #55, Sophia, my first Flow Curl puzzle. Neither puzzle sold.

Here are the puzzles I brought to the 2000 Parley with description in italics:

#45 - Camille - $150
263 Pieces - Swirl Curl. "Difficult Swirl Curl"
Sold!

#52 - Fantasy Faire - $500
792 Pieces - Long Round. "My largest puzzle to date (29 figurals)"
Did not sell at the Parley, but did shortly thereafter.

#53 - Ghost of Florence - $195 - this was a remake of 100PP #1
284 pieces - Swirl Curl. "Swirl Curl"
Did not sell at the Parley, still have it!

#54 - Imperial Silver Dragon - $350
284 pieces - Creative. "Genesis of Flow Curl - Important historically for Custom Puzzle Craft"
Did not sell at the Parley, I later auctioned as #100PP #7, sold for $220.42.

#55 - Sophia - $450
414 pieces - Flow Curl. "First Flow Curl Puzzle - Limited Edition print, signed #7 of 100.
Did not sell at the Parley. I later pulled it off the market due to paper problems; I still have it!

August 29, 2010

Sunday 11:53 am - Let there be light! The move is done. Slept in my new apartment for the first time Friday night. Still, of course, I have many settling in items to do (unpack a few remaining boxes, hang pictures, buy some furniture, etc.) One nice thing is that while I have lost my due west view, I now have an excellent view to the east, with quite a bit of Earth greenery. A lot fewer sunsets now (will still have plenty mostly in the Winter as the sun moves south), and a lot more sunrises!

As there are occasional thunderstorms well to the east at this time of the year (this year's season is almost over), I'm quite happy that at last I have good prospects for getting nice photos in the future. Already working on it:

Looking nearly due east August 25, 2010

Later in the same day
Picture heavily Photoshopped

August 26, 2010 - that's the Museum of Man (built for the 1915–16 Panama-California Exposition)
Picture heavily 'shopped

Here is an overview of my new eastern views:

This morning - three photos overlooking Sixth Avenue to the east - hazy, quiet Sunday morning.
Museum of Man poking up just left of center

Here are my new southern views:

Still can see Point Loma to the right with some Pacific Ocean

Looking due south - left picture is from the new apartment with Sixth Avenue to the left, the right picture is from my old apartment with Fifth Avenue to the right:

New and old southern views - note the very subtle shift in the skyline.

Lost: My western views

Today is the first day in a very long time I can think about relaxing - the long intense work to wrap up the 100 Puzzles Project, preparing smaller puzzles to sell at the Parley, preparing, traveling, presenting the 100 Puzzles Project presentation at the Parley, Robert Archer's sudden death (memorial service was yesterday), then moving and all the things associated with getting an address changed and services moved. Too many muscle twitches and tingles, will rest!

As for puzzles..... some day the calling will come back strong. My next puzzle will be the Creative Art with Two Tricky Eggs. I had prepared the board and was ready for cutting prior to the Puzzle Parley.

Couple more pictures taken on August 23 from my old apartment of the full moon. Both pictures were Photoshopped from the same original - normally my moonshots come out with the moon being washed out white, somehow this one really came out nice.

Moonrise, August 23, 2010

For good measure, another "flag" shot, taken August 27, 2010 from my old apartment:

Almost aligned....

August 22, 2010

Sunday 10:42 am - This morning I made a "huge" update to my Wooden Jigsaw Puzzle Makers page. I added at least a dozen puzzle makers, too numerous to list here - working off an email requests list and including names I picked up at the Parley and elsewhere. I also marked a few pre-existing entries as having websites that now do not come up. In the first section, I added puzzle cutter names to the entries - this will help myself as it getting harder to keep track of who is with what company. Puzzle makers: For those of you for whom I do not have your last name or there needs to be corrections, let me know. There are now at least 65 wooden jigsaw puzzle maker websites, a vast increase from the time I started over 10 years ago.

There are a few minor updates I plan to do to this website, but they are on hold until I get my move done. I am going "dark". No more journal updates planned until my move is compete, expected by August 31, 2010.

At the puzzle parley there was a slender dark haired wheel chair bound woman. Anyone know who she was?

August 21, 2010

Saturday 11:57 pm - I've did some grammatical cleanup of the Puzzle 836 page (The Garden of Earthly Delights), also added of a picture of what the painting looks like when the panels are closed:

The Garden of Earthly Delights - Triptych with panels closed - Creation
Maybe some day if I could get this image in super hi-rez, a companion puzzle?

Saturday 8:10 pm - I'm now pretty much caught up with loose ends; I expect to start moving tomorrow.

Today I updated the Geometric Pattern Puzzles section, adding the Geometric Pattern Puzzles I've made in the past couple years, including the recently introduced mini version of Synthesized Synchronicity, even though I remain closed to new orders.

August 20, 2010

Friday 9:35 am - Still getting caught up on things prior to my move down the hall. I haven't decided how long I'm going to be closed for business - many at the Puzzle Parley expressed interest in puzzles....

On August 8th, I noticed two large ships about to pass each other in the harbor. I zoomed in to get a good shot and just as the ships were passing a plane came in for a landing and I nailed it perfectly with great focus, lined up with a flag to boot!

Cargo ship Palmella passing in front of the USS Ronald Reagan aircraft carrier CVN-76
U.S. Airways plane overhead, U.S. flag below!

August 18, 2010

Wednesday 7:55 pm - A few hours before my 100 Puzzles Project presentation, I received a phone call from the daughter of Robert ("Bob") Archer telling me that he had passed away. Death came suddenly, an apparent heart attack, as I and others had talked with him recently and he was in excellent spirits.

As many of the longer time readers of this journal will know, Bob and I built The Puzzle Tree, a puzzle sculpture which was on display on the water front at San Diego from late 2003 to early 2005. The puzzle tree was later destroyed in a fire which also burned Bob's house down to the ground. Bob was one of the friendliest persons I ever knew, wouldn't hurt a fly, he sometimes chuckled saying how that since he was black and fairly large, many people assumed he was this big dangerous guy that ought to be feared! There will be a memorial service for Bob on August 28th which I will be attending.

As for my 100 Puzzles Project presentation, it went well - although with 213 slides - I did go beyond my allotted time by almost 1/2 hour! I received many thank you / congratulations, and for this I say thank you and you are welcome! One slide showed the 39th puzzle of the project, The Puzzle Tree college puzzle I had made, I was a bit choked up presenting that one.

I sold all of the puzzles I brought to the Parley. I was late arriving to the Yankee Exchange event Friday evening as I was showing off some particulars of The Garden of Earthly Delights, my puzzle, Storm Panorama - March 22, 2007, was not accepted..... so..... I sold it the next day during the puzzle sales!

I enjoyed meeting so many from the puzzle community!

The passing of Bob is still heavy on my mind. As for Mixed Media, for the time being at least, I will likely be the one to take over the Mixed Media financials, as accounts are discovered and sorted out by his daughter.

Here are a some pictures I have found of Bob and The Puzzle Tree today in my Puzzle Tree archives.

Puzzle Tree installation - October 30, 2003

The Puzzle Tree - January 10, 2004

Puzzle Tree - taking it down - last pieces standing - January 26, 2005

Bob Archer - January 26, 2005 after all the pieces have been taken down

August 17, 2010

Tuesday 8:20 pm - Back in San Diego after an excellent Puzzle Parley. Jet lagged. Will update tomorrow.

August 11, 2010

Wednesday 9:05 pm - Still need to do some packing, otherwise I'm as ready as I'm going to be for the Parley. This evening I purchased an adaptor which I think will enable me to use my MacBook w/ the projector at the Parley instead of attempting to move the files over to a PC. I'm about as physically drained as I can ever recall. I plan to do a lot of resting of the plane ride out, glad I bought first class tickets!

Next post here will be after I return next Tuesday.

Wednesday 1:13 pm - Final pieces counts #837: 208, #838: 176, #839: 182, #840 203.

I've revised some of the prices I'll be asking for at the Puzzle Parley.

#837 - Storm Panorama - March 22, 2007 - remains free as it will be in the "Yankee Exchange Puzzle".
#838 - Mini - Synthesized Serendipity increased to $250 from of $220 - It's the first mini of this pattern, a beautiful work.
#839 - Mini - Magnificent FlowScape Pattern remains at $220
#840 - Iterated V Pattern - lowered to $200 from $260 - Extremely difficult puzzle and I'm concerned it might not sell.

Six Piece Golden Ratio Compulsory #3 (with stand, stand not shown here), will list for $400. By the rules of the 100 Puzzles Project I cannot sell a puzzle / art object for a price less than the same or similar puzzle / art object sold within the project ($381.54 in this case). Unfortunately two things have developed which are problems. Without going into details, I kicked this work early this morning, there is a tiny bit of damage (two chip-outs) on the back. The front is fine. The second problem is that I can't take it fully apart! The white and green sections are stuck at the white gear curl (middle of picture about 2/3 up). I tried and tried but gave less I introduce new damage. I still think this is a fantastic work and will be happy to keep it if it doesn't sell.

Six Piece Golden Ratio Compulsory #3
Made on May 16, 2010

As mentioned before, I've cancel the creation of Creative Art with Two Tricky Pieces for the show - ran out of time.

Everyone says not to worry about the projector situation, but I won't relax about this until I see for myself that the Mac files can be transferred to a PC, the resolution remains good, presentation controls work, the slide transitions the way I them want to, and a video can play.

Leaving for the shop shortly to complete the repair of a void in #840 and make some backing boards for the puzzles to be transported to the parley.

Hope to get some sleep on the plane, I really need the rest!

August 10, 2010

Tuesday 8:26 am - I ended up staying well past 1AM last night playing through the presentation and fixing a bunch of small things and recreating two slides that somehow disappeared during the development process.

Obviously, at this point I do not have time to make a new Tricky Eggs puzzle, so I'm officially cancelling that idea.

So..... I can almost begin to relax!

Today I need to:

• Resolve the projector issue

• Go to the shop to pickup 6 Piece Golden Ratio Compulsory #3 with stand (this will be offered for sale at the Parley) and an Octastar prototype with giant pieces that I plan to bring to the show, so I can show off the concepts that were used for the production version.

• Get the four puzzles I made in the past week and the Compulsory ready for the show.

I expect to get this done today, a far easier day than yesterday. Tomorrow I plan to relax, pack and play through the presentation a few times.

August 9, 2010

Monday 10:00 pm - After more than 13 hours of work today, the presentation is done!

Tomorrow I'll review it, go to the shop to pick up some things, inspect, clean, count the pieces of the four puzzles I recently cut for the show and prepare boxes for them, then focus on resolving the projector issues. After all this is completed, I might, if I push myself, have time to cut the Tricky Eggs puzzle - looks very unlikely now. Meanwhile, I have confirmation that the winner of The Garden of Earthly Delights has received shipment of the puzzle - the shipment will remain unopened until I arrive there. I have been in contact with the winner and also in contact with the cabinet maker for the display of the puzzle - all now appears to be in good order, the cabinet will be made and will arrive at the Puzzle Parley, Friday evening.

That's it for today.

Monday 8:02 am - Now in "emergency mode" - I have more than I thought to go in the presentation, gathering the images for my own works - I'm resuming work on it now and will continue until it is done - I expect to get the presentation done by this evening (slept well last night). I then will start work on the cleanup of the small puzzles. Tomorrow, the issue is the projector. The Eggs puzzle has lowest priority, no cutting planned for today. All email except for Parley related issues will be set aside until tomorrow.

August 8, 2010

Sunday 10:04 pm - Pushed myself hard today, but the presentation is still not done. I have images gathered for all of the slides but seven with about half the slides composed. I still need to compose all uncomposed gathered images including the seven slides worth of images that remain be gathered into dozens of additional slides - should go fairly smoothly as I don't need to create any images from scratch. I'm now well over the hump as far as this work is concerned. Then a few conclusion / summary slides. Today, I worked from early morning until about 4pm, then went to the previously scheduled "100 Puzzle Project is over" party with Mixed Media people, that went well, left early around 7:30pm and resumed work until now, and now am calling it quits for today.

I completely skipped all dance stuff this past week and weekend, not even a remote chance for that.

Tomorrow morning I'll design the Creative Art with Two Tricky Eggs puzzle (essentially the location and expression of the two tricky eggs) then go to the shop and cut the first 100 pieces. I'll quit that and return home and complete the presentation, that will take me well into the evening.

Tuesday I'll complete the Tricky Eggs puzzle. If I decide there is not enough time to do the tung oil, I'll skip that, give whoever purchases it at the Parley the option for me bring to the puzzle back home, do the oil and then ship it - no biggie. The rest of Tuesday will be spent going over the completed puzzles, counting pieces, cleaning, preparing the boxes, packaging / labelling for the show.

That will leave Wednesday completely open. One urgent new problem that needs to be addressed, today I received an email saying that the Parley projector doesn't work with my Mac. So besides packing for the trip, which will be quite routine, I need to get a projector that works with my setup - my understanding is that technology has advanced a lot in the past few years and projectors are now small and lightweight, yet have good lamps. I know of a place that has a bunch of them, so I'll go there. If I'm unsuccessful, then this situation will have to be resolved in Salem, MA on Friday (I arrive Thursday evening, the presentation is not until Saturday evening).

There are still issues about how the big Bosch puzzle will be displayed. I've given my input to the appropriate people, I'm in the dark now; if things don't come together for a secured display, then it won't be displayed as planned - I just have to let this one go.

Freedom - just a week away!

August 7, 2010

Saturday 5:36 pm - Ton of non-puzzle work stuff so far today, will get back to working on the presentation soon....

Here are pictures of the two puzzles I made yesterday (with the #840 picture replacing the one I posted yesterday).

August 6, 2010

Friday 7:54 pm - Bedraggled, back from the shop. Well not quite that bad! In a longer more difficult day of cutting, I cut #839 and #840. Yay!

I didn't get a good picture of #839 - Magnificent FlowScape Pattern, will have one later, it's the geometric pattern pictured on the Home page - scroll down. About 7 3/4" by 7 3/4" with about 180 Long Round pieces (down from the projected 200). I plan to offer this puzzle for sale for $220.

I changed the name of #840 from Mini - V Pattern Exploration to Iterated V Pattern. This is the first time I've cut this image and I decided that, although smallish, the puzzle represents a full scale rendering of the image and thus is not a "Mini"; also the name is more meaningful. I developed the image sometime in the 1980's perhaps 1986. However, the puzzle was extremely difficult to cut as the blades were virtually invisible against the mostly black image - I really had to intensely concentrate to get the puzzle done without disaster, and I succeeded. The puzzle will be "impossibly difficult" to put together - seriously - I really wonder if I should bring it to the Parley! OK, I will. The puzzle is roughly octagonal shaped and is about 10 1/2" across its widest points, with about 200 Swirl Curl pieces (up from the projected 175) including the Fractagon figural I include in full scale Geometric Pattern Puzzles. I'll have a picture of the figural later. I plan to offer this puzzle for sale for $260.

Edit: Picture of puzzle #840 deleted, replaced the next day w/ better picture.

The creation of the pattern for this image is discussed in the Expansions section of this website, a section that has been around for years but exists as if it doesn't. See Iterated V Pattern (better title than what is there now) for an obscure brief discussion about this pattern, a description which was written more than 14 years ago when those pages were on my long gone "Pixel Pathways" website.

Last night, again, I was tired and did not work on the presentation. Not even going to think of it tonight. Need dinner! This weekend will be focused on completing the presentation. Must be done if I'm going to get to the Creative Art with Two Tricky Eggs puzzle. Sunday afternoon at 4PM at Kim's house there will be a "100 Puzzles Project is Over" party. Hopefully I'll start work on my last main task before the Puzzle Parley on Monday, the Tricky Eggs puzzle.

August 5, 2010

Thursday 6:39 pm - Yesterday evening I was so bushed from going through shipping The Garden of Earthly Delights, that I took off, had a nice dinner then retired early; no work on the presentation.

Today was puzzle cutting day! In two marathon work sessions I started and completed #837 - Storm Panorama - March 22, 2007, cut in Long Round with about 206 pieces and #838 - Mini - Synthesized Serendipity cut in Long Round with about 175 pieces. Cutting went extremely well, no voids, no problems. #837, being a picture taken in San Diego, has one figural, Pellie the Pelican. #838, per my usual practice for "Mini-Geometrics" has no figurals. Both have my signature piece. #837 is really overdone as this will be the "Yankee Exchange Puzzle" - advice was to limit retail value to around $50, this one would list for about $250 if ordered via my Custom Puzzles page using the pricing that I have not changed in years! I plan to list #838 for $220.00 - should be a pretty challenging puzzle despite its small size.

Puzzle #837 - Storm Panorama - March 22, 2007,
About 15" x 5" with about 206 pieces including "Pellie the Pelican"

Puzzle #838 - Mini - Synthesized Serendipity
About 10" x 8" with about 175 pieces

Based on my phenomenal success with the climax of the 100 Puzzles Project, I suspect there could be good demand for the few puzzles I'm going to sell at the Puzzle Parley - I'm not really sure how to handle it. I've already had email requests to reserve puzzles, not going to do it. Best I can do is to say "one puzzle per customer"! By far the most elaborate puzzle I'll be selling there is will be Creative Art with Two Tricky Eggs. For this puzzle if there is more than one person interested, I may hold an auction in a format to be determined, suggestions welcome.

While I made a good dent today in my remaining tasks, I'm still feeling the weight of the pressure to accomplish things based on my self imposed goals. I'm now down to six working days before I leave. This evening I might do some work on the presentation, I'll see how I feel after dinner - I'm OK now! Tomorrow, "definitely", I plan to go back to the shop and make puzzles #839 and #840, the work effort will be similar to today, maybe a little bit more as one is Swirl Curl and that style is a bit slower to cut. With the two small puzzles today, I was cranking out Long Round at about 60 pieces per hour! Then over the weekend I "must" complete the presentation - I'll have all day Saturday and Sunday to do it, very doable. At that point everything will be done except for clean-up and counting the pieces of the puzzles I've made (I'd love to do that on the flight out, but, sigh, no way I can bring an X-ACTO knife on the plane), and of course I still have to cut Creative Art with Two Tricky Eggs. Give my traditional pace of Creative Style cutting of 100 pieces per day (as in the Bosch puzzle), I should get that done by Tuesday afternoon. I'm pretty sure I'm going to put a couple coats of tung oil on it - puzzle should be ready to go late Wednesday. I leave very early Thursday, so all puzzles and what-not must be packed and ready to go by Wednesday evening.

August 4, 2010

Wednesday 5:06 pm - More progress today. This morning I mounted the four boards (#837, 838, 839 and 840). This afternoon I went to the shop, cut and fine sanded five large boards to secure #836, The Garden of Earthly Delights, then packaged and shipped it, completing the shipment just a few minutes ago.

No work on the Puzzle Parley presentation. Will do a little this evening. I've decided to go back to my idea of mixing cutting and working on the presentation. I'll cut during the day and work on the presentation in the evenings. I expect to get at least one puzzle cut tomorrow. I'll post pictures as they are cut.

August 3, 2010

Tuesday 8:58 pm - Another really long day of work on the Puzzle Parley presentation. I'm finally into the "meat" of the presentation, discussing the 100 puzzles themselves (styles / discoveries), currently focusing on the Seewald puzzles, being one of five artist categories I've established. I'm way behind where I want to be. Figure, might as well keep pushing, I see that glorious life changing break coming up in less than two weeks!

This morning I printed four prints for the five puzzles I want to make (one will be plain wood).

Tomorrow I'm going to ship the massive The Garden of Earthly Delights puzzle. Obviously a $25K anything has to be very, very well packaged. I first have to go to the shop to make some backing boards, then go through all the steps to get it shipped. Then I'll mount the four prints. What time I have left tomorrow will be focused on the presentation again. I think I can get the presentation done by late Thursday. Then Friday and Saturday will be spent cutting 837, 838, 839 and 840 - pretty tall order, but then I've cancelled everything else. Sunday, I'm bankrolling a "100 Puzzles Project is Over" party for all Mixed Media members at Kim's new house. Then three days to get #841 done - I think it's doable.

August 2, 2010

Monday 6:38 pm - First really long day of work cranking out slides for the Puzzle Parley presentation of the 100 Puzzles Project. Finished Slide #44 and I'm now just up to the start of the project! Yes, I'll probably cut some stuff out, maybe not - I've put together what I think is quite interesting documentation of the genesis of my cutting styles. I've been doing a lot of research into the early days of Custom Puzzle Craft and have unearthed a ton of interesting details that I had forgotten about, plus resolved some time sequencing issues.

Did no work on the five puzzles.

That's it for today. Tomorrow I'll resume work on the slides and I plan to print out all of the images for the five puzzles and mount them. I noticed I didn't finish updating the Puzzle Queue yesterday, did that now.

August 1, 2010

Sunday 7:29 pm - I have received many more congratulatory emails regarding the fantastic finish to the 100 Puzzles Project. I've responded to all of them and publicly thank you all again here!

I made a little more progress on the presentation. It's clear to me that I'm going to plod on all week to complete it, so I have decided that it will be best if I work on the Parley puzzles part of the day and then the presentation another part of the day rather than focusing all on one or the other. So..... I went to the shop and prepared the five boards for the Parley Puzzles. Even though I had a good night's sleep I became so tired when sitting at my work desk that I nodded off to sleep for a while! I'll be sure to get plenty of sleep tonight.

I've changed the title of the "Yankee Exchange Puzzle" from Skyscape - July 26, 2010 to Storm Panorama - July 22, 2007 - the puzzle will have a much nicer image and it will be about 15" wide by about 5" high and have around 200 Long Round pieces, down from the previously projected 300. Prior to cutting the boards, I also finalized the sizes for the three Mini Geometrics and the Creative Art with Two Tricky Eggs puzzle. Originally I was thinking the Eggs puzzle would be square at about 14"x14", I've change my mind, it will be more like 19" x 11", about the same area.

I'll be shipping The Garden of Earthly Delights tomorrow or Tuesday, probably Tuesday. The winner will then drive the puzzle over to the Puzzle Parley.

July 31, 2010

Saturday 8:41 pm - At last! 100 Puzzles Project project has ended, and in the most spectacular fashion, with a record price for the record puzzle. A high water mark that should stand for a more than a few days in puzzledom! Thank you all who bid on this one and in prior auctions. There will be celebrations here this weekend and at the Puzzle Parley!

I will slowly get around to adjusting this website to indicate the project is done; tonight the dance floor beckons. And thank you for your many congratulatory emails..... I'll respond to all "soon".

Saturday 9:32 am - Final day for the auction! The Auction ends at 7:36:35 PM Pacific time (10:36:35 PM Eastern). Of course I'll be watching to see how it ends, I do expect more bids..... ! Meanwhile I'll be spending a lot of time today working on the presentation.

July 30, 2010

Friday 7:53 pm - I worked a lot today on the presentation, I now have about 20 slides done. Completed all of the slides leading up to the formation of Custom Puzzle Craft. My goal was to complete the presentation by July 31 (tomorrow). Looks like I'll be working on it through the weekend. I expect to complete it by Monday at the latest.

The Auction has just ticked into the final 24 hours. No new bids for more than three days now, this is the normal pattern. By my standard Custom Puzzle pricing plus image acquisition costs, the puzzle would priced at $7779.31, the current bid is well below that. Given the massive amount of additional work associated with image development and double cutting both mock up and production, the raw cost should be well north of $10K. I do expect more bids to come in, particularly given that the number of eBay views and eBay "watchers" are way beyond the levels I've seen for any previous auction in the 100PP.

July 29, 2010

Thursday 6:52 pm - Yesterday I still needed more rest, due to the aftermath of working months nearly non-stop to complete the 100 Puzzles Project. Did no work on the Parley presentation. Today I've put in quite a few hours on the presentation, I'm now focused on getting it done. Today was spent on the "numbers" side, making a bunch of graphs looking at the various artists and cutting styles related to price over time. Not going to "scoop" the presentation here. However, sometime after the presentation, I'll update the 100 Puzzles Project page, sending it into "past tense" and added various items to it, include a graphic for fast linking to individual 100PP puzzles.

Yesterday I was at Mixed Media for about an hour, cleaned up my shop. Also destroyed and trashed the mock up work for the 100PP #100 The Garden of Earthly Delights as well as some remnants from the Logosphere project.

The Auction continues the script of previous auctions, no bidding during the middle portion. Several people have said to me that I should have put in a much higher reserve price. My policy from day one was to set the starting price at $1.00 with no reserve, this policy was followed for every one of the 100 puzzles!

July 27, 2010

Tuesday 11:06 pm - I made just a little more progress on the presentation - on the logistics side - I downed loaded an iPhone App which will allow me to control the playing of the Keynote presentation on my MacBook Pro laptop via my iPhone - I tested it out and it worked fine. I expect the writing of the presentation to speed up tomorrow, I only have two slides done!

I have decided on the images for the Puzzle Parley puzzles. The "Yankee Exchange Puzzle" will be a highly processed photo of a skyscape I took yesterday. There will be three "mini" Geometric Pattern Puzzles - the first one will be the first time Synthesized Serendipity will be offered as a mini. The second mini - Magnificent FlowScape Pattern - will be a repeat of a mini offered at the last Parley. The third mini will be a first time offering of an offbeat exploration of the V Pattern; this will be a black and white puzzle. Pictures of all them will be posted here in due time. Creative Art with Two Tricky Eggs will be a square puzzle, about 14" by 14" with close to 200 Creative style pieces and, of course, will include two "Tricky Eggs". The mini's will be priced to sell easily, the Tricky Eggs puzzle will be priced substantially higher. One puzzle per customer, excluding the "Yankee Exchange Puzzle" which will be a free puzzle donated to the Exchange thing.

Tuesday 3:33 pm - Time just keeps rushing by! The Auction is already in its third day with a little more than four days to go. So far the bidding is going well, everything is nice and above board.

It's taking me a lot of mental effort to get going in the presentation write-up for the Parley. I've made some progress and I expect things to move along faster as the week progresses. I'm going through documents of my early childhood to put together an intro section. I'm realizing just how many things I've done and things that I haven't revisited for such a long time, in particular my pattern generator work which consumed years and years; but also my early artist expressions (which were effectively squashed by a rigid grade school) and to some extent my weather and photography interests and more. Some of these interests, and for example my stock market interest, came out as subject matter in my puzzles!

The huge effort I made since early last year to create mega puzzles such as The World (huge clc'd map of the world for a U.K. customer), the big write-up and photos for 100PP #87 6 Piece Golden Ratio Compulsory #2 with stand, all of the Milton Bradley Big Ben puzzle research that went into 100PP #88 Color Thin Cloud Sunset, the large 100PP #89 Space Shuttle Triptych, the major puzzle 100PP #90 Carina Nebula; the beautiful Swirl Curl cutting that went into 100PP #92 Beyond the Rainbow, the spectacular Creative cutting in the huge Creative style puzzle 100PP #93 First Harvest in the Wilderness, then another spectacular Creative style puzzle, 100PP #95 Creative Art with Five Tricky Eggs, then all of the failed starts finally leading to 100PP #97 the inventive Octastar puzzle, then the record setting price for 100PP #98 Carnival of Harlequin, which also saw a major disaster during its making requiring a total restart after almost a week of work, then the huge research and cutting efforts to make the multi-board 100PP #99 Logosphere, with the 100PP finally culminating with the epic #100 The Garden of Earthly Delights a two month effort - all of these consuming almost a year and a half for "just" 14 puzzles and 2 Compulsories - do I ever need a break!!! Yet I need to go on to completely wrap this up - get the presentation done and the several much, much less ambitious puzzles (with the exception of Creative Art with Two Tricky Eggs) for the Parley! Then serious freedom from my puzzle making trek. Yes, a huge puzzle making break is coming, as I have said, to last at least through the remainder of the year!

I didn't mention it in the auction, the Bosch puzzle is a limited edition of one.