The final Post – one for the future!

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

I know these as Hanjie, but I’ve also heard them called Paint by Numbers and Paint by Sudoku. They’re a Japanese logic puzzle, in which you use number clues to shade in squares on a grid, until you end up with a picture in the end.

I am absolutely addicted to them, so in the spirit of sharing, I’ve created some new ones with a Professionals theme. If you haven’t tried these before, read on for a tutorial…





Right. Here you have a blank grid. Notice the numbers on the side and the top? Each represents a solid row of shaded squares. The rows cannot touch each other.

Two of the rows have no numbers at all. That tells you that none of the squares are shaded, so put a dot or a line in each one. This way you’ll remember not to shade them in.



Some of the rows have numbers that equal the length of the row. You can shade those in right away.



And finally, the rest can be filled in using simple logic. For instance, if the top row across is 3, 2, 3, then you know there’s only one way those three sets of shaded squares can fit together and still not touch. The second row from the top is a little trickier, but since you already know the first number is 2, then you know the third square can’t be shaded. The final three squares in the second row can be filled in two ways, so you’d leave them blank for the moment, until you’ve solved the rest.



Now if you’re ready to try some Hanjie on your own, or if you are already familiar with how the game is played, I have a variety of puzzles in PDF form for you to print out.



Bang! (easy)

In Moderation (easy)

Hardly a Creampuff (hard)

LOL! (hard)

If you’re having difficulty solving them, or if you’d just rather see what the finished puzzles look like without all the bother, you can find the answers here: http://rebelcat4.tripod.com/id161.html

While if you’d prefer to do them online, you can search for the puzzle titles on the website I used to create them here: http://webpbn.com

Merry Christmas, All!

ETA: The numbers are always read in order from left to right. So a row with 2, 1, 3, will always have two shaded squares, followed by one shaded square, followed by three shaded squares. And an unknown number of white squares between them, depending on the length of the row.
Thanks to msmoat for pointing this out! :-)

Comments

[bistokidsfan77.livejournal.com]

I have to say, I'ven't a bloody clue how to do these, but I'm sure you worked hard on them! Tomorrow, when I've had some sleep, I'll tackle them :D

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

I should warn you, though, they can be dangerously addictive! I keep buying little books full of them... ;-)

[andreathelion.livejournal.com]

It's too early in the morning. I tried the easy one, but failed .... But I'll find out, I know I will,lol. Clever idea :)

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

Well, the nice thing is that you can print as many copies as you like! ;-) Here's a hint... try getting one line down a side, and then working off of that.

Also, suppose theoretically you had five blank squares to fill with just three shaded ones. No matter where you move those three shaded squares (imaging them sliding from one side of the puzzle to the other) the middle square will end up shaded in. So that's one you know for sure!

Does that help any? It's a very addicting puzzle once you get the hang of it.

[madmogs.livejournal.com]

Fantastic! I love these things! Logic puzzles and with a Pros slant too,

I now have the horrible decision about whether I get dressed and start cleaning my flat or whether I attempt the next one. :-P

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

So do you mean you've played them before?

I hope you enjoy them! I checked and double checked - the hard ones really only do have one solution and they're solvable through logic. But they might take you awhile.

[madmogs.livejournal.com]

Not often, but since I spend way too much of my free time on sudoku and other related puzzles I could pick up the thought processes comparatively easily.

And I'm definitely enjoying them.

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

Oh, do you play Kakuro, too? I started with Sudoku, but have been exploring other kinds of puzzles lately.

[madmogs.livejournal.com]

I enjoy kakuro but tend to make way too many careless mistakes. My weakness tend to be Hashiwokakero, Hitori and Slitherlink, but I seemt o stick chiefly to sudoku from sheer force of habit.

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

I've played Slitherlink, but not the other two. I'll have to check them out!

[elizabethoshea.livejournal.com]

My poor little brain's not up to this kind of thing *g*, but it's a great idea. It's wonderful how creative people are being with their calendar offerings. And how generous - another three things in one day! Thank you again *g*.

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

You're welcome! I originally set out to just do the Hanjie today, but then I started making icons, and then that grammar bunny ambushed me a few days ago... Yeah, I got a little carried away!

[msmoat.livejournal.com]

Ha! I did the easy one, at least. *g* I had never heard of these; they are fun! Cool. I like the incentive of a Pros-related picture at the end.

One question, though, do the boxes always get filled in in the order that the numbers are presented? That is, if the row says: 2, 3, 1, then it will be 2 shaded squares followed by 3 followed by 1? Or might the order be mixed up?

Thank you for the game! I'll save the others until after I've finished my story that is due--yikes--in two days. Hmm. But these are fun.... Maybe one more wouldn't hurt....

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

Oh, excellent question! I hadn't thought of that one. I'll have to make a note above.

Anyway, yeah, the boxes are always filled in the same order. So a 10 square row of 3, 1, 4, would have three shaded squares, a space, one shaded square, another space and finally four shaded squares.

Where it gets a bit trickier is if you have, say, a 15 square row. So then you might have three shaded squares, two spaces, one shaded square, three spaces, four shaded squares, and finally two more spaces. In order to figure out where the rows of shaded squares are you'd have to use deductive logic, based on the other rows.

I'm glad to hear you're having fun! I love puzzles like these!

[izzie7.livejournal.com]

These are new to me - much more fun than sudoku, as you actually get to something at the end rather than just more numbers!

I've done the easy one, but the Christmas tree beckons so I'd better not look at the next one just yet. I can see how these could become addictive!

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

They're cool, aren't they? There's a variation called "Mosaic" in one of my books that I'm looking forward to trying. It seems more mathematical...

If you really get hooked, there's an endless number of them on the website I linked. Plus, you can make your own!

[diegina.livejournal.com]

I did the last one instead of studying for a tomorrow final exam. It was easy, only time consuming. It took me almost 3 hours. Slowly but surely. I like these logical puzzles, I even made one myself and it was printed in a magazine. It is known here as "coded pictures". It also gets funnier, when you add colours and diagonal half-squares into it.

Thank you, now I go to the third one pic.

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

I love the multi-coloured ones, but I've never tried one with diagonal half-squares! Do you know where I'd find those in Canada? Is there a particular magazine that publishes them? And how do you go about getting them in magazines anyway?

I'm very happy you enjoyed it, but I hope it doesn't harm your performance on your exam!

[diegina.livejournal.com]

Uhm, I know nothing about Canada, because I'm from the Czech Republic. But some 6 years ago, in Slovakia, they used to publish a whole magazin devoted to this type of puzzle. I bought several of them. I don't know how it is today, if they stil sell it, but here I scanned you several pages from this magazine:
1-tutorial (http://img222.imageshack.us/img222/9780/skenovat0001tutorialbo4.jpg)
2 (http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/5233/skenovat0002rt7.jpg) 3 (http://img100.imageshack.us/img100/6645/skenovat0003yc7.jpg) 4 (http://img184.imageshack.us/img184/783/skenovat0004eo4.jpg) 5 (http://img142.imageshack.us/img142/8043/skenovat0005nl0.jpg) 6 (http://img134.imageshack.us/img134/5793/skenovat0006gl7.jpg) 7 (http://img134.imageshack.us/img134/3264/skenovat0007hn0.jpg) 8 (http://img174.imageshack.us/img174/3733/skenovat0008hu2.jpg) 9 (http://img174.imageshack.us/img174/5725/skenovat0009cn1.jpg) 10-normal (http://img297.imageshack.us/img297/8791/skenovat0010normalng0.jpg), but big and nice:-)

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

Wow! Thank you!

You know, I'm going to have to print some of these and try them. I think I'm jealous - I've gone over the magazine stands locally and never seen anything other than sudoku booklets, and sometimes the occasional mixed puzzle book. But nothing like this.

[diegina.livejournal.com]

All of them are - I hope - big enough to be printed in a good quality on A4. All of them have a solution, otherwise they wouldn't be printed. I like these puzzles more than sudoku. Sudoku is fine, higher levels are really challenging, but you always know what you get in the end. With these pictures you never know what's waiting for you. The pic can be nice, but it also can be awful. You don't know until you solve it.
When I played with your two coded pics, I enjoyed it enormously. Somehow I didn't expect the first result (looking back, it was quite naive:-),so it was a very pleasant surprise when I saw the first face smiling at me. Decoding the other one was done with a very pleasant expectation *how* would he look like. I wish I could decode more pictures with this great theme:-) And the bigger the better:-) I like a challenge:-)

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

Yay! Thank you so much for letting me know your reactions to the pics! I worked very hard on those, with what I felt was mixed success. I was trying to keep them to a reasonable size, which limited the amount of detail I could put in. But hey, if you ever want a really large complex one, I'd be happy to oblige!

[diegina.livejournal.com]

As long as it can have only one solution and B/D theme I'm willing even to glue four A-4 sheets together:D But that would be an enormous work, so you don't need to do it.
I've just loginned to that page where you created that and now I'm trying to get orientated. Try to decode a pic or two. So, thank you also fot the link:-)

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

Hum... I'll see what I can come up with. It'll be great to share these with someone else!

Hey, what's your screen name going to be on the webpbn site? Is it diegina? Are you going to make your own puzzles, too? I really like the fact that they rate the quality of the puzzles as well as the difficulty.

[diegina.livejournal.com]

Yes, I'm there as Diegina. I still don't know if I'm going to do any pic, I've already tried it several years ago, but even then I knew I lacked a real inspiration. But who knows, maybe one day I would try it again.

[diegina.livejournal.com]

OK, some news: I've begun work on one really large colored pic(84x99). The Pros theme, of course. The question is whether it will be solvable.

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

Well, if you save without clicking the little box that asks if you're ready to share it with others, then you'll be offered a chance to try to solve it.

I think I had to try solving LOL about a dozen times before I got it right.

Also, don't play all the way through to the end, if you find an area with multiple solutions. If you do, you'll get a glitch that labels your puzzle as having multiple solutions, even if it ultimately doesn't. (Not that it's a big deal, or anything - just annoying.)

I'm looking forward to trying it!

[diegina.livejournal.com]

Uhm, please, ignore all those terrible mistakes I did in the previous paragraph. I hope you understand what I meant to say.

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

Oh... honestly I didn't notice. What did you do? Drop an 'e' off 'magazine'? My brain automatically gave it a french pronunciation, lol!

Very much appreciate the scans!

[crimson-37.livejournal.com]

Oh my goodness, very clever indeed. Thank you.

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

You're welcome! :-)

[metabolick.livejournal.com]

Ingenious! I've done Sudoku but have never seen this kind. I'm going to show it to my daughter who is a math/computer major and loves logic puzzles. I did the first one and will try some more tomorrow after a good night's sleep. Thanks!

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

You're welcome! I'm glad you're enjoying it!

[myrebelcat.livejournal.com]

Great! It's a fun game - I'm happy you tried it!