@EVERYONE EXCEPT udusok.In case you when reading the two previous posts, feel like suddenly finding yourself in the middle of a conversation, slightly confused about the topic, its context and wonder where to find the start, I'll try to fill you in.
This started as a PM conversation between udosuk and myself, but to save precious PM space, we decided to continue here.
Since udosuk actually is an ultra secret XI9 agent, currently on an extremely important deep undercover mission in Oz, open unencrypted emails is unfortunately not an option to PMs. Udosuk is currently only allowed to use encrypted email communication, and for work purposes only, and I as a common ordinary person am of course not allowed a copy of the email client required for reading encrypted XI9 emails. The real reason for his sparse Assassin puzzles and the many versions every time he actually makes one, is for communicating a new encryption key, which is embedded/hidden in various places in the puzzles, images and their solution(s).
udosuk, please start reading here:I originally thought that udosuk produced his images using JSudoku and sent him a PM asking how he configured JSudoku to get the cage sums inside the cage frames. The answer was that he did not use JSudoku, but Excel. And as the clever agent he is, he did not reveal all his secrets, but gave me some unconcealed information, and some hints:
udosuk wrote:
I'll share a little of my tricks here: what you need is to create very tiny square cells (for me, 1 unit in width and 9 units in height). Then I'd group them like, 8x8 tiny squares for each grid cell of the puzzle. Normally the middle 6x6 squares of each cell can be merged and included in the "caged areas", but I usually twitch them a little to facilitate an area for the cage sums.
Also, there are minor tricks involved for shading some regions, drawing the diagonal cages, and perhaps the diagonals in X puzzles. One important trick is to do it in layers and then superimpose them using MS Paint etc. I normally have 3 layers: the background (picture/shading), the grid lines, and the cages.
Based on this information I think I have figured out how he does it all, and have made my own Excel versions of all his puzzles.
Two questions udosuk:1)
You said you use tiny cells, 1 unit in width and 9 units in height. Is this correct?
I have to use 0,5 units in width and 4,5 units in height, i.e. half of yours.
2)
Did you colour the tubes connecting the diagonal cages making up the wheel in the Assassin 123 Roulette puzzles in Excel or later (in Paint)?
udosuk wrote:
Geez you've completely outdone me here. For both pics. I'm gonna shamelessly nick your pics onto my thread. Don't sue me for copyright violation!
No need to worry!
You were so kind and shared some of your tricks on how you make the cages!
udosuk wrote:
FYI, for the "manta ray" photo I used a 75% brightness + 25% contrast. Can't remember what stretching ratio I used. Didn't do any sharpening, just a shabby job using good 'ol MS Paint. And that explains the terrible overlapping effect on the cage sums.
AFAIK, MS Paint can't change the brightness and contrast of an image. I used paint.net. Perhaps you used MS Word's image formatting, as you mentioned in one of your PMs?
I think the "terrible overlapping effect on the cage sums" is due to how MS Paint's "Not Draw Opaque" option works. I believe it just ANDs the colour information (24 bits pr. pixel) in the two images being combined. So if you end up with a lot of 1's giving nearly white = RGB(255, 255, 255), you'll get the "terrible overlapping effect on the cage sums". The origin of the problem is the Arial 8 Bold font you use for the cage sums, which is not entirely composed of black pixels, but 16 shades of gray I think, some of them almost white.
I did the following:
- Took a screen shot of the Excel worksheet with the Assassin 175 "Devil Ray" cages and imported it into MS Paint.
- Positioned the Assassin 175 "Devil Ray" in the upper left corner and cropped it to W435xH471.
- Edited the digits in the cage sums to be composed of black pixels only. Did each of the digits 0-9 once and used copy and paste to do the others.
- Edited the tube connecting the cells in the 28 cage in the lower left corner so it is composed of black pixels only.
- In the MS Paint window with the massaged "manta ray" photo, unchecked "Image > Draw Opaque" and pasted in the image with the "Devil Ray" cages and their edited cage sums.
I did the same with the "Sting Ray", but copied and overpasted its digits with identical ones from the already edited "Devil Ray".
In case of interest you can find the edited "Devil Ray" image below.
Here the URL of the udosuk subfolder on my SkyDrive, which has all the images:
http://cid-c136798e52d0119c.skydrive.li ... ver/udosukudosuk wrote:
I actually thought about using the one you used on my version of "Sting Ray" (yep I also got it from google image), but too tired to do more photo remaking, so just used a small clip-art pic instead.
Absolutely sure you thought of the same image I used?
I used
THIS ONE and then massaged it as follows: 21% Zoom in Firefox, +95° Rotation, +30% Brightness, -60% Contrast, +25% Lightness In paint.net.
I only had time for one attempt and did the rotation by eye. In hindsight, perhaps +96° would have been better
udosuk wrote:
I here pronounce you the "designated inhouse artist" of this forum. Other members who wish to have a nicely decorated pic of their puzzles can go to
Børge from now on.
Thanks for your confidence, but I politely decline.
Unless you have any objections, I can however make my Excel file/workbook with my Excel versions of all your puzzles and a template for fast and easy cage layout for Killer/Assassin puzzles public. I however want to see if I can make some improvements before making it public.
FYI: I have deleted the one in the udosuk subfolder, in case you have not downloaded it yet.
After some practice, it now takes me about 10 minutes to make the cage patterns and cage sums for a puzzle, including background colouring (as in the Assassin 123 Roulette puzzles).
BTW: I do all the background colouring including the tubes connecting diagonal cages in Excel.
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1x9 is what I used for other logic puzzles, so as the larger 2x14.5, 3x20, 4x25, 5x30 & 6x35.5. As for the killer grids what I used was actually "0.5x5". As you can see, so many different dimensions you can't blame me for being confused.
). But I guess you're already doing quite fine by yourself, as any high IQ individual would be able to grasp from my vastly vague tips. 
