The Millennium Puzzle was a project that really started the love for making props for me, I count it as the first official prop that I have ever made. It's constructed out of a thick card-stock with clay details for the loop and the eye, the chain was bought. The finished Puzzle is around seven inches tall from tip to the top of the loop and seven inches wide at the widest point. The Puzzle itself was around a pound, but with the chain it may be around three or four. Sadly, all of my pictures for this project, the Millennium Ring and the Millennium Rod were all on my slider phone that up and died. I can't get to those pictures, but I will try to explain the process as well as I can. For all of my newer projects, I promise to take more in-progress pictures!
Okay, so starting off this project, I created a template out of paper to spot-check for any problems with the sides fitting together. When the angles and sides were all sorted out, the card stock was next. I cut out the pieces and made a square pyramid like the one below. This pyramid will be used as the base for the puzzle pieces and details. Now it's time to create the part of the Millennium Puzzle that you see.
The pieces of the Puzzle were created using the same technique as the base pyramid. I made a second square pyramid, making it slightly bigger so that it would fit on top of the first, base pyramid. Now that I had the triangles for each side, I cut them up until they resembled the Puzzle's pieces. I had to guess a bit on the design since I couldn't find an exact picture of each side. Now that all of the details were ready, I attached the triangles to the first pyramid in the specific way they needed to be placed. Now all that's left is the ends and the clay details!
The tips of the edges were made by using the basic pyramid template and accounting for the fact that it has to fit over the existing pyramid, like with the main details above. The pieces were cut to size and fitted onto the pyramid without too much trouble. The Sculpy clay details were made, baked and added and finally all that was left was to add the gold, the clear-coat and the chain!
I still like how well the Millennium Puzzle turned out, looking back on the project I wonder what type of material I could have used to make the gold more prominent or the edges more exact. Perhaps one day I will remake it with PVC plastic or even aluminum. Who knows?