How the artwork is made

Made of many things.

All Flipsi artwork is created digitally in-house with Photoshop and Procreate. We use licensed photographs, our own photographs, digitally drawn elements and some AI-generated pieces. Here is a glimpse of how Enchanted Falls came together.

Start at the beginning What is it made of?
Save one of the artwork: a robed stone figure cut out on a black canvas, already reshaped, with a first pass at a head and an outstretched hand. The finished Enchanted Falls artwork: a giant stone geisha built into a waterfall city.

Enchanted Falls · one statue, thirty-three saves, more than a hundred elements.

What goes in

Seven things, roughly.

There is no single method. Each artwork uses whatever it needs, in whatever proportion it needs it.

Concept references
Images Demi gathers to help us work out the mood, scale, architecture and direction. They guide the artwork, but don't appear in the finished piece.
Stock photography
Licensed photographs. Roofs, rock faces, water, plants, buildings, textures.
Our own photographs
Things we photograph ourselves when we can't find what we need elsewhere.
AI-generated elements
Specific source elements generated when we can't find what the artwork needs in a usable form, then altered and integrated.
Drawn by hand
Elements digitally drawn, painted or substantially reworked in Procreate.
Photoshop
Where the artwork comes together. Elements are cut out, reshaped, layered, lit, coloured and matched.
Colourisation
Demi's word that means more colour, but also: making every part of the artwork satisfying to build.
Demi says"Let's build a fantasy city with a giant stone geisha in it."
MeanwhileMelissa has to work out how you actually make a woman out of rock.
Stage one

First, work out the world.

We start with the concept. Demi gathers references: photographs, film frames, paintings, architecture, anything that helps us work out the mood, scale and visual direction. None of those images go into the finished artwork.

Then we work out the story and the hook. Once we know what the idea is really about, Melissa can start building.

Demi: So… I have a new product idea.
Melissa: What is it?
Demi tells her what it is.
Melissa: What's the hook?
Demi: It's a cool idea.
Melissa: That's not a hook.

Curiosity, rewarded
  • What is the visual story?
  • What is the hook?
  • How does the front stand on its own and still set up the surprise side?
  • How should someone feel when they flip it over?

We never lock the front until we know what the surprise side will be.

Then I show it to Demi

The Falls, over five months.

A Flipsi artwork usually takes between three and eight weeks. Enchanted Falls took longer than any of them.

An early working file: a rock figure in the shape of a woman, closely cropped, with a red arcaded bridge running across her waist and waterfalls behind her.
Version oneBefore November 2022

Once I had the shape of the geisha, my challenge was somehow building an entire city? forest? waterfall village? around her.

DemiI'm not sure about the thing that looks like a train.
MelissaIt's a bridge.
DemiIt looks like a train.

Then.

DemiYou need to zoom out. It's too close.
A working file zoomed out to the full composition: the rock figure at the centre, cliffs and staircases on the left, a stone bridge and water on the right.
Version twoBefore November 2022

Weeks pass and I finally think I have a good base.

DemiDo we need three sets of steps?
MelissaWe don't NEED all three.
DemiIt's just... two of them look like they're coming out of a roof?

He is still looking.

DemiAlso, do you think her dress looks weird?
A working file with the dress now reading as folded fabric, and doors and windows set into the cliff face on the left.
Version threeNovember 2022

Days pass.

DemiI like it.

Relief.

Then.

DemiI'm just not sure what's going on with all the houses in the rock?
A working file with the houses removed from the cliff face, leaving bare rock and greenery on the left.
Version fourDecember 2022

At this point, I really am not sure anymore.

DemiSo we're not doing the houses in the rock anymore?
A working file close to the finished composition: buildings worked back into the cliff, blossom, and small figures gathered on the walkway at the bottom.
Version fiveMarch 2023

I decide not to show him again until I actually like it. Genuinely. So a few weeks pass.

At first there is nothing. He just looks at it for ages.

DemiI love it.

One second of that.

DemiIt just needs colourisation.
A frame from the build of the stone geisha's head. Frame 01 of 32
01 Drag to build her
Stage two

Building the stone geisha.

The brief was a giant stone geisha. There is no photograph of one, so I had to construct her.

I began with an illustration of a geisha as the base, then sourced photographs of stone, rock and plants as raw material. In Photoshop, I warped and layered those textures over the image to build the shape of her face, neck and hair, using the natural lines in the stone for her eyes, nose and mouth.

More rock, planting, trees and blossom were added until the hairstyle worked as both ornament and landscape.

The reference. An illustration with the pose and tilt of the head I wanted.

Demi says"People have to live there. Make it feel lived in."
MeanwhileMelissa has to decide where you put the front door of a house that is also a hip.
The finished artwork

Press a gold point to see what it's made of.

Enchanted Falls: a giant stone geisha standing in a waterfall city of Japanese rooftops, bridges and pools.

Eight marked points. Press one.

Start anywhere

What is this made of?

Press any gold point to see the source material behind that part of the artwork.

Stage three

Thirty-three saves.

A frame from the build of Enchanted Falls.

Frame 01 / 33

Keep scrolling to build it

Loading the build · 1 of 33

Save one: the statue cut out on black, already reshaped, with a first pass at a head and a hand. Build frame 8: the statue turned to rock. Build frame 14: the village arrives on her left. Build frame 20: the house at the bottom right. Build frame 28: the sky goes in. Build frame 33: the finished front.
Demi says"From a puzzling perspective..."
MeanwhileMelissa already knows what is coming. Something needs colour, or there is too much sky.
Where the pieces came from

Some of the actual files.

These are a few of the source images from the build: roofs, rock faces, temple photographs, stone textures, gardens and water. This is what a Flipsi looks like before it is a Flipsi.

Source photograph: a temple roof cut out on a white background.
Temple roof, cut outLicensed stock photograph
Source photograph: grey rock formations with small trees growing from them.
Rock spires with plantingLicensed stock photograph
Source photograph: temple rooftops in green hills.
Rooftops on a hillsideLicensed stock photograph
Source illustration: a geisha holding a parasol.
The pose referenceUsed for the tilt of the head only
Source photograph: a temple pavilion beside a still green pond.
Pavilion and pondLicensed stock photograph
Source photograph: layered sandstone rock cut out on white.
Layered sandstoneLicensed stock photograph
Source photograph: a red rock cliff edge against the sky.
Cliff edgeLicensed stock photograph
Source photograph: a close grey stone texture.
Stone textureOne of many. Texture does most of the work.
Source photograph: a tiled temple gable against a pale sky.
Temple gableLicensed stock photograph
Source image: a stone staircase climbing a cliff between flowering plants, with a pavilion above and waterfalls behind.
A stone staircaseIt was the steps we were after, not the waterfalls
Source photograph: a cracked granite rock face.
Granite faceLicensed stock photograph
Source photograph: thatched houses beside water with autumn trees and a mountain.
Houses and waterLicensed stock photograph
Source photograph: a weathered stone statue of a robed figure standing in a niche, with a carved lion at her feet.
A statue for her figureA stock photograph of a broken, weathered stone statue was used as the base for her body.
An AI generated warrior geisha in armoured robes holding a blade, cut out on a white background.
A warrior source elementAI-generated, then modified in Procreate.

The roofs are real roofs. The rock is real rock. The waterfalls are real water, falling somewhere else entirely.

The last pass

Finishing the artwork.

Once we're both happy with the overall image, the slow, tedious part starts. I go through the artwork, element by element, checking and adjusting placement, edges, shadows, lighting and Photoshop errors. Sometimes I export something into Procreate, fix it, then bring it back. This can take hours.

Then I'll spend days messing with the colour. I'll try things that don't make sense, swap pink for orange or blue for lime green, just to see what happens.

The very last thing I do is lay the puzzle die cut over the artwork. I zoom in and go through it piece by piece, imagining what it will be like to build.

Concepts by Demi Christo & Melissa Bonne · Artwork by Melissa Bonne
Before it is a puzzle

From screen to puzzle.

A finished file is not quite a finished Flipsi.

Before anything goes into production, our manufacturer makes a printed sample so we can compare the physical puzzle with the artwork on screen. Screens produce light; printing uses ink, paper and cardboard. The same colour can arrive looking surprisingly different.

Sometimes we get it right on the first sample. Sometimes I adjust the artwork and we go back and forth until red is red rather than orange, aqua is aqua rather than blue, and the darker parts still have enough detail to build.

That can take a few days or a few weeks.

We proof the box in the same way so the colours and details match the puzzle inside.

The prints, side by side.We compare different prints until the colour matches what we see on the screen.
An assembled sample of the Enchanted Falls puzzle, showing the cut pieces.
A puzzle sampleThis is where we check the colour on the actual puzzle.
And the boxProofed the same way.

So what's the story of Enchanted Falls?
We may tell it one day. But the clues are there in the meantime.

Curiosity, rewarded

Want to go back further?

Before there was Enchanted Falls, there was the idea that eventually became Flipsi.

Find your first Flipsi How Flipsi began
Flipsi Puzzles · Original Flipsi artwork on both sides · Concepts by Demi Christo & Melissa Bonne · Artwork by Melissa Bonne
The source photographs and illustrations on this page are licensed stock. The AI generated warrior is shown exactly as it arrived, unaltered. Everything else is our own work in progress files.