In the frame
A thicket of branching staghorn coral fills the lower half of the picture, and hundreds of small orange and pink anthias hover above it. The water surface and sun rays are visible at the top.
This dive turns the picture into a 3 × 3 slide puzzle: 8 tiles and one empty space. The shuffle is fixed, so everyone starts from the same board, and it is always solvable.
Dive plan
- Start with the easy part: the antler-like coral branches along the bottom.
- Save for last: the turquoise water near the surface. About 21% of the frame has little detail, mostly in the top third, and those pieces look alike.
- Finish the top row first, then the left column; the puzzle shrinks to a smaller board each time.
- Switch on the numbers if two tiles look alike — they show where each tile belongs.
- The picture is busy enough that neighbouring tiles can usually be told apart without numbers.
- A 3 × 3 board is small enough to solve by feel; try to finish in as few moves as you can.
Colours of the picture
Main colours, measured from the picture's pixels: teal (34%), olive (15%), turquoise (15%) and brown (14%).
- teal34%
- olive15%
- turquoise15%
- brown14%
- charcoal11%
- sky blue11%
How deep it goes
Depth 1 of 5 — a calm paddle.
Snorkel dives are the shallow end of the logbook: small boards with pieces big enough to read at a glance.