Maze of the Week #89 - Hollywood Sign Maze

Maze of the Week #89 is a maze of a very famous sign, maybe the most famous sign I have made a maze of, the Hollywood Sign, in Los Angeles, California. This was once again an abandoned maze (4 in a row!) that I decided to try and salvage. It was a very weak and boring maze originally. I did a lot of work to improve it. A few facts about the sign - the letters are each 50 feet tall, and it was first erected in 1923 as HOLLYWOODLAND. It has a great story you can read about on the Wikipedia page, and the sign was almost demolished in 1949.

YouTube: Excellent 6 minute video to learn about the sign

The Maze: Originally this maze was abandoned and made my list of mistakes in maze making. You can read about those abandoned mazes here:

Why I abandoned these 10 mazes - Mistakes in Maze making

Then I went back an made it into another case study, which you can read about here. I should mention that if you look at photos of the sign, the vegetation on the hill in more recent years in dry and brown from drought. I went with lusher green vegetation.

Hollywood Sign Maze

I hope you enjoy the maze. Maze download is available on the homepage, including a version with more accurate coloring. Check out my YouTube channel where you can watch this maze be made and solved !!!

If you like mazes of California signs you might like this one too:

Fresno Van Ness Sign Maze

Coming these next few weeks: Mazes with case studies !

Tiki Totem Maze

El Danzante Conchero Chichimeca Maze

Red Rocks Amphitheatre Maze (last week)

Hollywood Sign Maze (this one !)

A maze of ruins

Myles Garrett is a-maze-ing (and not corny?)

The NFL season is upon us. We all think our team is good and going to make the playoffs. I’m not going to name any names, but look at what people were saying last year pre-season vs. what actually happened. I am currently living in Cleveland and so this article caught my eye, because a local farm is featuring a corn maze of Myles Garrett !

Mapleside Farms, an 100 acre farm located at 294 Pearl Road in Brunswick, OH 44212 features a variety of attractions and festivals the next 2 months. You can plan your visit on their website. Check out this list form their website of the upcoming festivals ! So many fun events for families !

And of course I need to show you the maze !

Book Review - Murder in the Corn Maze

Murder in the Corn Maze (2019) AMZN

from Kensington Cozies, 290 Pages (Granny Reid Mystery Book 2)

by G. A. McKevett (Author)

You may know author G. A. McKevett from their book series SAVANNAH REID MYSTERIES. This particular book is book 2 of the GRANNY REID MYSTERIES series, that tells about the popular grandmother figure from Savannah’s books.

In the small town of McGill, Georgia, Stella Reid and her seven grandchildren are enjoying a Halloween corn maze when Savannah stumbles upon a human skull. The skull is later identified as that of Rebecca Dingle, a woman who went missing decades earlier. Stella and Savannah team up to solve the cold case, and their investigation leads them to uncover long-buried secrets about Stella's family and the town's history.

Along the way, Stella and Savannah learn about the importance of friendship, family, and forgiveness. They also discover that even the most seemingly innocent places can harbor dark secrets.

Murder in the Corn Maze is a heartwarming and suspenseful mystery that will keep readers guessing until the very end. It is a perfect book for fans of cozy mysteries and Southern Gothic fiction.

Here are the main themes of the book:

• The importance of friendship, family, and forgiveness.

• The dangers of secrets and the power of truth.

• The importance of never giving up on a mystery, no matter how old it is.

Case Study#3 - How to Improve a Bad Maze - Red Rocks

I have written 2 blog posts featuring a total of 20 mazes that I abandoned for one reason or another. You can read them here:

Why I abandoned these 10 mazes - Mistakes in Maze making

10 More Abandoned Mazes - Mistakes in Maze Making

I took the time to evaluate the mazes and see why they did not work and try to determine - could they be salvaged ? Today I present my 3rd case study for improving one of those mazes, Red Rocks Amphitheatre. If you want to read the previous 3 case studies:

Case Study#1 - How to Improve a Bad Maze - Tiki Totem Maze

Case Study#2 - How to Improve a Bad Maze - Danzante Conchero Chichimeca Maze

Back to this maze. Here is what I wrote about the maze in the previous post on why it was abandoned:

“Abandoned Maze #5 - Red Rocks Amphitheatre Maze

Never completed. I never made the maze…just the picture which I struggled with in terms of coloration - every photo of RR has different lighting so the colors are difficult. And most of all, the maze was going to be placed in the rocks but that is a bad structure to make a maze in. Mistake made: Poor subject matter for a maze”

And let’s look at that maze, also known as the ‘before’. Notice there is no maze yet.

Now here are the changes I made to (hopefully) improve the maze:

1. Color - I changed some colors to be less cartoonish. Tree trunks brown from a mustard color (even if you can’t see them). Buildings that were mustard toned to browns. Seating area from a pink tone to more of a brownish tone.

2. Layering Fixed - This is somewhat minor, but there was a layering problem under the trees where the seating ends. In this area there are small concrete or stone shelves between the seating and the rockface. I fixed this issue to expose them as intended.

3. Seating changed - I changed the searing area to include more accurate seats vs. walking area.

4. Start and Finish change - The arrows are a distraction from the picture. It says this is a maze clearly but I changed this to an internal START and GOAL that is less distracting.

5. Maze addition - I went with freehand drawn internal walls within the exposed rockface. I did not want straight lines in the rockface.

6. Zoom Change - Now that the maze was on the rockface and that was the focus I zoomed in to feature that, losing some of the previous details in the stage area. I had thought it was important to show the entire stage but now I disagree with old me.

7. Letter and branding changes - Changed the sizing of the name of the maze and it’s location (floating int he sky before was terrible) and added my branding to the top right corner.

I also did some minor clean up of details in the maze.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Better. I considered changing every tree but decided against it. I think the zoom in and the color changes made a big difference.

And now the “After”. The new maze:

I think this is an improvement. What do you think ?