Puzzle Picture Frames: Custom Laser Cut 1/4″ 6 mm Thick MDF

Custom puzzle picture frames is something I’ve done several times in the past for various organizations, but this customer wanted something special, instead of just solid puzzles, these needed a way to hold a photograph, generally, people would just glue it on the front.

The tricky aspect of these custom puzzle picture frames is that they have to interlock both up, down and side to side.

For this job, I had a lot of quarter inch 6 mm MDF left over from an earlier job so I was able to use some of it, which is why you see odds bits and pieces of MDF on my CNC laser table, I hate throwing away still great material at CNCROi.com and this is a prime example of how something can be used and used again for as little wastage as possible.

This is a very similar design to what I made a few years back using plywood, at the same quarter inch 6 mm thickness.

Again, this is the older design, without the cutouts and related bits and pieces that form the custom puzzle picture frames.

What I really like about my updated design is that all the parts needed to make the finished custom puzzle picture frames are actually solidly in the picture frame itself, those two large pieces and smaller ones all come together with glue to form the finished puzzle piece.

That means when it comes to shipping from CNCROi.com, the package is a lot more compact, production at my end is very efficient and the customer gets something that’s very easy to assemble, first time I assembled one of these it took me two minutes but the next time, I cut that in half after I got comfortable with all the parts.

Puzzles are great fun to make, here’s another one I made a while back, of my father’s favorite animal to feed in the summertime.

Chipmunks are like kangaroos, you really can’t say anything negative about them, they are independent but incredibly friendly, astonishing considering they are at the base of the food chain in nature.

Some of the off-cuts from this custom puzzle picture frames production run I actually kept for further projects I have using this MDF at CNCROi.com, again, MDF is great for a wide variety of jobs, it paints fantastic, is relatively strong and light weight compared to alternatives.

If you were looking for custom picture frames that were a little more detailed, CNCROi.com can produce that for you as well.

Do keep in mind that the more fragile your design, the easier it is to break, but luckily the lift of a picture frame isn’t an overly harsh one so you should be fine more often than not.

When it comes to this job specifically, we will be making hundreds of these custom puzzle picture frames, in two sizes (thus far), the design scales perfectly to just about any size, that’s the way I designed it to be at CNCROi.com.

Of course, CNCROi.com isn’t just a laser cutting shop, if you wanted these custom puzzle picture frames cut out of metal, we can do that too!

That’s the flexibility we offer our customers, literally any size, material or design you want, we can make and ship right to your door!

Some of my most favorite projects involve a mix of materials, for instance, wood and metal, it’s astonishing how these two go so well together for a variety of custom projects CNCROi.com makes for customers.

And don’t be scared about using spray paint, it has come a very long way in the past few decades, it use to be sticky and awful to work with, now, the color options and possibilities they bring to a custom job are endless.

The bright light you see in these pictures is the instant vaporization of the MDF by the laser, there is no contact otherwise between the laser head and the material, it just magically gets cut using light, which gives CNCROi.com the possibility to create incredible tolerances that are way beyond the scope of these custom puzzle picture frames.

If you wanted something a little more detailed and dimensional when it comes to make custom puzzle picture frames, CNCROi.com can make those as well.

We aren’t just a “name your machine” shop, we make using what is best for this particular application, for instance, here’s a MDF front cabinet cover that I made just to give you an idea of what’s possible and yes, we can make puzzle pieces with our CNC router just as easily as our laser onto MDF.

Which machine and approach we make depends on material, design and budget, timeline doesn’t often come to play CNCROi.com is always striving with 24 hour turnaround on most of our jobs.

Below is a picture of the MDF custom puzzle picture frames after they are cut, a piece of masking tape applied then flipped, the masking tape keeps all the inner pieces in place as remember, CNCROi.com laser cut THROUGH all of this MDF so otherwise, as soon as this got lifted off the bed of our CNC laser, they would fall out.

As for shipping, like you saw in the video about these custom puzzle picture frames, once flipped, another strip of masking tape is applied, keeping the inner pieces in place as we don’t want the customer chasing small pieces all over a package.

Although unrelated, just to give you an idea of what paint can do to MDF, in this case, it was 1/8″ thick 3 mm, I made a custom monogram picture frame, which can be easily adapted to have a picture in it by the way.

So the same approach was used for these custom puzzle picture frames, first step is assembly using just glue, I did consider making interlocking parts but I wanted the front of the puzzle to be totally flush.

Below you can see how all the pieces come together, this is holding literally a piece of colored paper, so the design and build on this is massive overkill.

Then after the glue is allowed to dry, just a little enamel spray paint, I did two coats at CNCROi.com, and it’s pretty much done and ready for action.

I didn’t need to spray paint both sides, one side goes against the wall, but I figured practice makes perfect so why not take this opportunity to brush-up on my spray painting skills at CNCROi.com.

At first I didn’t have any picture to put in this custom puzzle picture frame but they I realized my great grandparents were in a printout next to my computer, so I just cut it to size and slid it into the frame I designed and cut at CNCROi.com for a perfect fit!

I know they’d be super happy to find themselves in this frame if they were still alive today!

If you are looking for custom picture frames, any size, shape or design, contact CNCROi.com right now!