Seek-and-find picture

1. 01Choose a level and theme. The preview shows sheet 1 right away, and with a press on “Solution” also the solution.
2. 02The tool rolls the search list from the theme for every No. With “Choose yourself” you set symbols and numbers yourself, then the list applies to all sheets.
3. 03For a class, choose several sheets: each has its own No. and is laid out differently. Download the PDF and print.

What it is. Not a drawn busy picture with one scene, but a seek-and-find picture made of many simple symbols: 50 symbols of this toolbox, drawn as vectors, printed black on white. 49 of them can be in the search list; the musical notes cannot, because their name is already plural.

The levels. Easy (intended for preschool): about 30 large symbols in rows, nothing rotated, nothing overlapping, in color on screen. Medium (grades 1 and 2): about 120 symbols, rotated and in different sizes, nothing overlaps. Hard (grades 3 and 4): about 300 symbols that overlap. Really hard (grades 5 and 6): over 400 symbols, plus look-alikes and two extra tasks. The levels are recommendations. The real number of symbols is shown under the preview; it depends on the sheet orientation and the length of the search list.

How counting works. Rotated or flipped, a symbol stays the same symbol and counts. A look-alike that is missing a part (a house without a roof, a bicycle without a rear wheel) is a different symbol and never counts. Symbols from the search list get no such look-alike on their sheet. Every number in the search list is exact; a test over 200 numbers in all levels checks this.

Overlapping. With Hard and Really hard, a symbol drawn later covers earlier ones. Every symbol stays at least 40% visible, searched ones at least 70%. This is measured on a grid of 0.5 mm; a symbol that can still be seen can nevertheless be hard to recognize.

The extra tasks. With Really hard, exactly one symbol appears only once, every other at least twice. That is why every entry in the search list needs at least 2 there. Exactly 3 symbols are upside down, all others are rotated by 25 degrees at most. Only symbols with a clear top are turned upside down: a ball, sun or snowflake looks the same rotated, a fish like a mirrored fish, a leaf has no top.

Limits. 3 to 8 entries, 1 to 12 per entry. With Easy every symbol has a fixed place: if the list asks for more copies than there are places, the tool names the maximum and makes no sheet. With the random list at least a third of the theme stays for filling, so in the theme Animals there are at most 3 entries. The heading is set in Helvetica: characters this font does not know (emoji, some letters of other languages) are dropped and named.

No. and chance. The No. is the starting value of the randomness. The same No. and the same settings give exactly the same sheet, even on another device. Further sheets keep counting the No., so sheet 3 of No. 100 is No. 102. The No. is in small print at the bottom of every sheet.

Solution and PNG. The solution shows the same picture a little smaller and in gray, every searched symbol circled, each entry in a different line style; with Really hard also a square around the symbol that appears only once, and a diamond around the symbols that are upside down. The PNG shows sheet 1 as a whole A4 page at 300 dpi.

Nothing is saved. The page remembers neither settings nor heading. The file from “Save to a file” contains level, theme, search list, settings, heading and No. and is made only on your device. If the heading contains a name, it is also in PDF, PNG and file.