Spooktacular Squash

Today’s builder, Wisa, built his perfectly spooky pumpkin friends as part of a pumpkin carving competition on Planet Minecraft. For the contest, entrants had to build a giant pumpkin, but with the catch that it has to be done alone, with no mods, texture packs, or help from others.

“In the beginning, I did not even a specific idea for the construction,” says Wisa. “It was difficult to come up with something interesting!”

It wasn’t until Wisa visited an artist friend that he became inspired. “I came across a beautiful still life which he recently painted,” says Wisa. The painting was perfect: autumn leaves, fruits and vegetables, all the things that make you think of cosy nights by the fire.

Wisa began to outline his idea on paper. He searched the internet for ideas and details to include, and then started craft. It wasn’t easy at first. Plants and organic structures are among the hardest things to build in Minecraft, because they are usually lumpy, random and unpredictable, unlike lovely symmetrical buildings.

“I tried many ways to build the pumpkins’ shape,” admits Wisa. In the end, he settled on an unusual solution: “each pumpkin consists of several spheres, arranged in a circle, and then smoothed to the desired shape.” This gives each pumpkin that distinctive bulgey appearance, but took a lot of work – Wisa spent two weeks on this build in total!

“Building pumpkins was very interesting and I do not regret that I spent the time on it,” says Wisa. “I think that the most ambitious part of my build is the candles inside the pumpkins, as well as the big pumpkin in the hat!”

Well, it wouldn’t quite feel like a Jack-O’-Lantern without the candles inside, would it?