THE GOLDEN WOOD – FROM SKETCH TO FINISH

Here are the steps for creating a painting from The Twelve Dancing Princesses

Here is my “thumbnail” sketch from the storyboard -about 2×4 inches

It took me three days to photograph the models for this book. For this painting alone I probably took over 50 pictures, taking them in small groups of two and three. Also, a number of the models posed for two princesses each, changing clothes to become a different princess. It was complicated to keep track of it all! Here are a few of the reference photos, next to the finished painting of them.

Here is the final sketch in the book dummy. (11×17 inches.) The notes are to figure out the colors for the various dresses. The scene in the story of the golden wood was the one I wanted to “key” the colors of the rest of the book to when the princesses are in the underground castle, so the color scheme is quite golden, with a bit of green and a touch of blue, but no bright colors to compete with the magical “golden” feel of the scene.

And here is the final painting –this took about 5 weeks to finish and is 17×34 inches in oils on stretched canvas. I liked this painting so much I named my studio Golden Wood Studio.