About the artist, Melissa Schatzmann

ARTWORK IN PROGRESS

MORNING PEONIES

STEP ONE
	In this stage, I had carefully drawn in my peonies - and I do mean carefully! I think I almost went blind trying to find each petal! Well, I didn't actually follow EACH and every petal as I had to make up some here and there. The black background was built up with multiple layers which took about 4-5 hours to complete because I took my time.
STEP TWO
	As you see, I have made some progress since the last scan. I started with the small peony first and then made my way in layering my greens in my leaves. I will leave the best until last - or should I say the hardest one! With all of that light in there, it can actually create a challenge for me. I like the progress I have made and again taking my time - very slowly.....
STEP THREE
	I need to work on the larger peony still and the lower leaves as well. I need to get this done for an upcoming juried show so I'm moving a bit more quicker now! I have used a variety of pinks, reds, blues, and violets in the peonies and have written down all of my coloured pencils. Without doing this, I will definitely loose track of my colours and thus, creating a totally different value for my petals. This is very important for a coloured pencil artist to follow.... write down your colours!
	Well, I am almost done! As my deadline approaches I am being very careful in looking over everything on the peonies before I take it to get it framed. Nothing like having your artwork nice and framed only to see that you forgot to add something!! Been-there-done-that and don't want to go there again. I usually will keep it somewhere where I can constantly look at it while walking past it or something so that I can notice any small details or changes that need to be done before the framing process.