It’s been a while since I posted anything on my Works in Progress page! Fortunately, I have the perfect project to share. I’ve been working on a painting of some Iceland poppies for a client, for whom I do a botanical painting each year. The first step, of course, was to purchase some actual Iceland poppies; I much prefer drawing plants from life if I can. You can get multiple angles of a single flower that way, plus then the color is much easier to match.
I began making studies of the poppy flowers:
![](https://eehunter.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/poppies.jpg)
I made several sketches of leaves too. Once I had enough sketches, I compiled them all in one big layout (including color swatches for reference):
![](https://eehunter.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/poppies1-1.jpg)
This image was sent off to the client, who responded with a request for a more horizontal format. We also decided to make it larger that life—meaning that I couldn’t fit it easily on my scanner, and this terrible photo will have to suffice!
![](https://eehunter.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/poppies2-1024x668.jpg)
My client loved the new size of the sketch, but thought perhaps it could use more open flowers to incorporate more color. I was happy to oblige:
![](https://eehunter.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/poppies3-1.jpg)
Now we’ll wait and see if this is the last of the rough drafts. If I get the go-ahead, I’ll transfer this drawing to a large piece of watercolor paper and start painting!