Well, I thought I would start a series of posts about my step by step process. I’m not sure how long this will go for, but it seemed like a cool idea. I know that I am always interested in other people’s process, so I figured, why not share mine?
I don’t always remember to take pictures every step of the way, but on this particular project I was posting “work in progress” posts on my Instagram page as I was working on it. ( Check out my Instagram here! I try to post frequently!)
I finally finished this piece yesterday. You can purchase it as an instant download to print at home right here:
I’m really very pleased with it!
Anyone that knows me (or maybe even those of you taking the time to read my posts), know that two of the things I love are flowers (especially daisies) and galaxy art/astronomy pictures. So, what better project than to combine the two!
This shape is really my go-to when I am doodling. I draw a daisy with five petals and a swirly stem with another swirly piece coming off of it. What better place to start an unfamiliar technique than with a familiar doodle.
To keep all my petals uniform in shape (since this was not going to be just a doodle) I drew one on a scrap piece of cardboard, cut it out and used it as a stencil for all five petals in this picture. I’m really happy with that decision, because now I have a stencil that I can reuse on other pieces, and not have to start all over. That is, if I want a uniform size all the way around.
So I drew my flower shape, leaving room for more of a design on the paper. Was not sure what I wanted to put on there with it when I started the project. I figured that would come to me later.
I had tried and failed another color combination, so I needed to make sure the colors I chose for the galaxy clouds would flow nicely together. I ended up using a hot pink, a lilac, and a dark purple, and black. I wanted some blue as well, but that was in the combination that failed, so I left it out to try again another time.
I used all Prismacolor colored pencils for this. Except the white, but I’ll get to that later.
I had watched a couple tutorials, and it seemed pretty straightforward on what to do, so all I had to do was start. I was able to do this in acrylic paint for another project, (check it here!) and was pleased with the results, so a drawing was the next step.
I kind of outlined how far out I wanted the pink to go. The pink was my main color.
Next step was to add the black in one petal and make sure this was going to look how I wanted it to before I went any further. No one likes to waste time on something that doesn’t look right.
So, OK, it’s looking pretty decent and I’m confident about moving on and doing more. Yay!
I was constantly sharpening my pencils for this galaxy daisy! I was pressing really hard to get the strength of color that I wanted and the edges of the petals were tricky. I think I could really draw about an inch at that pressure to keep the line clean before I had to sharpen it again.
I honestly was still a little unsure at this point if I was going to like the finished product, but I stuck it out anyway.
I think it looks pretty good here. At this point I start doing some research on what to make the stars with. I find that a white gel pen is coming up pretty consistently. This seems way easier and controllable than white paint. After reading a few different articles, I finally picked one out that I thought would work well for me and ordered it. I was a little nervous to try it, so it’s a good thing I had that scrap piece that I didn’t like the color combination of. It was perfect for trying the pen out. My concern was if it was going to work on the waxy surface of heavily colored colored pencil.
I should not have been worried, because it worked great! In fact, I want to try it on other projects as well to add highlights and such. It’s a pretty fun little pen to play with.
I did have to go back over some of the stars, they did fade a little. I actually kind of like how some of them look a little faded, and others are bright white. It adds a kind of depth I wasn’t expecting.
I had the main flower part finished for a week or two, and I had been trying to figure out what I wanted to do to finish it. I knew that I wanted to make a spiral type stem, like I usually do when I doodle this. That was not enough on it’s own though. This is how it looked.
Definitely lacking something, don’t you agree? It’s not enough, looks top heavy and incomplete.
So I added a little bit of color and some stars.
Not a ton of extras, because I didn’t want to take away from the main focus of the picture, which is the petals of the daisy itself. I think it’s just enough to complete the picture, once I added in the stars.
Here it is finished again.
Here’s a picture of the colored pencils and pen that I used to make it.
Not much, unless you count my regular 2h pencil and eraser that I used as well.
I did end up spending a decent amount of time on this. I think maybe if I had to guess-because I didn’t even think to keep track-next time!- that it was around 5 or 6 hours. That’s not really too bad, and even then I’m probably being generous. It may have been less, but I would go sit and work for a half an hour, an hour, here and there when I had time during the week. Had I sat down and been able to do it all at once, I probably could have started and finished it within a day.
Hope you’ve enjoyed this glimpse into my process. I’ve enjoyed sharing it, so I will probably continue this as a series, adding to it when I can.
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Freckles N Flowers Art 
Love your work!
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Thank you!
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