Mission Carwash Mural: start to finish

The husband and wife duo behind Mission Carwash (and Lube N' Tune, and Tia Gladys Cantina) have been supporting a revival of the historical Mission Play. To build some excitement about this year's centennial festivities, and cheer up a ho-hum hallway, they commissioned me to paint a mural. Other than requesting lots of color and joy, The parameters were pretty loose. That's a good thing.

I used the mission playhouse as a background, and added doves and folklorico dancers for a little life. Adding flowers makes injecting color really easy.

Here's the process start to finish.

Freehanding the initial drawing is doable, but getting the perspective right would have been a big pain since its in a hallway. I took my outline to Staples and got an engineering print made, blowing up the original drawing from legal size to the intended 4' x 12' life size scale.

To transfer the image, I sprayed the back with this awesome awesome transfer spray made by Bernini from Blick. It leaves really precise, erasable marks without any smudging or mess. Way better than any premade transfer paper I've ever used. Time to trace.

Trace trace trace. You can barely see it but its there.

Next comes filling in the sky. It's quick and makes you feel like you've done a lot.

How about some foliage?

O yeah.

Time to start the playhouse, and ignore an increasing sense of dread and foreboding.

Paint everything that's not a playhouse!

Get in there, tiger!

Now it's time for a distraction. How about more plants!

Dark dark dark makes other colors bright bright bright.

Forget it I'm going to paint the tiles. Bah the playhouse has jaundice!

Getting better. There's a peek at my photoshopped source material. The more initial planning, the better the result.

OMG so much detail. I'm tired.

People won't even notice most if this but if its not there it'll suck and no one will know why. But I will. Flower distraction time.

And lettering. I like lettering :)

Hey this is starting to look pretty good. o crap. I added people. WHY did I add people.

Ignore them. Paint the fountain.

Ok get in there.

Teal tops were a good choice.

Go sit down.

Funny thing is, you never run out of details. Their heads are so small!

I hadnt decided on a border beforehand but i liked the lapis colored tile in the restroom, so i recreated it around the edge. it looks pretty convincing in pictures.

A few more details.

Clear coat. And done.