Painted Dragon for Patt Blair's Retreat

Rita went with me to Alphagraphics to enlarge my dragon head, after finally deciding where to actually crop it. The first enlargement was about 250%, which made it about 24" x 36". This looks good, but maybe not as large as what I want it to be. So enlarged it again at 400% to about 30" x 40".  We hung both up in the shop. The larger one definitely has more impact, so that is the size I'm going with! Thanks, Rita, for all your help!!

I also had them make me 2 original size drawings, so I could work on colors. I transferred the drawing onto 14" x 17" watercolor paper. I wanted to paint it with watercolors, but couldn't find my larger set, just my travel set of half pans. So I decided to just use acrylic paints. After all, this painting is just a guideline for painting my quilt! This is my finished result.

Dragon (drawn and painted by Lynnita Knoch)

I happy with it for the most part. The colors aren't quite true to what I painted. The blue scales are more turquoise in color. The yellow/green is more of a brighter lime green. The red is more orange/red.  

I think I'll make some changes to the actually painting. The red/orange scales will be changed to purple. Then the scales will be more analogous in color, instead of the lime green/red-orange fighting with each other because they are complimentary colors.  I don't like the yellow I used for the triangular spikes on the head at all and I'm not happy with the light blue background. I was thinking of sky when I chose the light blue. Will see what suggestions Patt has once I get to the retreat, as I'm running out of time to prepare. I still need to pack. I also need to help TR pack for his fishing trip, so no more time to paint. 

I'm so excited about this retreat!! I'm can't wait to get started on this dragon!! What fun it will be!!