Once I recieved permission from Terp-to-Terp to paint a mural for their storefront, I had to communicate with appropriate building staff to get permission to paint in the building. As Terp-to-Terp is located in Harford Hall - a residence hall on campus - I needed to meet with ResLife staff and fill out a mural contract with them. During this time period, I also visited the Terp-to-Terp location several times to take measurements and survey the area.

(Images: Google Maps, Office of Sustainability, Sustaining Progress UMD)

When I was happy with my final thumbnail sketch, I then visited Sherwin Williams to develop a color palette with paint swatches. Based on these colors and the final sketches, I created a final digital design for the mural. The process for this was sketching over a photo of the final thumbnail, adding color to the main figures, and then finally coloring in the background.

The first step in sketching on the wall was to decide on a good size for a grid overlay on the design. I ended up settling for roughly 16" blocks in a 9 x 4 grid. Once I decided on this, I measured and painted the properly sized grid on the wall. The gridding method is standard for scaling images up or down, and through this method, I was able to break the sketch down into manageable pieces. I sketch with watered-down paint as I find it easier to cover up than pencil or chalk in the final piece.

It's difficult to create an exhibit for a mural because it's so location specific. The hallway I painted in was too narrow to get a clean, full shot of the finished mural, so I decided to display a series of photographs both far-away and close-up in addition to my initial design. I took the photos, adjusted them in Photoshop, drafted potential layouts on paper and on Canva, formatted and printed the images, and mounted them on foam core.