The "Resurrection" Mandala - Installment #11 - Done!

I completed the Resurrection Mandala on Sunday, February 25, 2007. During the final session, I finished coloring the outside row of beads, and did some touch up coloring to the center background, the outer band background, and on the inner three rows of beads.

The next phase of this project is to take it to be professionally photographed and digitized. This will allow me to use this image on prints and greeting cards. Also by having it digitized at a professional shop, I can have them produce giclee (museum quality) prints, which are printed on archival paper and archival pigment (watercolor) inks.

The "Resurrection" Mandala - Installment #10

Today I had a big block of time to color. Yeah! Finally! I finished coloring the sections within the outer band. The march of the cobras and scarabs is now complete and moving forward. I'm going to look into animating this so it rotates; it seems to want to move clockwise.


I finished two of the three rows of 'bead' work around the outer edge. For the gold beads, I used canary yellow and dark grape. The two blue beads in between the gold ones are colored with true blue/indigo blue/dark grape and copenhagen blue/indigo blue/dark grape. I have only one more row of beads to color and they will take on the colors used on the innermost row of beads surrounding the inner circle.


If all goes well, I hope to finish this tomorrow. Earlier this week I received the message for this mandala: "At all times, I choose peace." Since I became aware of this message I have been doing my best to put it into practice. It's very challenging. It's amazing how tense I am most of the time. This message helps remind me to be calm.

The "Resurrection" Mandala - Installment #9

I was able to do a lot of coloring over the weekend and completed three and half more sections of the outer band. I had hoped to finish this week, now it's looking like it will be done by Sunday.

"Hearts As One" - 02/16/07

On 2/15, I colored the outer hearts using hot pink, carmine red, violet and black grape. I used a little dab of white on the upper curves to give it a shiny appearance, which is difficult to see in this photo.

On 2/16 I finished coloring the inside hearts with the same colors I used on the outside hearts. In the end it took me about 8 hours to color this mandala, which was a page out of my "Mandala Coloring Book Volume V" (which is available for sale on my web site: www.maiahcreations.com.

"Hearts As One" - 02/14/07

Yesterday, at the last minute, I decided to color the mandala, "Hearts As One" for my husband for Valentine's Day. Silly me for thinking I could do it one day...especially the way I color :)

I was already well into it before I realized that I needed to take photos. So this photo shows about an hour's worth of coloring. The center was colored with lemon yellow, canary yellow, orange, scarlet lake, and dark grape. The green sections were colored with yellow chartreuse, grass green, and dark grape.

For the blue 'horizon' I colored with ultramarine blue, electric blue and white. Tip: along with lightening what ever color is underneath, coloring with white also creates a clouding swirly effect, especially if you burnish the white (color hard).

For the gold on the wings, I used my favorite color combination: canary yellow and dark grape.

For the individual 'feathers' of the heart wings, I went with a rainbow pattern. Actually these colors are more in line with chakra colors. (google it you're new to chakras). I used scarlet lake, orange, lemon yellow, apple green, electric blue, ultramarine blue, violet, hot pink, and aquamarine. To created the shaded look, I colored dark grape at the bottom and top of each feather. I also colored a thin layer of black grape in between each 'feather.' To blend the black grape into the rainbow colors, I used a 'colorless blender'. This great pencil allows me to blend the colors I've already put down without adding another color.

The "Resurrection" Mandala - Installment #8

It's been a couple of days since I've colored on this mandala. Yesterday I had a big chunk of time and was able to color another small scarab and a cobra set in the outer band. My plan is to finish it by the middle of next week (around 2/21).

The "Shine On" Mandala - Installation #8

Now this looks a lot different. Today I added vermilion red to each of the flames. I have to admit that it looks yucky to me at this point. I hated to stop here for that very reason; however, I need the paint/paper to dry before adding more paint. On the plus side, at least the flames have more definition than they did a few days ago.

The "Shine On" Mandala - Installation #7

Last Sunday, I was able to put another wash of the arylide yellow on each of the flames to give more definition to the shape of each flame. It's very subtle at this point, put if you look closely you'll see darker and lighter shades of the yellow.

The "Shine On" Mandala - Installation #6

It's been a few days since I had a chance to do any more painting on this mandala. With me being in the studio for longer hours on Saturdays, I was able to have time to put it on the table and do some painting. Yeah!

Using a light wash of da vinci's arylide yellow, I painted the undercoat for the 'flames', which up until now have been somewhat invisible in my photos.

The "Resurrection" Mandala - Installment #7

I continue to march around the outer band of this mandala. I finished another cobra grouping. I think I've neglected to note that the two gold orbs above the cobra heads are colored with lemon yellow (a cooler yellow-more green) and dark grape versus using canary yellow (a warmer yellow-more orange) that I've used throughout for all the gold trim and the boat. Using the lemon yellow makes for a lighter, more metallic gold (in my humble opinion anyway).

The "Resurrection" Mandala - Installment #6

I'm making slow but steady process on "Resurrection". Yesterday I finished another small scarab. I actually timed how long it took me to color it: 45 minutes. To look at it, it may seem like it should take less time; however, I color with multiple layers of color in each section of the scarab. The gold trim sections take about as much time to do as the entire blue sections of the scarab. It takes some finagling back and forth with yellow and purple to make the gold look just right.

The "Resurrection" Mandala - Installment #5

I was able to color in another cobra section, which took me about an hour to do. The smaller scarabs, take about 45 minutes to an hour to color.