Desert Cicada Work in Progress

With all the amazing feedback I have been receiving from my dioramas, I have been inspired to make more framed specimens. Cicadas have been on my brain a lot, as well as dragonflies. Shown above is the progress of some of the different stages of cicada creation this weekend. I've had a lot of fun experimenting with different materials and techniques when building this little guy.

First, I sketched out the entire cicada to make sure I had all the proportions right. Since I knew I was going to make the wings out of vellum, I had to figure out how to attach the wings while making it look natural. Deciding the best course of action for this was to make a back plate to sandwich the wings between. Before beginning the coloring process, I traced the veins of the wings onto the vellum with a sepia micron pen and set them aside for later. I have also found it faster to begin my projects by painting a gouache base coat of color before adding the color pencil details. After all the pieces are created I then fold, score, and curl the paper for a more realistic look. Finally, I glue it all together and mount it to a piece of bristol paper to frame.

I hope this helps answer questions, but doesn't dispel the magic of how I make my little creatures.