The sketch for the mural superimposed onto a school photo for the staff to imagine.

Painting several walls in a school for 1 mural was a great challenge. The pathway in the artwork tied everything together to help the viewer's eyes travel.

I always try to utilize visual storytelling, but an educational picture is different–all aspects of the image should illustrate the lesson (or seven lessons in this case), which leaves little room for secondary items without purpose.

Sketching characters in a tug of war, where one boy's leg wraps around a door in the mural.

Near the end of the school mural I was asked to continue painting until lunch so each class could visit me and ask questions while I worked. This was the first time I actually saw the school during regular activity. I became extremely impressed with the genuine good nature of students and teachers working together. Education is something I have always thought important, but I now have a real idea of what that should look like as opposed to ideas formed from statistics.

The school mural at the very start of work. It's exciting to start painting on large blank walls!

I tried matching doors of the painted version of the school to be on the actual doors of the gymnasium for an additional affect when the doors are opened.

Ronald Harvey Elementary School students were happy to see the nocturnal artist during the day, and gave lots of great questions about painting a mural.

Care was taken when creating the mural to not paint the many windows, door handles, signs, fire alarms, and other areas that needed to remain untouched.

Tape is an easy way to quickly visualize areas of a mural, even if it can look like stick people.