My latest mosaic is a rendition of William-Adolphe Bouguereau's painting, Song Of The Angels.
The mosaic is built in a 'Studs Out' fashion (see my Mosaics page if that terminology means nothing to you). The final dimensions of the piece are 75 inches wide by 100 inches tall (240 studs by 320 studs).
This was a fairly straightforward project. The client (based in St. Louis), wanted a large mosaic to complement many other LEGO creations they were having constructed (not by me) which were all to be displayed during the holiday season at The National Shrine of Our Lady of the Snows.
We discussed possible images, sizes, and prices. Given the fact that these discussions did not begin until late September, there were some constraints involved. I had about one month to build the mosaic, so I had to make sure that the overall size and colors used did not make the project undoable.
Of all of the potential images we looked at, both myself and the client agreed that Bouguereau's image would be the best. I had to keep the final mosaic under 9 feet tall (wall space constraints), and we decided to use only the 6 basic LEGO colors (black, white, yellow, red, blue, and green). It would have been nice to use brown and tan bricks as well, but since I don't have several thousand 1x1 bricks of those colors just lying about my studio, I didn't want to risk not having the correct inventory (with the basic 6 colors, the only pieces I had to order were about a thousand green 1x1s -- since the mosaic used about 4,000 such bricks -- the rest I had on hand).
I ended up using almost all of my black bricks. I guess I still have about 3,000 2x2 blacks... but all of my 2x4s are gone. I have less than one full tub left of each of the sizes: 1x1, 1x2, 1x3, and 1x4.
To ensure that I would be able to complete the project during October, I hired another assistant. Abby and I completed the mosaic is about three week's time (no, these were not 8 hour workdays).
The mosaic used 30 extra large grey baseplates (15" squares), 7 green baseplates (10" squares), and one 16x32 stud baseplate.
We carefully numbered each plate on the back (so the client would know in what order to reassemble them when they arrived).
As each plate was completed, I laid them out in my carport (various stages of completion: 1, 2, 3). Abby was working on the plates starting in the upper left corner, while I started in the lower right corner.
I never actually had the mosaic mounted at my place, of course, so all of my pictures of it are being taken as it lies flat on the ground. I hope the client will send me photographs of the mosaic once they have successfully installed it on site.
Here are a few more pictures:
