Now The Really BIG Show!

So, here we go.... stretching what was created on the 6 foot map to now take every inch of the old version to a full foot of the new version. I've made a clear plastic grid marked vertically every inch. This plastic transparency gets placed over a 10 inch section on the old map version.

Now I cut a 10 ft length off a roll of white butcher paper and marked the bottom edge every foot.. eg 1 ft, 2 ft, up to the 10th ft. This marking makes it pretty easy to figure placement of cities along the route. My first goal is to get the city locations in place... I began with about a 3 inch yellow circle. Then knowing it required a bigger presence, I chose to place the yellow circle centered on what will be a texture plate rubbing. The plate I chose has radiating circles growing larger the further from the center it goes. It was much easier to get the rubbing plate in the right place if I taped the plate to a light box which I placed under the fabric.

Now using a fantastix with an emerald green ink... I dry brush rubbed the stix across the circle rubbing plate to get a radiating texture. It ofcourse will go all the way around the yellow circle.

This texture will offer a slightly bigger presence for the cities along the route. After this, I chose to add a surrounding red edge to the yellow circle before adding the city name.

The really large cities will be called out within boxed areas with an triangular point to the heart of the city. I'll add a layered texture of first basic soft yellow and a green texture plate rubbing surrounding the city name.

A black drop shadow is added using a marker.

And finally, it seemed a simple almost unnoticeable darker outline of each letter seemed to finish things off nicely.

All the city locations get added before the physical route is drawn in between cities. I'm getting a simple line in for now... and will add surrounding color all at once when the 10 ft panels are done. Along the route, from time to time I'll add things I believe will be of interest to viewers... real things that existed at that location along the old route. Shown here is a restaurant sign from Mitchell, Illinois.. "The Luna Cafe" was a Route 66 hot spot for dining.