Forest Light, Forest Path

This is a piece I worked on for approx 10 hours in art class. (I would've posted this like a week ago but I didn't have the perfect title till now)

I had a reference photograph of a forest I mostly copied from, though I did simplify some things. (It was 1/2 as small than the paper so it was challenging)
I started with pencil to sketch for a plan guide on light green drawing paper. Chalk pastel is an adding medium so I worked back-to-front starting with the background. (That was also challenging- I kept wanting to draw the foremost trees). I had not worked with pastels before so my art teacher was very helpful. As I went I blended with my fingers and Q-tips.
The pastels had no paper wrapping like crayons do, so it was very messy. Another thing I don't like about them is the difficulty of doing fine details. Even if you sharpen the end into a tip, it wears too fast to do much detail.

Initially I didn't like the medium at all. But as I spent more time on the piece, I moved further out. Rendering the texture of the bark and the contrasting colors of the foremost trees was when I began to like the power of the pastels. They have an amazing color lay down.

Closer pics:

After I finished my teacher sprayed it with a fixative to protect it. Even so, I'm still control-freak paranoid about someone touching it. Notice how the picture's quality isn't so great? That's because I won't even take it out of the shadow box I duct-taped it into.