1. I chose the ideas for this project by thinking to myself what I thought would be cool up close. The personal part of the prompt came in to play because I've always thought fire was cool as well as having the figurative and literal meaning of lighting the way. Thinking of that, I drew a match as it's the basic tool to starting a fire.
2. I tried to put as much emphasis on the flame as possible, making it the center point of the picture. Everything seems to be emanating from the flame; the smoke, the light, and maybe even the matchstick a bit. 
3. I used oil pastel as my medium. I didn't use pencil because I did not see my pencil drawings as very good. I chose oil over chalk because I thought that the oil blended and showed value better than the chalk did. I really liked the way it came out, as the oil blended so well, making the flame look really good as well as a sort of highlight on the tip of the matchstick. The wood of the matchstick also looks very nice with it's texture, the way the pastel is going down the stick.
4. I did take a risk, with the light emanating from the flame. I did want to make it look as if the light was slowly dying into the black background but the pastel did not turn dark enough and I did not want to make the light too big. Though it did come out better than I expected and I have no problem with that part of the work.
5. I used technique in my drawing, trying to make each part of the drawing to stand out in its own way. I used a swirl on the tip of the match to try and give it a bit of a highlight. I made a lighter inside of the flame to make it look a bit realistic. I went in one direction on the wood of the matchstick to try and give it a real sort of look. I tried to shade the little bit of light being produced by the flame to make it look as if it were disappearing into the darkness. And lastly I tried to make the smoke look a bit wispy, using soft lines of darker blue within the light blue, giving it a sort of layered look