Painting Galadriel & Frodo, day 1+2

I just started this movie still study last night. Everything's done on 1 layer in SAI so far.
The purpose of this study is to capture the dramatic atmosphere and lighting of the scene. I'm not using the exact color scheme of the reference picture.

1. Laying down basic colors & shapes

2.Adding more details to Galadriel's face

3. Resizing canvas, refining some details

4. Moving on to Frowndo Frodo's face (scariest part!)

The first two stages are from last night. It took me nearly 2 hours this morning (without breakfast!) to get to the third stage. I recorded today's process but Blogger's video window is too small for the whole thing to be seen.
I have always been struggling in the refining stage where I have to turn big blobs of color into details since the day I started painting in this method. Has it gotten any easier for me? No, but that's the good part. When something becomes too easy for us to obtain, it tends to take away our will to face new challenges.