On completion of the initial version, David immediately began work on the second version which was finished on 25 May, the date of Bonaparte's inspection of the portraits at David's Louvre workshop. Two of David's pupils assisted him in producing the different versions: J*r*me-Martin Langlois worked primarily on the first two portraits, and George Rouget produced the copy for Les Invalides. In contrast to his predecessors Fran*ois Boucher and Jean-Honor* Fragonard, who employed a red or grey undercoat as a base colour on which to build up the painting, David employed the white background of the canvas directly underneath his colours, as some of his unfinished works show, such as his first attempt at a portrait of Bonaparte or his sketch of the Tennis Court Oath.
George Rouget
Fran*ois Boucher