Bro "cheating" to remake what you have already made once is no cheating at all, so use whatever makes it easier for you to make those awesome artworks. We support you. Also it will be nice to see all the creators to gather near those walls and give a farewell before they are demolished. If you are in contact with them, I hope you give it a try.

Maybe before the wall is demolished you could do a “thank you” mural or something that the workers there will be able to see and appreciate….before they destroy it lol

They’re very useful for commission pieces. First - time is money. Any time you can save is money in your pocket. Second - the customer has signed off on a specific design, and any variance they can use to justify not paying the full price.

I've been working with projectors for years. Avoid moving them when switched on and let the bulb cool down after using before you pack it away else you can blow the bulb and replacements aren't cheap. The Optomas are nice and bright for the price. As previously mentioned, a short throw projector may be a better option.

artist should be free to use all the tools they can find. who cares about the "cheating" factor? seeing their creations on the wall is still stunning though.

I’ve been using a projector for years, time is money! Most simply put, it all depends on What you project. If you are projecting and tracing your own work, it is simply a fantastic tool 👍

2:00 no. Proportions are always important, but graffiti letters, bugs, monsters, and spaeceships are so easy to paint, because most people are not experts in this stuff and so they can`t decide if it is good or bad. but if you are an expert in graffiti letters, like in portrait painting, crooked lines hurt the same way like two left eyes in one face.

@doke You need to get yourself a "short throw" projector. They are more expensive but the distance issue would virtually be eliminated. The other factor is the "nits" that the projector puts out. The more nits, the brighter and more powerful the projector can throw the image. As a baseline, you'll be after 5000+ nits for it to be fully visible in the daytime. This will NOT be cheap at all but it is possible if there is a situation where you can see yourself needing to put something up in a time crunch. Really love your videos and your work man. I appreciate you and look forward to your future projects!

Work smarter not harder. Use it when it benefits you. You're still creating the initial design. It's no different then drawing something on one thing and tracing it onto another. It's not cheating. Keep being awesome and thank you for the content.

The projector seems to be the way to go! Of course, the weather plays a roll but, you've got backup options! Thanks for sharing. The construction guys were hilarious.

To fix the lighting, you can just start early in the morning when its darker then by full light, you can finish the details

One thing you could improve. A projector projects light, it cannot project "dark", so when you project an image composed of black lines, what it is really doing is projecting the white background around it, and not putting any light into the areas of the lines, this means your lines will be the same brightness as your background. If you have a quite a light coloured background (like the light grey wall in the video), this would mean there's less contrast between the background and the strokes, to bump up the contrast you can paint the wall black instead of grey. Alternatively you could also change the image you are projecting to have a black background and strokes which are brightly coloured like bright red or green.

I’ve been working with doing my art with projectors for a few years now! I use a Epson LC 1080p one! Ever sense my teacher went ‘ yeah back in the day the masters used to use them also to trace there huge paintings out ect’ and I was hitched on it. Cause I didn’t really know how to paint at the time.. And it has increased my painting a ton. I also started with shit projectors! If you really dump you’re money into em, you’ll get better results with you’re work! I also get loads of requests/jobs so I don’t have a lot of time to sit and measure shit. Even though I should! Cause people want there shit lol. Loved this video man! Been watching you for a few years now! Wish we had legal walls here

One thing that wasn't mentioned was parallax, which is where the image will warp if the projector is not aimed exactly at the middle of the canvas. Think if you were going to aim the projector at a 20m wall from the ground... the wall at the bottom might be 5m away, but the wall at the top is now 25m away, and the image gets bigger as it goes up the wall. Most projectors have built in ways to counter this effect, but you must take time to adjust the setting to make sure it is correct.

I’ve been using this method for years and it can’t be cheating when you just blow up what you already created. Excited to see what you create with this in your arsenal.

Hey brah, my Names Jever and I'm a muralist from Usa. One of your old vids was my introduction to doodle grids. I now use them constantly and has totally changed my game. It's helped my business a ton. Saves time, Helps me give renderings better than just a pic of a sketch. Etc. game changer for sure.

what you could do is get a laser projector that shines the laser where the lines are. like one you use for a party, but instead of music... use it for painting if the laser light could shine where the lines are then it would be powerful enough in the daylight

Personally I don't longer see this as graffiti. I know that everybody has a different vision of what graffiti should be. But one of the things that makes someone a good graffiti artist or writer, is that he's also able to put his letters on the wall in the right proportions. That's what separates the good from the bad. I think I'm getting old but if I see someone using this for 'easy' stuff, then it'll be hard for me to take them serious.

Super awesome Doke! I have the mindset that it doesn't matter how you get to the end, as long as you are satisfied with the result. The projector could definitely help speed up the tedious parts of your work, so you can focus on the details.

This is what I call the winner of the number 1 mural artist of the past 10 years. Cause that’s what’s doing the work.

I'm curious if there's a machine that can project lasers of your design 🤔 would be stronger than a normal projector for sure

I think it is pretty cool, and I agree that the final result is what matters. This would shine when doing portraits (I've seen you do some faces and it's hit or miss! lol). Would love to see more with the projector and what limits you can push it too!

You should paint the green tractor and the two workers in orange jackets on that wall,... It will blow their mind

Also there’s one more old method people still use Pouncing. I have done it a couple times for a mural company, but yeah projecting is a lot easier. I only like using a projector if it’s for a client piece that they want the mural done asap, but for my personal art I use a grid I just make dots. I have tried other things like putting pieces of tape in random spots of the wall as a grid method.

If you ask me, the different types of methods have their place. If you want it quick and dirty with only slight preplanning, go freehand. If you want to make a moderately large piece like a graffiti on a 2 meter wall, go with a grid. If you want to do a mural on the side of a large building where crucial details could be several feet apart, go with a projector

Super dope 😯 It's a good tool for sure when is used right. Like I can definitely see that it can be helpful for characters or for doing a clean project for a business/shop etc.

This video saved me months of thinking, the scribbles method i see all the time with artist using but i never know what its called or how its being used, thanks doke.

Brand spankin new viewer here - found you while doing research on nightquill adapters. You've got great stuff, I learned a few things that had nothing to do with the projector from this video and I've been painting about 17 years. Thanks for spreading the knowledge

I started my sign and mural painting business three and a half years ago. From the very start I purchased a projector for $800. Since then it’s paid for itself at least 50x over. I’ve used freehand, square grid, doodle grid and projector. Hands down the projector is always the most fast and accurate. Like I said before, I started a mural “BUSINESS” years ago so whatever can get me from start to finish and onto the next project the quickest is the best way. Time=$$$. And completely agree, end result is all that matters in the end, could care less if people hate on me for using a certain method.

i don't think using a projector is cheating especially because you still have to design what you will draw before hand. The only thing I can say is that freehand has some uniqueness that the projector doesn't have. Maybe the slight mistakes that the freehand creates makes the art feel more organic? However you will not always want this organic feel, when you are doing a commission for example, you probably just want the exact perfect proportions. Projector will be very good for that.

It looks great Doke. I have 2 suggestions to alleviate the issues you seem to be having. 1. They offer short throw projectors. The benefit is that they don't need to be 7m away. 1 or 2 would probably be good. 2. Having another projector shining the same image from another angle would prevent you from casting your Shadow on the wall so much. A problem you would like likely encounter with this setup though is that the images would need to be skewed because they wouldn't be perpendicular to the wall.

Hi Doke. I started following your work at the beggining of this year, and I love your stuff. As you ask what we think, to be honest, I've seen that there is some sort of street meritocratic idea that this is not true/based enough. But in job terms, you win a lot of time and loose a lot of effort, specially when you deal with clients that want things get done fast and as close as possible to the sketches that you present to them in the first place. Its simply a tool, and as valid as the grid or the free hand method. The downside is in the cost of having such tools, but if you can afford them (and make your life easier btw), then I guess you can ignore all that street meritocracy and do your thing. Cheers from Argentina and keep it up!

If you cut your stencils out by hand or use a digital image of your own on a projector, it is fair game. The only grief I have with the process is that I foresee some people in the future never learning to draw and only tracing. I enjoy doing a piece over and over again. I get better every time and in my opinion, that should be the point. I think the projector idea would be ideal for a giant mural. Thanks for the inspiration.

Those construction workers were hilarious, i love your people, dead honest, no BS. "I dont like those stupid letters" lol

You need to use a short throw projector . You place it on the floor about a foot away from the wall and it projects the image up at an angle .

I was using freehand graffiti techniques from many years but now making murals in a restaurant and doing commission work, Projectors gives crisp and fine results in lesser time and the satisfaction of the client as well

I'm not an artist but I used a projector a couple of times to draw art on our walls at home. My daughter can choose every couple of years a new look for her room. I just project the photo she wants a we paint it together and she is always happy with the result.

On light surfaces invert the image so the outline you are tracing is white or green, this will help it be more visible as you eyes will adjust to the small amount of white light reflected from the outline and not the large amount when its projecting white for all of the background.

This would not be for me, I love the creative part most so my favorite is freestyling the first outlines and creating those initial shapes and proportions. Anything after that is just technique that is learned by repetition and painting by numbers basically, which is boring but has to be done to get that nice end result. But I can see the value for professional artists and muralists and I know many that use it for years. So if it makes you happy than use it. If you think it makes it too easy and everyone can draw like you with less training than you have just been taken over by technology. You're not gonna stop people from using it anyway, so adapt or die.

You said it yourself. It´s not just faster but also more accurate. It´s more like striving for perfection than cheating. For someone doing professional art it gives you more time on project planning and will also allow you to use time differently. It´s only a benefactor.

I've used a projector for commissions before, sometimes its straightforward you have enough room and the room isn't so bright, sometimes it is a nightmare the room is not big enough it is too bright. But should you use one if you are not painting for a job? My honest opinion is if you can do it free hand or with a grid then why not. But I don't think that people who can not achieve the same results with manual methods should use the projector as that is cheating rather than saving time.

I use a projector exclusively for my murals....I do mine a little different though, I mask off what's not going to be painted with blue painters tape, the I cut what ever tape is still in the area that is going to be painted...so I lay it, spray it, the peel it...works great for me

As long as the original art is yours however you reproduce/resize it is not cheating. Projectors are a fantastic tool. Great video. Thanks

Thats such a shame that the legals walls are gonna be taken down. Theres so much lovely art on there. Hopefully theres another legal spot close to you!

You don't have to Prove your skills Doke! As an artist you get to use whatever tools you want to achieve perfection!

I’ve been painting graffiti since 2000. I never considered using a projector to paint graffiti. But when I started painting professionally around 2010 I discovered that using a projector is practically essential to paint professional murals, at least for me. When a company needs to see a perfect render prior to the job, or when they need their logo to be exactly perfect, a projector is almost required. There have been times when I used a portable power source (which I already had for camping). There have been times when I traced the projected image with pencil or chalk prior to using the spray paint. Light is always your enemy when projecting. Sometimes if there’s too much ambient light, you can see the image from far away but then when you get up close it’s difficult. A way to fix this is to alter the image to black and white, and even break it down to a simple “line drawing” if you have to. I’ve done this many times. The point of using the projector is to get the sketch on the wall, you don’t need to project a full color, final looking version, project black and white so you can see it better. You can also still paint much larger than your projector can go by projecting a portion, tracing that part and then moving the “box” around on the wall to get the other parts, hope that makes sense. But as for using a projector to paint your name as a graffiti writer, I wouldn’t call it cheating as much as I would just say it’s wack, it’s a crutch, it’s not the way graffiti is done and it doesn’t help you get better at painting. I think if you’re painting a character and choose to use the “doodle grid” technique, that’s a pretty cool way to use technology to get it done. It still requires a lot of skill.

Ten Hundred - Peter Robinson uses projector's on his large project's. I see no problem with them as long as you and your client are happy with end results. On a personal note Doke I would like to thank you again for the very cool print I recently received from you. The 3d print is amazing. The gold print is also a favorite but the two the additional tags you did are very special to me because they were done by your hand. I'm looking forward to what the new year brings my friend.

About 20 years ago I build my own projector out of a cardboard box, a little light bulb, a battery and a slide. It worked well when it was dark.

Is it worth experimenting with different colours in the projected art to make the lines more visible? Yellow and black give the highest contrast. You could also try inverting the background and the line (black background with white or yellow lines) to see if that makes things easier. Finally, you have the artwork you want to create, perhaps having a version for projections with thicker lines would be make it clearer on brighter days.

If you're a professional mural painter and this could speed up your work then yeah it makes total sense to use a projector to at the very least get your proportions 100% correct. I know I have see you and many other painters mess up the proportions of a wall painting and then have to redo them. But with this you can just do quick outlines of the piece and boom your off to painting and doing your thing with 100% certainty that you can just go ahead and lay down paint without worrying about proportions and such. Anyone who thinks hand sketching is a total must do aren't really thinking in an efficient manner for their work. Honestly it would make allot more sense to take a photo of a wall or if possible the clients send you a photo of the wall they want painted. And then you take that photo and sketch out a work over that photo. Then use the projector maybe the night or evening before if possible to get your outlines down. Then come in the next day or maybe you just show up really early in the morning and sketch. And then paint. What ever you do to work it out you will definitely be far more efficient overall. The down side is relying on dim lighting conditions. Maybe you could work with a company to make a lazer projector that just puts up a lazer outline of the work. Lazers show up in daylight and its maybe possible to make something like this cheaply due to how common certain lazers are these days. Or this already exists am I am already describing something already out there. If all you need it to do is give you outlines for your work then color and such aren't needed anyways.

Like Tequila Dave mentioned.....a short throw projector will help get large images on walls from a shorter distance away. Additionally, a projector with higher lumens will produce an image with a brighter picture in daylight. That can help with the sketching during the daytime. Either way, keep up the good work and use whatever tools help you recreate your vision.

I would say that instead of using a traditional projector, use a laser light projector. Instead of spreading out light, it concentrates the beam into a point. This would allow you to make outlines in situations where bright ambient light like outside a lesser issue. Sure you might not be able to color inside lines as well as your projector, but if you’re just making outlines, it should be perfect.

I work for a company that rents projectors called PRG. We have offices in Europe Asia and the americas. If you were charging to paint a mural you could factor in the cost of a bright PJ with generator and even scaffolding.

i think this is a great solution. ive used a projector before for murals and it always makes everything so much easier, and it also takes the guesswork out

Idea for a wider picture even in narrow spaces: Place the projector facing away from your wall. Then position a mirror in a tripod to reflect the picture back to the wall. That way you can cut the distance by ½. We used this method when we had a projector instad of a tv. Works pretty good. Of cause you have to flip the image.

In the pass, i had hired a team to paint on a wall in a club. They used Retro-Projection (the same tool they used in school to teach you maps on a wall) ^^ it did worked well

The only time I think tracing is bad is if you’re trying to learn how to draw because you’re not going to learn from tracing. If you have the artistic skill to draw without tracing, then it simply becomes a tool to speed up the process.

If doodling, tracing, protecting and any other means to get the sketched outlines of your project up on a wall, is cheating, then so be it....its the final painting that is the life of the art. So what's now buried underneath is only a part of the process...you still did all the hard-yards to create the artwork! BOOM!! 💟💟💟

Can't believe when you revealed the other projector it is the one I'm actually watching this video on in my livingroom right now! It is a great projector indeed, it is all about the lumins and the short throw my friend :)

Also, you might want to prepare your sketch image to "pre-correct" perspective projection and put projector right side of wall normal axis, to avoid occluding light by your body and hands.

The use of the projector I believe is great when you have less time for the piece and complicated lines or design altogether….sometimes being able to have it sorted ( outlines)in less than two hours rather than a whole day helps.

I find overhead projectors give much cleaner lines and work better in light situations. You can find 3M ones that fold into a little case. You can also get a ryobi battery with power inverter for ease of use/transport.

Hells yeah!! I've been struggling with this for a while, deff the most informative video on the topic. I do not see how the projector method is cheating.. I use mine all the time but mines not digital its a drawing projector from autograph so you have to draw what you project and have more limitations to the sizing of the images. If I were to do more murals on walls I would deff look into investing thank you again for your time and for the doodle grid process as well

Using a projector will keep you from learning to naturally draw the right proportions, Which is a must have skill for any artist

I think a lot of large scale muralists use it. Also it’s good for odd perspective techniques and sort of using 3D CAD program and projecting it onto buildings and achieve results like Peeta. I used to use projectors a lot in traditional graphic design, the only drawback to them is their lens distortion. If you want absolutely straight block letters it’s difficult to achieve without warping them in some way.

Regarding the Projector. If doing work for clients, Time and Accuracy is of outmost importance, but when you are having fun and just making murals on public walls for KZfaq, I believe your viewers will appreciate you showcasing your skill (without Projector).

Love the 2 nd portion with different paints already printed !

Projectors were used before the doodle grid. As some mention it’s a pain in the ass to use as you notice because of distance and time problems. However there is another issue which is the location of your projector. Really needs face on every time as it will deform the image when placed at an angle. The trick used before was to deform the sketch in advance according to the angle of the wall and then project but actually that also gets slightly deformed. It’s barely noticeable at first but on faces it’s what gives it away. Doodle grids are the only way to go in my opinion. And always freehand if graffiti

If you vectorize the sketch you could use something like the laserCube. Since the draw with laser light they are relatively immune to sunlight, bit they are quite expensive and i don't know about their field of view. Great video :)

Since you're already a proven professional who is perfectly capable of replicating the correct proportions, I only see this as improving your speed and not cheating

If you do a really big mural you can rent big professional projectors with the lens you need. I work with equipment like that. But I can tell you that in would need a little more planing, more power and projecting something in direct sunlight is close to impossible.

Could you break the image into quadrants, and do a quarter of the image at a time, moving the projector between areas?

This is exactly what I have thought of and used once, helps a lot.

Short throw projector from optima are very handy outside. But will need power source. They sit very close to wall so brightness better but shadow is harder to deal with. You can also try stacking projectors. In some exhibition they use multiple projectors and stack them vertically or horizontally and faze in the different screen to sit all in one location to enhance the brightness of the picture.

Idk if this had been mentioned yet but inverting the drawing so it’s a black background instead of white would increase contrast during the day and make it easier to see!

It’s super satisfying to watch you paint with the projector

you need to get a short throw projector. they are meant to be close to the wall

9:10 these guys were super chill, and as an outsider to this hobby I'm kinds with em. We can't even read the names sometimes, and even if you do we don't really recognize graffiti artists names lol. People really like to see murals and pictures rather than someone's nametag splashed up on a wall

i think there's no problem using the projector it turns out very smooth very fast and very clean, you also did create the art yourself in the sketching and all, but only until you copy other people's work and that's 100% plagiarism 😂

For cheap, You could get a flash light and point it through a piece of paper

You can still use it in small spaces by bouncing the image off a mirror. And you can also to some degree reduce the parallax issue with it. Just remember to project a mirrored version of your original image, if the projector doesn't have mirroring as a menu option.

I do lots of visuals for events and clubs. The best ones I have found are laser projectors for doing lined art in daylight, but no matter what, it's going to be hard to get a sharp image. The only thing I could suggest is adjusting the image's contrast using the built-in settings or the app settings. Hope that helps

You can get short throw projectors that only need to be a meter or so from the wall to project a large image

Laser projector! Convert the image to vector layers, then set a laser projector to trace what you need. It's very bright and will work in the sun. You can also break up the layers into areas, which would also work with a regular projector (project onto a smaller mapped area).

Since you only have a small area with projector during day time you could zoom in the image so it matches proportions of the wall and do the panting in portions.

Can you make a vid where u show all the pieces on these walls for a memory? Would be interesting

My father R. I. P. used a projector over 30 years ago to do murals on bedroom walls. Most definitely a good way of doing things.

that backhoe driver was a top dude! what a great attitude. as for the subject of cheating... its just a TOOL. it doesnt apply paint for you nor create sketches for you, it just a tool to help bring your ideas to life. if people want to be pedantic, they should put the spraycans down and go back to using brushes only.

Oh and if you are using a laptop make sure that the laptop doesn't put itself to sleep automatically or you will have to resize and line up your reference again which is damn difficult sometimes!

I wonder if you created a negative image so that you are projecting a black box with white lines, that would probably help to improve the visibility of the sketch projection.

I'm wondering if projecting the template in a different color than black could work better, because the black will only be an absence of white light on an already white wall, conflictingly making not that high of a contrast. Maybe projecting something in blue with an orange background or something would be more visible during day

They also make a projector called a "short throw" projector that allows the projector to be closer to the wall.

You should also look into whats called a short throw projector...im not sure how powerful they are but they are made for narrow spaces

Maybe try using more contrasting colors from your background on the projector to the wall. That might help make it pop in the day time

My opinion is even with a projector it is still artwork that you've taken time to make it really doesn't matter that it's tracing the work you had already created. You're effort is still in the art work you designed it then transferred to the wall it's still dope thank you for your content

My dad was a commercial sign painter and used to paint billboards and sometimes he would use a projector on big projects. Or he would use a pattern and chalk bag .

Nothing wrong with short cuts especially on a commissioned piece...that being said if your regenerating an image u already created and already knowing ur plenty capable of freehand...no way tracing ur own piece is cheating...rock on DOKE!!!

They have short throw projectors that produce a very large image with the projector very close to the screen (wall) and laser powered projectors that are very bright. They can get extremely expensive though!

Maybe with colors swaped. Black background and white outline, the projector would be more visible under a bridge with limited darkness

This is how I painted cartoon characters in scenes on my kids' walls 16-17 years ago. Guess I was a prophet.