Does anyone have experience with painting an indoor mural?

I’ve done this for a charity before. What type of paint you use depends on whether or not it will be an indoor or outdoor mural. We projected the image up on the wall, drew the outline in pencil, and painted it.

Contact local art stores for donations of supplies and a pizza joint for fuel for the kids! Good luck!

I have a good friend who does this sort of thing for a living. Unfortunately my cell is dead and my charger at my girlfriends house, Ill try and remember to text him tomorrow and ask him everything about it.

When I was in high school we had a sort of senior project where a group of kids from the art class worked on murals after school. We each got a different part of the school to work on, like cafeteria, gym, music department, etc. and made a mural around that theme. (My friend Grace and I worked on cafeteria, so we got to make a mural that was all about food!)

The way they did it was to have us paint the mural in sections. We got flat sheets of wood, painted them with primer (gesso, they sell it at every art store) and then just painted on top with acrylic and they mounted it to the wall. This let us work in the art room and break the mural down into manageable sections- about 4’x2’ at a time. It was really easy to do it that way.

I have painted a number of murals (both inside and outdoors) and of both small and large scale. Feel free to PM me with questions. It would help if you could give some additional details (scale, height of the bottom from the ground, subject, etc.)

@BarnacleBill ‘s suggestion about using a projector to project the image onto the wall is a great one. You can also use carbon paper to transfer an image to the wall. That’s the way my husband usually does it because sometimes with a projector you can have some distortion.

I was also going to suggest asking for donations like @Cruiser said. Try any local paint and hardware store to see if they will donate tape, drop cloths, paint, carbon paper, etc.

If the mural is going to be outside, you’ll have to protect it. Keep in mind that if you choose an area without smooth walls, you’ll have to either paint on something else (like canvas or plywood) or else find a way to smooth the walls. If you get a craft or paint store to donate primed canvas, the mural can be painted on the canvas and then hung in your selected location with wallpaper glue (for an indoor mural).

My husband paints murals for a living. If you have any questions about sometime specific, PM me and I’ll ask him for you.

I would paint it small-scale first to get the picture, details, colors, etc. to your liking.