Like Ellen, I use ArtGrid. especially for portraits, And agree its a bit labour intensive but it does enable you to enlarge the image. Never thought of using a light box though

If you are keen on tracing and you don´t want to use transfer or carbon paper you can always rub the graphite of a soft pencil on the back of the picture which you want to trace. It will leave good marks on the painting surface after tracing.

Hi Paul. I don't know what your DIY skills are like, but I made myself an A2 sized lightbox for under £30 using MDF, strip LED's and a couple of A3 opaque white acrylic sheets. It works well for the occasions when I just want to get on and paint without spending too much time on drawing.

Just joined this blog.....a bit late. I'm like Jenny Harris and paint on Saunders Waterford rough on a block. How can you get images onto that? Or am I being a bit dim. I'm not too accurate at drawing so I use an app on my iPad called ArtGrid (it's free) then I print it off and lightly draw a grid onto my watercolour paper the same as the photo grid. It's a "faff" to do and takes a while so I'm open to ideas! Not all of my paintings are done by that method though as I'm always eager to get paint on.

That's interesting, hadn't come across the Aquafine paper before, although it does say it's suited to fairly 'dry' watercolour techniques, which wouldn't be any good for me - I use Saunders Waterford 300 lb which is a bit like cardboard! (Doesn't need stretching, though, which I can't be bothered with.)

I have used lightboxes in the past, mainly year's ago when working as a graphic designer (pre-computers). They are useful things at times and so much easier than standing at a window, they are very easy and cheap to make, Google will tell you how to make one.

Jenny- using this method and the paper I'm using the daler rowney a4 size aquafine the image is easily traceable and you can clearly see the image through the paper Adele- Yes you are right its only a daytime method but at present it works for me. When I do them I try and do several at a time to save time later. Personally the standing is not a problem for me however I appreciate that its not for everyone

Hi Paul, Just invested in an A3 size lightbox. Drawing takes too long for me as I am not very good and I love the painting part so I trace and then enlarge my design on my copier and transfer it with Ghiant Transfer Spray. Even some of the Old Masters used a type of camera (obscura I believe) to project the image onto the surface to paint. If the window works for you then that is fine. The only major setback I can see is that you couldn't use that method at night. Of course, as Jenny points out, it is not as comfortable standing at a window.

Tried to change my previous comment but it won't let me! Meant to ask how, using the window method, do you then transfer it to heavier weight paper to paint on?

Paul I transfer my designs from layout paper to my watercolour paper by tracing, but I use transfer paper - a bit like the old fashioned carbon paper - available from Ken Bromley. It does mean your original needs to be normal paper weight, but if not you can always use a photocopy of it and then you don't mark the original either. Much more comfortable than standing at a window!