The motif. The surface. No stencil.
Decorative painting has always been a placement problem. A damask repeat, a trompe l'oeil panel, a gilded crest — each has to land at exactly the right size, in exactly the right place, on a wall, a dado, or a cabinet door. The traditional ways all carry a setup cost: cutting a stencil for a motif you may only use once, pricking and pouncing a full-size cartoon, or wheeling out a projector that needs a dark room and a flat pale surface. Grid Maker Pro answers both ends: settle the repeat and its symmetry for free in the browser with all 82 overlays, then use the AR app to anchor your ornament to the actual surface through the phone and trace it at full size by hand. Free grids for spacing the repeat. The paid app for placing the motif on the surface itself.
Why placing ornament is the slow part.
The painting itself — the glazes, the gilding, the graining — is where the craft lives. But before a brush touches a wall, the motif has to be transferred to the surface at the right scale and in the right spot, and that transfer is where the hours quietly go. Here is the honest shape of the traditional routes, and the third one the AR app adds for the jobs where a cut stencil is overkill.
Cut stencils, pounce patterns, and the projector
All three work. Each asks for setup a one-off placement rarely justifies.
- A cut stencil is unbeatable for a production repeat, but cutting one for a single bespoke motif is a lot of blade work for one use.
- Pouncing — pricking a full-size cartoon and dusting charcoal through the holes — is exact and traditional, but making and perforating the cartoon is a job in itself.2
- A projector is fast but wants darkness, mains power, a clear throw, and a flat pale surface — a lit room or a curved cabinet door defeats it.
Anchor the motif to the surface itself
The Grid Maker Pro AR app pins your ornament artwork to the real surface through the phone camera.
- Look through the screen and the motif sits locked on the wall, panel, or furniture at full scale. Shift the piece; it stays put.
- It works in daylight, on a dado, chair rail, or cabinet door, with no cable run — the conditions a projector can't take.
- Zoom into one flourish without re-aligning the whole projection, then draw or pounce the outline straight onto the surface.
- It runs on-device. Your artwork never leaves the phone — the same privacy promise as the web tool.
Space free. Place at scale.
Decorative work rewards a settled repeat: get the drop, the pitch, and the mirror line right small, where a change costs nothing, then commit to the surface. The free browser tool owns the spacing; the AR app owns the placement. Three moves.
Space it in the browser
Drop your motif into the free tool and stack overlays. Set the drop and pitch of the repeat and confirm the ornament is truly symmetrical while changes cost nothing.
Free web tool · all 82 grids
Anchor it to the surface
Open the AR app at the panel, point the phone, and pin the motif to the surface. It locks in place at full size — no cut stencil, no pounce cartoon, no dark room.
AR app · paid
Trace it by hand
Draw or pounce the outline you see through the screen straight onto the surface. The scale and placement are already right, so the effort goes into the glazing and gilding, not the layout.
Pounce · pencil · your hand
Free overlays that settle the repeat.
Ornament reads by rhythm — even spacing, true symmetry, a repeat that holds across a whole run. That structure has to be deliberate, and it is cheapest to resolve small. These overlays live in the free browser tool. Stack them over your motif, fix the spacing and the mirror line, and only then take it to the surface. Leon Battista Alberti described squaring a design through a gridded veil in 1435;1 the principle behind scaling and placing a design accurately has not changed, only the tools have.
Sacred geometry
Flower of Life and radial constructions for building balanced rosettes, medallions, and radial ornament from a true centre.
→Rule of thirds
The first placement decision. Seat a feature motif on a third so a panel or overmantel reads from across the room.
→Golden ratio
Phi proportion and the spiral for scrollwork and cartouche that grow at a natural, unforced rate.
The AR app does the thing a browser can't.
The web tool spaces the repeat. The app places the motif. Built by Sujith Puthran, a working artist of more than fifteen years, the AR app locks your ornament over the real surface and lets you trace at full scale on-device. The 82 composition grids stay free forever in the browser — the app is the separate, paid product for the surface itself, and it never paywalls the planning.
Grid Maker Pro AR
Anchor any motif to your wall, panel, or furniture and trace it by hand at full size — no cut stencil, no pounce cartoon, no dark room. Android on Google Play, with iOS planned. No account to start, and your artwork never leaves the device. The free tier gives you three AR traces of your own photo every month plus all 82 overlays, so you can test it on a real panel before paying. For a long production run of an exact repeat, a cut stencil is still the faster tool — the app is for the bespoke and the one-off.
Free tier 3 AR traces / month + 82 overlays · Paid $29.99/yr · $6.99/mo · $79 lifetime
What decorative painters reach it for.
A client wanted a single hand-painted crest over a fireplace — not a repeat, just one motif, once. Cutting a stencil for that was a waste, and the room was too bright for a projector. I designed it in the browser, checked the symmetry against the flower-of-life overlay, then anchored the artwork through my phone and pounced it straight onto the wall at full size. The placement was right the first time.
For a long damask frieze we still cut a stencil — nothing beats it for fifty identical motifs. But for the one-off panels and the odd curved cabinet door, laying out the repeat spacing in the browser and placing the motif with AR saved us a cartoon every time. We use each tool for what it is actually best at.
The questions decorative painters ask.
Can I place ornament on a wall without cutting a stencil?
Yes — for a one-off motif or a layout you are still resolving. The Grid Maker Pro AR app anchors your ornament artwork to the actual wall, panel, or furniture through the phone camera, so when you look through the screen the motif sits locked in place at full size and you draw or pounce the outline by hand. That skips cutting a stencil for a single placement and skips wheeling out a projector. Be honest about the limit: for a long production run of an exact repeat, a cut stencil still wins on speed and consistency. The AR app shines when the motif is bespoke, the surface is awkward, or you only need to place it once or twice.
How do I keep a damask or ornament repeat evenly spaced?
That part is free, and it is best settled before you touch the wall. Drop your motif into the free browser tool and stack a grid — the rule of thirds and simple column grids set spacing, while sacred-geometry and symmetry overlays check that a mirrored or radial ornament is truly balanced. You resolve the drop, the pitch of the repeat, and the mirror line small, where a mistake costs nothing, then take the settled spacing to the surface. Composition is planning; the AR app is placement.
What does AR ornament tracing do that a projector cannot?
A projector needs darkness, mains power, a flat pale surface, and a clear throw distance — a lit room, a panelled dado, or a curved piece of furniture rarely gives you all four. AR tracing locks the ornament to the surface through the phone, so it works in daylight, on a wall or a chair rail or a cabinet door, with no cable run. You move freely, the motif stays pinned, and you can zoom into one flourish without re-aligning the whole projection. It runs on-device, so your artwork never leaves the phone. The honest comparison of methods is laid out in grid method vs projector vs tracing.
Is the Grid Maker Pro AR app free?
The free web tool with all 82 composition grids is free forever, in any browser, with no signup. The AR app is the separate paid product that locks a motif over your real surface and lets you trace it at full scale — the thing a browser cannot do. Its free tier gives you three AR traces of your own photo each month plus all 82 overlays. Unlimited AR is $29.99 a year, $6.99 a month, or $79 once for lifetime access. It runs on Android via Google Play, with iOS planned, and starts with no account.
Does this replace pounce patterns and stencils entirely?
No, and it does not pretend to. Pouncing and cut stencils are still the right tool for production repeats — dozens of identical motifs down a frieze, where a reusable stencil pays for itself in speed and dead-consistency. What the AR app removes is the setup cost when you do not need a reusable tool: laying out a single trompe l'oeil panel, siting a bespoke crest on a cabinet, or spacing a repeat you are still deciding. Use the free grids to design the repeat and check its symmetry, use AR to place a one-off, and reach for a cut stencil when you are running the same motif many times.
References
- Alberti, Leon Battista. On Painting (Della Pittura, 1435). Penguin Classics (1991). ISBN 978-0-14-043331-3. The velo — the gridded veil for squaring a design up accurately.
- Cennini, Cennino. Il Libro dell’Arte (The Craftsman’s Handbook) (c. 1400). Trans. Daniel V. Thompson. Dover (1954). ISBN 0-486-20054-X. The medieval workshop manual describing pouncing and the pricked cartoon (spolvero).
- Hambidge, Jay. The Elements of Dynamic Symmetry. Yale University Press (1920). Dover reprint, ISBN 0-486-21776-0. Root-rectangle composition keyed to the proportions of the surface.
- Bouleau, Charles. The Painter’s Secret Geometry. Harcourt, Brace & World (1963). The canonical study of compositional armatures and proportion in painting.
Get the motif onto the surface.
Space the repeat for free in the browser with all 82 overlays, then anchor the ornament to the wall, panel, or furniture with the AR app and trace at full size. No cut stencil, no projector, no upload — your artwork stays on your device.