Yes, Botsy draws on glass! This video demonstrates how to transfer lettering onto a window using Botsy.
It also shows the real drawing speed, so you can see exactly how fast and smoothly Botsy works in a live setting.
For best results, use glass or window markers specifically designed for non-porous surfaces like glass.
Botsy outlines your artwork with precise contours, making it easy to hand-paint over the lines if desired. This method is ideal for creating large-scale window lettering, signage, or decorative art, saving time and ensuring clean, professional-quality results.
This video shows how to draw a logo directly onto an office wall using Botsy.
Thanks to Botsy’s tool-free installation, you can easily set up or remove the drawing machine without damaging the wall—no nails, no cracked plaster, and no mess. The system uses removable hangers attached to the wall with popular 3M Command Strips, making installation quick and clean. Once the artwork is complete, the hangers can be taken down without leaving any marks.
Botsy is also ideal for drawing any font or text. With access to hundreds of font families and styles from popular font libraries, you can create custom lettering and branding in virtually any design. It’s perfect for logos, slogans, and wall quotes in offices, studios, or retail spaces.
Absolutely! Botsy is a fun and efficient way to create professional chalkboard art, whether you’re just starting out or looking to offer it as a service. Many coffee shops, barbers, restaurants, and wedding planners already use chalkboards—or need someone to design them. With Botsy, you can offer higher-quality, custom designs that stand out. It’s a great way to generate income from your home or studio, without having to work on-site or rush through projects. Just prep, draw, hand-color, and deliver.
Botsy User Tip for Beginners
A Botsy user explains:
When I started, I realized that clear communication, smart observation, and helpful suggestions can set you apart from the competition. It’s not just about drawing—it’s about helping small businesses grab attention, stay fresh, and sell more.
Here’s what’s worked well for me:
Observe the space. Notice traffic flow, lighting, and where a chalkboard can catch the eye. Suggest placements that make the most impact.
Talk to the business owner. Find out their messaging priorities—menus, quotes, hours, promos, or simply branding.
Bring ideas to the table. Propose visual improvements like adding a seasonal section, featuring bestsellers.
Use a hybrid approach: Offer a combo of permanent and washable markers. Draw the core graphics, branding, and layout with permanent markers, and leave areas (like prices or specials) in washable marker. This way, the client can update info themselves—without erasing your entire design or calling you.
Tap into the replacement board niche. If a shop already uses a chalkboard stand, offer to create a new board at home and deliver it. Just swap it in for the old one—quick and mess-free.
Offer discounted updates. If you already designed a layout, offer a lower price to tweak it for a new sale or season. Clients appreciate fast, affordable refreshes.
Keep it simple via email. Send sketches, approve digitally, deliver when ready. Many clients love how fast and hands-off the process is.
Pro Tip: Larger chains may require corporate approval, but small business owners are often excited to collaborate with creative professionals like you.
Botsy lets you focus on creativity while it handles the precision. The result? Professional work, done faster—and happy repeat clients.
The Botsy robotic tool offers many advantages:
Design on your computer first — Perfect your artwork digitally before bringing it to life on the wall.
Access ready-made designs — Use thousands of downloadable chalk art files and illustrations from popular design sites.
Draw any text, any way — Choose from a wide variety of fonts, styles, and languages. Botsy draws your text with precision—and you can hand-color it later for a custom finish.
Multilingual, multi-style — Botsy handles diverse languages and scripts with ease, making it a great tool for any audience.
Beginner-friendly — Even if you’re new to chalkboard art, Botsy helps you produce clean, impressive results. Your creativity is what makes the difference.
Minimal setup space — Since Botsy mounts to the wall, you can draw large artwork in even the smallest studio or home workspace.
Here are some examples of what you can create with the drawing robot and your own hand-coloring.
Visit the Botsy chalkboard drawing robot website atwww.botsy.com.
The faux stained glass is essentially fake stained glass that tends to be much more affordable.
The wall drawing robot is an excellent tool for sketching out your initial project on a wall. Botsy has a large drawing area, allowing you to create a realistic image. The image that will be displayed in your window frame. Furthermore, many faux stained glass designs have precise geometry and perfect symmetry. The drawing robot will outline everything for you with great precision.
Botsy can be a good tool for art classes and preparing materials for kids.
Step 1.
Choose a pattern that appeals to you. There are loads of free patterns available on the internet.
Step 2.
Outline the whole artwork on whiteboard or on a wall to check design flaws and overall appearance in real size. To experiment, use Crayola washable markers that can be easily washed out.
Step 3.
Apply painter’s tape to a hard plastic sheet and transfer the artwork to it.
Step 4.
Apply the liquid lead over the faux stained glass outline.
Step 5.
Color with acrylic paints, using your skills and creativity.
Botsy’s pen holder fits drawing tools with a diameter of 9 to 22 mm (0.35 to 0.86 in). This includes Sharpie markers, industrial Sharpie markers, whiteboard markers, chalk markers, glass markers and washable markers. These are available in retail stores, art and hobby shops, and online.
Choose your drawing tool for the surface you are drawing on, such as paper, painted drywall, plywood or concrete. On uneven or rough surfaces, use a marker with a firm tip. A firm tip keeps its shape longer and is less likely to wear down or mushroom.
You can certainly use the liquid chalk markers.
Use the markers you already love.
Botsy uses a different approach from Scribit—no brand-specific, proprietary markers required. You can use your favorite store-bought chalk markers, the same ones you use for sketching.
In the video, you can see the final stage of outlining the Espresso chalkboard. Botsy draws at a typical speed.
Two types of markers are in use:
Liquid wet-wipe markersfor menu items and prices. These can be easily erased with a damp cloth or sponge.
Permanent markersfor the decorative elements.
The finished chalkboard is for a coffee shop.
The overhead signs with wet-wipe liquid markers.
First, the blackboards are mounted on the wall and outlined with white and green chalk markers. After outlining, the letters are hand-colored.
When using the wall drawing machine, the washable markers are great for checking draft artwork on a wall.
Experiment with upscale, detailed patterns and images, different layouts, and geometric viewpoints. The machine will draw exactly what you’ve drawn on the computer at the scale you want. The large-scale outline can show design flows and mistakes that are difficult to spot on a computer monitor. You can even sketch your design on the client’s wall to demonstrate it and get final approval.
Crayola Washable Markers, in our opinion, are the greatest. Outlines created using Crayola Ultra-Clean Washable Markers are easily cleaned.
Yes, Botsy can draw on stretched canvases.
It draws the outline of your artwork directly on the canvas, so you can start painting by hand on an accurate base.
Botsy is a large drawing tool for vertical surfaces. It can outline large artworks in a single session, without splitting the image into parts or moving the canvas.
Why a vertical setup works for artists
Saves studio space. Botsy and the canvas hang on the wall, leaving the floor and tables free.
The canvas stays where you paint. Most artists work on an upright canvas, like on an easel. After Botsy draws the outline, you can start painting right away without moving or re-mounting the canvas.
Work in layers. Botsy can draw a new outline on top of painted areas. You can switch between machine and hand as many times as you need: outline, paint, outline the next layer, paint again.
Botsy draws the outline over the color painted layer.
Multi-layered painting with outlines drawn by Botsy.
Watch a short video of a multi-layered painting outlined by Botsy on the wall: watch on Instagram.
The video shows the painting in layers:
Botsy draws the outline of the first layer.
The artist paints the outlined areas in color by hand.
Botsy draws the final layer: black marker lines along the borders between the colored areas.
Adapter Set for stretched canvases
The Adapter Set is designed for stretched canvases up to 5 cm (2 in) thick. It moves the drawing tool 2.5 to 5 cm (1 to 2 in) away from the wall, so the canvas fits between the pen and the wall.
What’s included in the Botsy Adapter Set?
Three hangers with longer dowels and a wider base for a secure hold on the wall. Each hanger can be attached with three or four 3M Command Strips.
One bottom bracket for extra support.
The hangers work with 3M Command Strips for damage-free installation.
For permanent mounting, screw the hanger to the wall through the hole at the top.
The Adapter Set does not include hardware for mounting the canvas to the wall. Customers usually choose their own mounting method.
Contact us if you need help with a custom solution.
Yes, you can scale up a sketch using the drawing robot and a wood project.
These images show how to use Botsy over plywood to make a 3D window frame with traditional folk elements.
The drawing robot automatically outlines the sketch on the plywood in full size. In this case, there is no need for transfer paper.
This robot functions as a pen plotter, reducing labor costs associated with digital image transfer and increasing the consistency of the transfer process.
To begin, the entire window frame was blown up to full size on the wall. The full-size image greatly helps in detecting design flaws. The frame elements were then transferred to the plywood. The wood parts were then created using hand tools rather than a large CNC machine.
Botsy, according to a professional artist with an SFAI (San Francisco Art Institute) diploma, speeds up to 10 times the wall outlining process for complex vector art.
How did we figure this out?
Botsy traced this large 6-by-30-foot mural at the University of Florida. The experienced artist estimated that the same accurate outlining would take him 4-5 days. The drawing robot finished four mural sections in around 40-45 minutes each! That is why Botsy outperforms artists by a factor of 10 in image tracing.
Saves time. The wall drawing robot transfers designs to the wall quickly and removes hours of manual work.
Accurate results. Botsy enlarges your design to the exact size and draws it in the right position, matching the original design on your computer screen with high precision.
Saves space. Botsy is a wall-mounted drawing machine. It hangs on the wall it draws on, so it takes up almost no floor space in your studio, shop, classroom, or work site.
Lower costs. Less labor, fewer mistakes, and less wasted material reduce the cost of every project.
Works with any marker. Use permanent markers, dry-erase markers, washable markers, chalk, chalk markers, or pencils.
No drawing skills needed. The robot draws clean lettering and detailed artwork, so anyone can get professional results.
Open Arduino platform. Built on an Arduino microcontroller and CNC parts, Botsy is easy to learn, modify, and program.
Murals and Wall Lettering
Botsy is a wall drawing robot that draws your mural outline directly on the wall, so you can focus on painting.
Save time. The robot transfers your mural design to the wall quickly, without hours of manual work.
Accurate scale and placement. The mural drawing machine enlarges your design to the exact size and draws it in the right position on the wall, matching your original digital design with high precision.
Saves space. The robot mounts directly on the wall, so the floor stays clear for your paint, ladders, and tools.
Lower labor and material costs. Fewer work hours and fewer mistakes mean less paint, fewer materials, and lower costs for every mural project.
Creative freedom. Use any marker you like: permanent markers, dry-erase markers, washable markers, chalk, chalk markers, or pencils. Use any font or typeface for wall lettering, and try detailed patterns, complex images, and different layouts with washable markers before you paint.
Chalkboard Art
Botsy turns chalkboard art into a business you can run on your own terms.
New income stream. Coffee shops, restaurants, barbershops, small stores, and wedding planners use chalkboard signs indoors and outdoors. Offer them a chalkboard art service and start a side business or grow your current one.
Flexible schedule. Create chalkboard signs at home or in your studio, at any time. Deliver the finished boards to the business without taking up their time.
Professional lettering without hand-lettering skills. The drawing robot draws clean, even lettering and detailed artwork, so every chalkboard looks professional.
Faster production, more orders. The robot draws while you prepare the next design, so you can complete more chalkboards and take on more clients.
Technology and Science Museums
A wall drawing robot gives museums an exhibit that is both art and technology.
A live attraction. Visitors watch the robot draw large artwork on the wall in real time. It is an exciting demonstration that draws crowds and keeps people at the exhibit.
Hands-on intro to coding and robotics. Children see how code controls a machine and learn the basics of automation in a simple and fun way.
Links art and technology. The drawing robot shows children that creativity and technology work together, and it can inspire future careers in science and engineering.
Little staff effort. The robot can run the same demonstration again and again, with minimal setup and supervision.
STEAM Schools
Botsy is a drawing robot built on an Arduino microcontroller and CNC parts, which makes it a practical classroom tool for STEAM education.
Hands-on learning. Students learn coding, electronics, and engineering by working with a real robot instead of only reading about it.
Open platform. The Arduino and CNC design lets students build, modify, and program the robot themselves, and see how each part works.
Art meets STEM. Every project ends with a drawing on the wall, so students combine technical skills with creativity in one true STEAM project.
Universities and Colleges with Art Departments and Fabrication Labs
Botsy adds large-format drawing to the digital fabrication lab, next to CNC machines, laser cutters, vinyl cutters, and 3D printers.
Large-format drawing. The wall plotter draws at a scale far beyond desktop pen plotters and printers, directly on walls, boards, and large surfaces.
Low-cost addition to the fab lab. The drawing robot expands what the lab can do without the cost of large industrial equipment.
Skills in CNC and coding. Students learn how CNC machines and code work together while creating real artwork and design projects.
Useful across campus. Use the wall drawing machine for art projects, campus events, murals, and signage for departments and student groups.
Visit the Botsy drawing robot website: www.botsy.com.
