How To: Paint A 150-Foot Tall Dark Knight Rises Mural

This is a 150-foot Dark Knight Rises ad painted on the side of a building at 315 Park Avenue South in New York City. I dunno, I guess they don't make posters that big. I did have a pretty big Cindy Crawford one on my dorm room wall though. Jk jk, it was SpongeBob. The process:

A life-sized rendition of the artwork is broken down into a simple outline. This is called the cartoon and is, in fact, where the modern use of the word "cartoon" comes from. Holes are punched through the outline to form a dotted stencil that is then gone over with a charcoal pounce. By the end, they have the wall mapped out with the most basic shapes and proportions in place.

The oil-based paint is then mixed to match the larger portions of the painting, leaving the subtle blending and mixing to be handled ala prima on the wall. Each painter has a print-out of the design strapped to their arm, like a mini shield, that they use as a guide as they flesh out all the details.

It took four guys about five days of sunrise-to-sunset painting to complete The Dark Knight Rises.

Damn, five days of sunrise-to-sunset painting? How can you even feel your arm after that? Because one time I threw a baseball and my arm was done for like, days. My roommate had to feed me and everything. "Why didn't you just use your other hand?" Shhhhhhhhh, I made him give me sponge-baths too.

Hit the jump for a bunch of the process and a rock-solid shoutout.

Thanks to Evil Ares, who's so evil he would have graffiti'd the shit out of that thing and painted a penis in Batman's mouth. Okay now that's just TOO evil.

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