How to draw over ProPresenter slides in real time

ProPresenter is the backbone of thousands of church booths — brilliant at lyrics, slides and cues. But when the pastor says "can I circle things on the map while I preach?", you hit a wall: ProPresenter has no live-drawing tool. Here are three practical ways to add one without replacing anything you already run.

Setup 1 — Full-screen sermon output (simplest)

Best for churches that project one screen and want the least moving parts.

1. Export your sermon graphics as images. Whatever you've built in ProPresenter, Canva or Photoshop — maps, diagrams, verse art — save the sermon visuals as JPG/PNG (or video files).
2. Upload them to your telestrator booth. In Telestrator Live, drag them into the control page in any browser and put them in service order.
3. Send the audience output to the projector. One click opens the audience view full-screen on the projector input. During lyrics and announcements you're on ProPresenter as usual; when the sermon starts, switch the projector input (or your video matrix) to the telestrator output.
4. The pastor draws from the iPad. They scan a QR code, the graphics mirror to their screen, and every Apple Pencil stroke appears on the wall instantly.

Total setup time is genuinely about ten minutes, and Sunday operation is: fire slide → pastor draws → clear ink → next slide.

Setup 2 — Transparent ink overlay in OBS or vMix (for livestreams)

If your stream runs through OBS or vMix, you can keep ProPresenter as the base video and float just the ink on top:

1. Add a browser source in OBS or vMix pointing at the telestrator's transparent, ink-only overlay URL.
2. Place it as the top layer over your program feed.
3. Everything the pastor draws now rides over whatever ProPresenter (or your cameras) are showing — circles and underlines on the livestream in real time, while your in-room chain stays untouched.

Setup 3 — A dedicated sermon screen

Some rooms run two surfaces: lyrics on the main screen, and a side screen (or confidence-style center screen) for sermon media. Point the telestrator's audience output at the sermon screen full time and leave ProPresenter on the other — no input switching at all, and the pastor's drawings live on "their" screen all service.

What about drawing directly inside ProPresenter?

As of today there's no built-in ProPresenter feature for live freehand annotation by the preacher. You can pre-build highlights as slide variations (a slide with the circle already drawn, then advance to it), and for some sermons that's enough — but it's preparation, not presence. The moment the pastor wants to respond to the room — circle the thing people just reacted to, trace the route as the story unfolds — you need real live drawing, and that's a telestrator's job.

Which setup should you pick?

• One projector, no stream: Setup 1. Switch inputs at the sermon.
• Livestream through OBS/vMix: Setup 1 for the room + Setup 2 for the stream (they run together).
• Multiple screens: Setup 3 — zero switching.