Tips on Faux Paint Techniques

Tips on Faux Paint Techniques
Clouding
Paint your base color a soft sky blue and allow to dry. Mix a glaze of white and another glaze of light silver-gray. Apply white glaze to about 25% of surface of base with a soft rag in a circular rubbing motion. While the white glaze is still wet, apply a small amount of the silver-gray glaze with another rag to the "edges" of the clouds and blend in. You can create white billowy clouds or clouds that have more of the silver-gray caste to them, whichever you prefer. If you find you've gotten too much of the silver-gray on the clouds, just go over it with more of the white glaze. Allow to dry.
Crackling
Paint your base color and allow to dry. Apply a coat of glue with a damp sponge. You can use either white glue or hide glue. A thin coat of glue will make fine, small cracks such as those found in an old oil painting and a thicker coat of glue will produce larger cracks. While the glue is still tacky, apply a coat of your top coat paint. As the top coat paint dries, the glue will shrink and crackling will occur. Allow to dry and seal with acrylic.
Brown/Taupe Granite
Paint your base color in a rich dark chocolate brown paint and allow to dry. Make three separate glazes; one in black, one in taupe, and one in ivory. Brush the taupe glaze over the entire surface (a small section at a time) and then blot with a damp sea sponge. Apply the black glaze by saturating a paint brush with it and then splattering it over the surface. Do the same with more of the taupe glaze and then the ivory alternating until you have tiny splatters over the entire surface. You do not have to wait for the first taupe glaze to dry since you are not actually touching the surface. If you would like to give the final granite effect a softer look, then sprinkle the entire surface lightly with a paint brush full of mineral spirits. If you're painting a vertical surface the mineral spirits may make it drip, but for a horizontal surface, you shouldn't have any problems. Let dry for several days because of all the layers of glaze. Apply a satin or semi-gloss varnish to bring out the depth of the paint layers.
Article Resource:
George G. is sales manager for Painting Pros Chicago www.yournewpaint.com a Chicago residential painting contractor. I hope you found this article useful. When you need to paint your house, visit : http://yournewpaint.com/ , they are painting contractors based in Chicago.

How To Paint A Ceiling Of Clouds

How To Paint A Ceiling Of Clouds

It's not that difficult to create a faux-cloud effect on a ceiling. The size of the ceiling is what determines the effort involved. If your ceiling is large, consider painting only a few billowy clouds in the corners. To begin, make sure that the surface is smooth, and has a fresh coat of paint in a light sky blue. After the blue base coat has dried thoroughly, mix a glaze in an extremely light blue color, such as Porter Paints #6463-1 or Sherwin Williams Bliss Blue. Most paint manufacturers sell a glaze liquid and will tint the liquid in the color of your choice. Sherwin Williams is called Faux Finishing Glazing Liquid.
Apply the glaze with a natural sea sponge, applying more glaze in the center of the cloud, thinning and blending as you move to the outside edges. It helps to have photographs of clouds to look at for inspiration as you're creating. You may want to finish up with a pure white glaze applied lightly and randomly to give a billowy effect to the clouds.
Giving your walls a custom, painted technique is fun and can be tackled by just about anyone. The most important thing on any of the following techniques is to make sure the wall has several coats of base paint. If your base coat is not sufficient, then your glaze or top coat will absorb into the base coat before you have a chance to work it around. One way to tell if your base coat is nonabsorbent enough is to use a satin or semi-gloss (never a flat paint) and before you begin your glazing, put a small amount of glaze on the base coat, wait a minute, and wipe off. If the paint absorbs into the base coat quicker than desired, add another coat of base paint.
Paint Colors to Use For Final Effect
This may be the hardest part of Faux Painting simply because you are layering colors and the glazes are typically more transparent than if they were in their original paint form. A deep green paint made into a glaze may come out several shades lighter than you expected. If yours turns out too light, you can always add darker tints to deepen it, this will save you from starting all over.
Article Resource:
George G. is sales manager for Painting Pros Chicago www.yournewpaint.com a Chicago residential painting contractor. I hope you found this article useful. When you need to paint your house, visit : http://yournewpaint.com/ , they are painting contractors based in Chicago.