Every painter would like to paint fast and neatly. However, painting is a challenging task. Auspiciously, there are many painting tips, tricks, ideas, shortcuts and secrets that can help you paint efficiently without looking for painting service. Below are 6 ways you can paint like an expert:
1. Prepare the surface
If you want to come up with a good paint job, you should start by preparing the surface that is to be painted. This involves scraping, sanding, patching and filling every hole, dent, crack and surface imperfection. Although this is not an enjoyable part of the painting process, it is the vital part. No paint, in spite of its price, thickness, color, or manufacturer’s claims, can conceal a tarnished or cracked surface. You should also remove all the furniture in the room that you want to paint or if the furniture is not movable, cover it using a dustsheet.
2. Tint the Primer
To obtain expert-looking results, you should prime the walls or ceilings that you want to paint whether they are new drywall, raw wood or previously painted walls. There are reasons for priming:
• It obstructs stains and resinous ties from flowing through
• It provides single-coat layer for the cover topcoat
• It enhances adhesion that greatly minimizes blisters and lengthens the years of the topcoat.
To improve the topcoat’s coverage further, you should tint the primer to the finished color through mixing a small quantity of topcoat paint in the primer. You should make sure that the primer and topcoat are of similar solutions before mixing them. This can greatly enhance the capacity of the topcoat to conceal the prepped surface wholly.
3. Buy canvas
Expert painters often use canvas drop rags rather than plastic drop rags to protect the flooring from paint spatters. This is because canvas drop cloths are long-lasting, as well as rip- and puncture-resistant. They present low risk of tripping as they lay flat making it safe to walk from corner to corner. Moreover, canvas absorbs paint drips whereas plastic drop cloths become greasy when splashed with wet paint. Your shoes cannot collect paint from canvas. Furthermore, canvas droop cloths may without problems be folded in the region of corners and doorways whereas it is hard to achieve this with plastic sheeting. The other benefit of canvas is that they may be reused numerous times.
4. Extension pole
You should use extension pole rather than ladder to roll when painting rooms. There are several sizes of extension poles ranging from 18 in to 36 in. There are even extra long extension poles which telescope up to around 18 ft that can used to paint cathedral ceilings as well as loft spaces.
You should ensure the paint-roller handle include a threaded hole into its end so as to be able to fix it with the extension pole. You should buy an extension pole that has elastic, nonslip rubber grip as well as a firm metal core. Moreover, the extension pole’s threaded end should be metallic as plastic handles are very elastic; making them difficult to control, plus the plastic gets weary over time and may snap under pressure. Furthermore, ensure the telescoping shaft fits firmly in place and doesn’t break when forced.
5. Use a paint grid
You should use a paint grid to roll paint straight from the paint bucket rather than using paint trays. This is because paint trays can hold small quantity of paint, is difficult to carry it from one point to another and the paint can easily spill. To make it worse, a paint tray is placed on the floor and hence, it is easy to kick or step on it. On the other hand, paint grid is hooked on the rim of the bucket and you will just need to drop the grid in the bucket and close it at the end of the day.
6. Overnight storage
If at the end of the day you have not finished painting and have to continue the following day, you should roll off the extra paint in the paintbrushes as well as the paint-roller sleeves and then closely wrap them up in plastic food cover. After that, put the wrapped roller sleeves and brushes in the refrigerator so as they can remain fresh. This will prevent the paint from getting dry overnight and making your tools unusable. The following day, just remove the equipments from the fridge half an hour before painting time. Appropriately wrapped paint roller sleeves and brushes may be stored this way for a number of days if you’re dealing with a truly ambitious job.