Painting Tips

[Cgav34]

Going to attempt to paint my first carvings this weekend. Any tips?

The carvings are done on 1" thick solid pine boards. Colors will be white, black, and red. Planning to use some acrylic craft paints.

Do i need to pre-treat the pine first with a primer or polyurethane? These products will be for indoor use only.

Any advice/tips greatly appreciated.

[fwharris]

It does work best if you seal the board with either poly or lacquer to keep the paint from bleeding into the grain. If you are going to stain the board do that first before painting.

[rmock]

We
use a fast dry oil stain to seal the board then follow with acrylic paints and or other tone oil stain

[Ducky63]

The way I do my boards for painting is. If I'm going to stain it then put wood conditioner on it, then in 2 hours stain it. Let it dry that day and the then next day put outside varnish or if for inside then inside varnish on it. Let it dry before painting it. I use acrylic paint on mine. After I let the paint dry over night then I put at least 3 or 4 coats of varnish on it. Hope this helps you.

[jgowrie]

I have found a light misting of water on the bas-relief carves ( assuming you are painting a bas-relief? ) helps raise the grain. I'll then sand as much of the fuzzy grain away without digging into the details.. I am not sure it's possible to remove 100% of the fuzziness from the carve on a wood like Pine... I guess it really depends on the board, sharpness of the bit and what your carve quality was set to. I use an airbrush to mist the surface with water.

I next use shellac ( the Zinsser brand advertised as seal-coat ). One coat is normally enough on the bas-relief area to prevent any more raised grain once the final sanding. I have tried poly as others suggested but my personal feeling is shellac is a better choice.

[mtylerfl]

I agree with John. Seal the wood with SealCoat before painting with your acrylic craft paints. I'll often put two coats of thinned (50/50 denatured alcohol and SealCoat), sand off the fuzzies, then apply a coat or two of full-strength SealCoat before painting.

[SteveNelson46]

I also agree with sealing the wood prior to staining or painting. I have found that a good sanding sealer like Zinsser de-waxed shellac works pretty good. It's alcohol based and will accept just about anything applied over the top. It's not a good idea to use a lacquer based sanding sealer with a urethane topcoat. Lacquer dries relatively soft and urethane is very hard and durable. The harder surface on top of a softer base will allow the harder surface to peel over time. Shellac is a good sealer for almost anything as long as it's de-waxed.

[DevvyM]

I love this. What type of "fast dry oil stain"? I am not very familiar with this.
Thanks!
Dev

[rmock]

We use Varathane fast dry oil stain. Available at Menards. here is an amazon link with info
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B011VTB4YY...a-319683249243

[DevvyM]

Thank you!