Paper Bag Spray Booth

 I needed to put a light spray of polyurethane on this Christmas ornament but wanted to contain as much of the spray as possible.

My solution was to cut the side off a paper bag so that I could really see where the spray coating was going.
Using a whole bag contained the spray better but you couldn't really tell where it was going. Cutting it back and laying it down just made it easier to work with.

When I quit using this bag as a spray booth I'll cut it into pieces and use it up to lay paints out on as I work on other projects.

The other useful thing about working this way is that you can move the bag around and be able to spray all of the sides in one session which allows for a more even finish.

I'm using a satin finish polyurethane for this and fine that just one can can do several projects which keeps your cost down.

Pine Cone Box Painting Project

Putting the pieces together

Painted kit pieces

Painting the table top

I'm not doing any drawing out or planning with the design on this, just putting the branches and pine cones wherever I feel like it and really enjoying the process. When it's going well the time just flies.

As I look at this picture I can see that there are some areas that need more work and I'll take care of that when I get back to my paints.

Stopping to take pictures along the way keeps you focused on the overall design of the project and from over working some areas.

I still feel that this is going well, what do you think?

Making Flaws work for you

The beauty of locating pine cones over knots or other dark areas in the wood is that should the color ever bleed through it will just look like part of the design,

Painting a flat pack table

The beauty of working with a flat pack is that you can paint each piece separately without having to get in awkward positions or reach around anything. the pieces just lay flat on your table and isn't really much different than painting on a canvas panel.

Each pine needle is painted separately using a size 0  liner brush

This shelf turned out to be a wood veneer so I dropped the pine cones and branches over the edge so we didn't have to look at the core.

Here's a close up of the effect.

Here's a longer shot of the shelf.

The corners aren't bad either.

Painting a background to photograph fresh flowers against

Here's what I have for this project:

A blue and white pitcher given to me by a good friend

A bouquet of carnations given to me by my sister in law

A canvas panel from another friend

Old, natural sponges

An assortment of acrylic paints in shades of red, ochre, and black

I think this will work out well as I attempt to build a finish that will resemble the side of a barn.

I've stopped for tonight to let the first layers dry but plan to get back to it at first light tomorrow.

I arranged the flowers and we shot this the next day.
I'm back at work painting the background to look more like old barn wood.

Painted Pines Corner Shelf

Painting these shelves to look like wood gives me a nice way to display some of my pottery and keep various art and craft supplies handy at the same time.

4 step painted Butterfly

Paints:

orange

yellow

black

white

 Brushes:
Use any soft, round brush that will fit the size of your butterfly for the details and a flat brush to apply the base coat of black.

Use black to base coat your butterfly shape.

 Add details in orange, yellow and white as shown and black outlines as needed.

Painting rustic finishes

The shelves on the other side of the room are all simply varnished wood so I felt these shelves would be nicer if they looked more like they matched them.

 Just a few basic colors is all you need, You can mix red, yellow, white and black to get the brown tones that you want or you can just lighten or darken a couple of regular shades of brown. The choice is up to you and whatever you have on hand to work with. These are satin finish acrylic enamels.

I felt this was too dark for this project when working with the black so I pulled out a couple of bottles of brown paints to work in and over it.

I may keep working more lines of different colors into the woodgrain but I'm pretty  happy with this for now and will take another look at it in the daylight tomorrow.

It's going to be fun to see how it looks when I get the pine needles painted on to the branches.