Painting what a pain!

It take me forever to paint a board. I am talking about painting on the foam with black boarder pinlines, masked off rails and one color on the top and bottom. It take me over 6 hours to do this…I can shape a board in about 3 hours but when it come to painting I just suck. masking off and and getting things ready to paint is a real pain. any tips on how to make painting a board faster? Kudos to all you airbrusher and board painters out there.

First off, how are you painting? If airbrushing, its all about how you set up man. If you are doing it by hand with foam brushes - there is no quick way about it. Just remember to be light about how you apply the paint.

No brushes here mon. masking off for me takes most of my time. I am fully set up. got three air spays guns. 27 gl tank. I was just wondering how long does the average two color decent looking spray/air brush job take a pro to do? Airbushers should make more than shapers?

Ive done everything from spraying froma can, to brushing it on manually with a two inch foam brush, to airbrushing.

If you do your research and do stuff right and carefully, airbrushing should atually be pretty painless. Especially if you have the right equipment. I would imagine a full shaping process to take longer for an experienced shaper in comparison for an experienced paintman.

Watched Local Motion’s airbrusher from the early '70’s do some boards.

He takes about the time I take to shape! And that’s a rainbow 6 color fan from nose to widepoint, then fanning back out and faded!

I take about an hour and a quarter, start to finish, of a board shape I’d never shaped before.

Howzit Shipman, One thing you can do is use Nova paint, when done properly it’s a one coat spray job. Taping off can and usually does take the most time, but the more tape offs you do the faster you get done. I did a 2 color paint tape off yesterday which took about 1/2 hour . 4 panels 2 colors, Will paint today. when you think about it what really takes the most time is waiting for the paint to dry totally so you can get on to the next step. Aloha, Kokua

do you glass over top the Nova paint or you have to spray a protectant clear coat befor the glass?

is the red leak?

thanks

Howzit louis, No clear coat required before lamination. Nova is a Japanese made paint and one difference is the spillage on the outside of the container is elastic where as regular acrylic paint is hard and crusty. Rick Massey from Venice Beach turned us on to nova and he sprays it at about 80 lbs PSI which allows you to spray thicker paint so you can do a single coat that covers really good. Don’t try this with other acrylics since you’ll get crystallization when you lam it. Aloha, Kokua

actually I like (spraying)painting boards. I was having a bad paint day… it probably does take me a little longer than most but I am still learnring… :slight_smile:

Aloha, Kokua . is this the paint you are referring to?

http://www.novacolorpaint.com/ looks like some good stuff/ I am going to have to order some and give it a try.

from the ad it looks like a all purpose acrylic paint like the stuff from wal-mart or micheals called Americana Acrylic Paint http://www.michaels.com/art/online/displayProductPage?productNum=cp0028&channelid=3

…the paint that they sell at most surfboard making supply places is a Tempera paint. Tempera is bottom of the barrel poster paint. I know shops that use it with great results. so the artist quality stuff is probably way over the top.

Here is some more info on acrylics http://www.dickblick.com/categories/acrylics/#artist

Howzit Shipman, When using Nova paint you should add a little tempra paint to the mix to help in the drying phase. You have the web site address, they wiil send you a color and price sheet if you ask them. They’ve got some pretty decent prices, but being in Hi. the shipping is almost as much as the paint. Aloha, Kokua