Hello,
After reading just about every thread on the plant about screens I decided on making one using the metallic aluminum paint technique. I wanted to make a rather large screen of 96x72 so I decided on using 4x8 foot birch plywood sheets. I made the 96x72 frame of 1x4's and attached the plywood using glue, a staple gun and metal support brackets. I had the seam down the middle to contend with so I used a liberal amount of bondo to fair in the seem. I then had to get rid of all the grain in the plywood so I laid down few layers of drywall plaster, sanding with a big T-bar between coats. It came out ok..not perfect. After looking back on this I think I would use maple plywood instead but its almost twice the cost.
After I finished sanding the plaster I laid down a few coats of flat white primer with a fine foam roller. Then I got an old mayonaise jar and mixed up 50% metallic aluminum, 40% faux glaze, and 10% flat (all oil base) and rolled on two coats. It turned out Ok but nothing to write home about. For some reason it took about 48 hours for the first coat to dry..all the time with dust and other particles falling in it (was on my garage floor) so I was rather mad about that. The aluminum paint really shows all the flaws in the roller..a spray gun must be used for this or the results will not be that good.
I decided to try it anyway before sanding it all off and starting over. I noticed a major improvment in contrast which made the whites a bit darker but I was generally pleased with the result. I definetly need to use a sprayer as the roll lines where very obvious during bright scenes. Having too much or too little paint in different areas reallly stands out with this aluminum stuff..uniform is key.
After reading just about every thread on the plant about screens I decided on making one using the metallic aluminum paint technique. I wanted to make a rather large screen of 96x72 so I decided on using 4x8 foot birch plywood sheets. I made the 96x72 frame of 1x4's and attached the plywood using glue, a staple gun and metal support brackets. I had the seam down the middle to contend with so I used a liberal amount of bondo to fair in the seem. I then had to get rid of all the grain in the plywood so I laid down few layers of drywall plaster, sanding with a big T-bar between coats. It came out ok..not perfect. After looking back on this I think I would use maple plywood instead but its almost twice the cost.
After I finished sanding the plaster I laid down a few coats of flat white primer with a fine foam roller. Then I got an old mayonaise jar and mixed up 50% metallic aluminum, 40% faux glaze, and 10% flat (all oil base) and rolled on two coats. It turned out Ok but nothing to write home about. For some reason it took about 48 hours for the first coat to dry..all the time with dust and other particles falling in it (was on my garage floor) so I was rather mad about that. The aluminum paint really shows all the flaws in the roller..a spray gun must be used for this or the results will not be that good.
I decided to try it anyway before sanding it all off and starting over. I noticed a major improvment in contrast which made the whites a bit darker but I was generally pleased with the result. I definetly need to use a sprayer as the roll lines where very obvious during bright scenes. Having too much or too little paint in different areas reallly stands out with this aluminum stuff..uniform is key.
I dont know what you guys are doing wrong, because I rolled on 1 coat of primer and 1 coat of Tremclad Aluminum onto some drywall, and the results are great - besides the very limited viewing cone... no hotspots, no streaks or anything... You can notice all the dust particles with the lights on, but not when projecting..
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