Pictures requested by Featurepiece

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Of framing styles or techniques that rocked your boat, and also of those that didn't
vintage frames
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Re: Pictures requested by Featurepiece

Post by vintage frames »

Actually, stupid question. You would loose the mica effect if it was painted over!
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Re: Pictures requested by Featurepiece

Post by Not your average framer »

vintage frames wrote:The mica sand you've been using. Is it a mix of silica sand with mica flakes added?
No, it's a specific type of sand. It's very much lower density than normal sand and it is more, or less colourless. It's lower density means that gravity has less effect upon it when mixed with paint than if it was normal sand which is affected more by gravity due to it's higher density. The sand only help to maintain the texture produced by stippling the paint with a brush.

Normal sand would produce a texture due to it's larger granules, but then it would not be possible to get such a uniform and well controlled texture, because sand loaded paint such as Sandtex is not completely uniform in it's texture due to the fact that the distibution of the sand in the paint can be somewhat variable. Because the mica sand is much less dense and it's particule are so small means the texture comes stippling, not from the actual particules

Smaller and less dense sand partcules is why this sort of sand is found where sand dunes are formed. The self levelling effect is much less evident where the particule are less dense. Some things don't always work in the way that we expect!
Mark Lacey

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Re: Pictures requested by Featurepiece

Post by vintage frames »

If it doesn't contain any silica sand, I'm assuming it is just ground mica such as muscovite which is a commonly used adulterant in some paint processes. I've used mica flakes or powders in some instances and you can get a pronounced glitter effect. Some gilders use it in restoration work to simulate the effect of old gilding in crevices on old frames.
The mica I have used doesn't contribute any texture to the paint, so the mica sand you're using is a different product.
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Re: Pictures requested by Featurepiece

Post by Not your average framer »

vintage frames wrote:Actually, stupid question. You would loose the mica effect if it was painted over!
Mica flakes and mica sand are two very different materials. Mica sand does not sparkle to any significant degree, so there is no meaningful visual effect to be lost. In this particular application, the mica sand it acting as a texture retaining medium, but creating miniature sand dunes within the paint surface as the paint is stippled. Thinking of the mica sand in the paint as sand dunes should help to understand how the texture retaining effect is working.

Paint is normally self levelling due to it's ability to flow and find it's own level under the effects of gravity and also in some degree due to surface tension. Adding some fine mica sand to the paint largely illiminates the self levelling characteristics that normally associated with the more fluid types of paint. What little effects of gravity are acting on such low density small particules are not enough to overcome the friction between touching particule within the paint, so the texture remains.

I hope that this helps!
Mark Lacey

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Re: Pictures requested by Featurepiece

Post by Not your average framer »

vintage frames wrote:so the mica sand you're using is a different product.
Correct! Some things are not always as easy to explain as you might think!
Mark Lacey

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Re: Pictures requested by Featurepiece

Post by Not your average framer »

BTW, having produced those last three samples, I have decided that I don't particularly like them after all, so I'm scrapping them.

I only display handfinished samples which I feel have some real WOW factor. Now I've had time to reflect, I think that the WOW factor is missing, so they are going in the bin!
Mark Lacey

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Re: Pictures requested by Featurepiece

Post by Dave E »

Mark thanks for sharing all this I really like the dark finishes :-) and the antique white ones too. For these finishes how much work is involved regards layers of paint, sanding in between and waxing etc?
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Re: Pictures requested by Featurepiece

Post by Not your average framer »

Hi Dave,

The moulding is a barewood pine moulding, so if you are looking for it you may see a little raised woodgrain, unless you want to spend time wetting the wood to raise the grain so that you can sand it down smooth before painting it. I can't be bothered, so I rely upon the textured paint effect to hide any raised grain as best as possible, but considering the fact that the under colour only appears after the top colour has been distressed, then some evidence of the pine grain will be there if you are looking for it, but it's not too bad.

There is a close equivalent of moulding profile available from Rose & Hollis is obeche if you don't like using the pine moulding. Regardless of whether you use a pine, or obeche moulding you should expect to apply two coats of the base colour, followed by a diluted single coat of the top colour. Since the moulding profile is mostly flat surfaces, much of the distressing can be done with sandpaper. With the antique white finishes steel wool is not an option, because the steel wool will discolour such a light finish and ruin the finish. I clean the distressed surface afterward with a damp piece of kitchen tissue to remove any paint dust and maximise the contrast between the two colours.

You can wax the finished surface with a suitable neutral wax, or apply a suitable matt varnish according to your preferences. I would suggest that you need to be able to work quite fast to make handfinishing sufficiently worthwhile and that a certain amount of practicing is neccessary to gain the neccessary working speed and quality of finish. Pricing handfinished work should take into account the amount of time and skill involved in producing something which is quite exclusive and superior to normal factory finished mouldings.

If you don't want be messing around finding a source for mica sand, the Crown suede paints also contain a small amount of a suitable fine sand, but the range of colours available is not particularly large. If you decide to use this paint, you will need to add some thick acrylic paint to allow for the fact that the Crown suede paint does not contain enough acrylic resin to adequately adhere to wood and produce a sufficiently durable bond to the wood.
Mark Lacey

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Re: Pictures requested by Featurepiece

Post by Dave E »

Cheers Mark, excellent info I'll definitely be giving this a go
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Re: Pictures requested by Featurepiece

Post by Not your average framer »

The proportion of mica sand that you will need to add to the paint is extremely small, so be very careful as it is too easy to add too much. If you have not done much handfinishing before, don't go wild with buying lots of handfinishing materials until you've had some practice and experience.

Start with a small budget and buy some small quantities of only a few paint colours until you have a good feel for what you are doing and where you want to go with this. I would like to suggest perhaps a few of the 120 ml tubes of paint from the Amsterdam standard range of acrlic paints.

The 120 ml tubes work out at about £2.90 each, later you can graduate to the 500 ml pots when you know which colours you are going to use on a regular basis. Before you decide which colours to buy, may I suggest that you visit their website and investigate the standard acrylic range colour chart first.

http://www.royaltalens.com/media/117163 ... %20ENG.pdf

Not all the colours in the acrylic standard range are +++ colour permanence, but there are enough permanent colours for what you are likely to need. It will also be helpful to look at the opacity, or transparency ratings of these paints. Amsterdam also have an expert acrylic range which is more expensive, but the permanent rated colours from the standard range will cover most requirements quite well.

I also use a few of the AV studio range of acrylic paints, so you might look to take a look at these too!

http://cdn.acrylicosvallejo.com/053f84a ... _rev03.pdf
Mark Lacey

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Re: Pictures requested by Featurepiece

Post by frameartnyc »

One of the best frame we have created is here.
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Re: Pictures requested by Featurepiece

Post by prospero »

Very nice. :D That's what I call stacked. :clap:
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