Painting wood protects it from the elements, from cracking and seals it so it ages well. Depending on if the wood is interior or exterior, different paints should be used for best results. Vista Paint has several wood paints that will protect your project and make it look its best.

Which paint is right?

First, determine if your project is going to be interior or exterior. If it’s something that will only spend some time outside, like a folding table, that still should count as exterior since it will require protection from UV light and water.

Picking your paint is the essential first step. While stain will let some of the natural wood grain show through, paint is opaque and will hide everything but texture.

Unvarnished or painted wood is pretty porous, so a primer is required. Latex and acrylic primers both work well with wood since they dry more flexibly. Vista Paint primers include the 4000 Uniprime, which works for interior and exterior use. It comes in white and can be lightly tinted depending on the paint color you’ll be covering it with.

Another effective primer is the 8000 Carefree Prime-ZALL. This primer is uniquely formulated to paint on any interior or exterior surface regardless of if it has been painted over once before. It’s also low VOC, making it ideal for indoor use.

When choosing paints, decide if you want any gloss or prefer a matte finish. Most wood tends to look best with matte because it looks more natural, but you can also choose a finish with a light eggshell for some iridescence.

Exterior wood tends to look best with a matte finish, so Vista Paint recommends the 1900 Weather Master for exterior use as it resists mold and mildew and can be customized with any color.

The 1200 Coverall Low Sheen is an interior enamel topcoat that can be applied over previously painted wood. It’s available in white and many pastel shades.

The V-PRO 300 in Eggshell and Flat has almost no VOCs and is easy to clean, making it ideal for high-touch wood surfaces like doors and furniture. These are best for interior use.

Make sure the paint you select says it is for use on wood. Not all paint is and if you use the wrong one, you’ll have to do a lot of sanding to remove it. If you’re not sure about what gloss you want, you can test a small patch on a piece of scrap wood to see how it will look.

How do I paint wood?

Preparing wood correctly is key to having a beautiful final product. Before applying primer, make sure the wood is lightly sanded. This gives the primer something to cling to. If the wood is worn from being outside, it may benefit from being power washed to remove any mold and mildew.

Make sure you’ve covered your work surface if you’re painting indoors to protect your floors. A plastic drop cloth is helpful here.

Check over your wood project before painting. If there are any deep gouges or cracks that need puttying, fill them now and make sure you allow enough time for the putty to dry before you paint.

If you’re painting something that has previously been painted, give it a good cleaning with some TSP. This is a strong degreaser and phosphate that is helpful for removing oil, grease and other stains from wood. If you prefer a non-phosphate cleaner, there are several TSP substitutes you can consider.

If this is an interior project, sanding is still helpful but new wood doesn’t require power washing. After you’ve sanded, wipe down the wood with a dust cloth to pick up any stray particles that will interfere with the finish.

You don’t need to sand off the previous finish fully. Using 180 grit sandpaper, give the flat areas a pass with an orbital sander. This creates some rough spots for the paint to cling to and results in a better finished project. Use sandpaper by hand to scuff the edges, details and corners. You can use less pressure here especially if you don’t want to round off your corners.

Clean the sanded area with shop vac or dust cloth, taking care to pick up all debris. Tack cloths are great for small areas that are hard to reach.

Now it’s time to load up on your primer of choice and give the wood a healthy base coat. Use the right roller or brush and apply it liberally, pressing the roller into the wood so any low spots are filled.

Your first coat of primer may look streaky after it dries for about half an hour. You can apply a second coat of primer for thicker coverage.

After your primer has fully cured, sand it with a fine sandpaper like 220 and give it a light scuffing. Don’t remove too much primer. Clean up like you did when you first sanded, taking care to remove as much dust as you can.

Exterior projects like wood siding don’t typically require sanding between layers since you’re not trying to achieve as smooth a finish as you would desire for furniture.

Now you can finally add your color! Apply your paint of choice in even strokes, taking care not to apply with too heavy a hand. Rollers make this process much faster for interior painting. If you’re painting a large wooden exterior, you can use a paint sprayer with some thinner to speed up the work.

Two or three coats may be necessary to get the color saturation you’re looking for. For highly detailed surfaces like some furniture and crown molding, a paintbrush is best for getting into all the tiny spaces.

Painting wood is easy with the right preparation and tools. The finished project is rich in color and easy to clean because of the waterproofing wood paint provides. Additionally, it’s easy to use paint to modernize old wood furniture that no longer matches your home.

You’ve just been through a big move after spending weeks packing and organizing. However, you won’t be able to feel happy and comfortable in your new home until you’ve resolved one important issue: the paint. You love your new home, after all, you decided to buy it. However, the paint color is totally off. It doesn’t match your home décor or your personality and makes you feel slightly off about living there. You don’t want to pay for the added expense of hiring a professional home painter, so you’ve decided to do it yourself. However, you aren’t sure what you’re getting yourself into.

How long does it really take to paint a room? After all, you’ve just put in countless hours moving into a new house. The last thing you need is a project that feels like it is never going to end. This article will help you know how long it really takes to paint a room, and with that information, you can calculate the amount of time it would take to paint your whole house. So, read on, and good luck with your projects that will make your house feel more like a home!

How Big Is Your Room?

You’ll need to start by figuring out the actual size of your room to calculate the amount of time that it will take to paint your room. You can calculate the square footage of your room by measuring the length and width of your room. After you’ve taken those measurements, multiply them. For example, if your room is 10 feet long by 12 feet wide, you’ll multiply those and end up with 120 square feet. If you want to be super exact, you can also try to measure the square footage of window and door gaps. However, a rough estimate of the square footage of your room should help you to know how long it will take to paint.

How Long Will It Take to Paint My Room?

The average-sized room in a house will take around 5 hours to paint if all of your supplies are set up and good to go. A larger room could take closer to 7 hours. You might need to add on another hour or two for setting up drop cloths, laying down painting tape, priming your walls, and mixing up your paint. Additionally, if you have to do any repair work to your wall, such as filling in nail holes or scraping off debris, you may have to add another 30-60 minutes to your process. So, it isn’t an exact science to know how long it will take to paint your room, but you can use these details to make a rough estimation.

How Can I Speed Up The Painting Process?

If you are sure you want to paint your room but aren’t ready to commit to the average time that it will usually take, there are a few things you can do to speed up the painting. You can use extra-long paint rollers that will cover more space when you use them. Using a high-quality paint primer can help you to get a great result in fewer coats of paint. Also, having more people join you in the effort will also help your painting to go more quickly.

How Much Paint Will You Need?

You’ll also need to calculate how much paint you’ll need for your project. You can always get a rough estimation from someone at a paint store, but you can also use your square footage calculation to help you. Most gallons of paint will cover about 350-400 square feet of space, depending on how many coats you have to do. From that, determine how many gallons of paint you’ll need, and get to work painting!

What Other Supplies Will You Need?

Once you’ve decided to move forward with your painting project, you’ll need to gather together some supplies that will make the project a lot easier. Here is a list of the basics that you’ll need for most paint jobs.

• Primer: Primer is a material that you spread onto your walls to help your paint adhere properly to any surface. Your primer will ensure that you get a smooth, even professional-looking finish once your paint has dried. A latex-based primer is usually a good choice.
• Paint: Of course, you need paint! Make sure to choose a paint brand that has products with low VOC levels, like Vista Paint. This will ensure that harmful chemicals aren’t emitted into the air or absorbed into your home or your body. The color or base of interior paint doesn’t matter as much if you have a good-quality primer! So, choose a paint color that makes you happy! Just make sure you don’t find yourself painting over it in a year! Flat, satin, and eggshell finishes are some of the most popular paint choices for walls inside your home.
• Paint Sticks: These wooden sticks mix the paint together, ensuring your paint hasn’t separated at all. This will give you a clean, consistent, vibrant finish.
• Paintbrushes: The angled variety of paintbrushes makes it a lot easier to “cut into corners” and get those hard-to-reach spots.
• Paint Rollers: Paint rollers are great for any painting project. Simply dip your paint roller into a tray of paint and you’ll be able to cover a large space quite quickly with your chosen color of paint.
• Paint Trays: As mentioned above, this will make it a lot easier to cover your paint rollers with paint!
• Painter’s Tape: Painter’s tape will help you to cover any crown molding, windowsills, corners, or borders that you don’t want to be painted.
• Drop Cloths: Drop cloths can help you to cover flooring and furniture that you don’t want to be splattered by any paint. This is essential if you care about your floors or aren’t moving the furniture out of your home before you paint!

Imagine that you have just walked into a newly built house. Other than the fact that you already know that the house is freshly built and ready to be lived in, you can probably sense another tale-tell sign that will indicate that this property has just been completed: the smell of paint. Paint, specifically paint used in homes, has a very distinct smell. That smell can even be a little overpowering at times, especially if you’ve been painting all day or if you’ve spent an extended amount of time in a space with fresh paint.

Have you ever stopped to think that the overpowering smell of paint might be an indication that there are chemicals that are being released into the air and absorbed into your skin that could harm you? Unfortunately, there is some truth to this. Many paints have VOC, which could be emitting harmful substances into the air around you, which could reduce your good health. Of course, when you’re working on making your home more beautiful, you don’t want to inadvertently cause yourself or your family members to have health problems. For this reason, you should be well aware of VOC levels and which paints you should use to prevent these issues. Here is what you need to know about VOC so you can better choose which paints to use in your next project.

What Does VOC Stand For?

VOC stands for Volatile Organic Compounds, meaning that paints with VOC contain volatile organic compound chemicals that can be evaporated and absorbed into the surrounding air and environment. VOCs help paint materials to have a smooth movement as they are shifting from container to wall. They help paint to go on any material much more cleanly, flowing in a satisfying way. Unfortunately, lots of VOCs have negative side effects.

Lots of types of VOCs have substances, such as carcinogens, that have been known to cause chronic illnesses or even cancer. As a result, these VOCs can negatively impact the indoor quality of air. It can also be absorbed by contact or inhaled, which can be potentially harmful to your health. Unfortunately, VOC chemicals are often found in paints, cleaning supplies, and other substances. For this reason, it is important to be vigilant about the paints that you’re using in your home and even the paints that have been used in your home in the past. For example, many homeowners have become more familiar with the dangers of lead paint. The health risks and issues presented by lead paints have become much more well-known over the past years. Similarly, you should be aware of the dangers of using paints with high VOC levels.

Why Is It Important to Use Low VOC Paint?

Have you ever gotten a big headache after you’ve been working on a painting project? If so, that is exactly the type of issue you could be dealing with when you use paints with high VOC levels. These paints can cause headaches, asthma, and other, more serious health complications. If you’re shopping for paint and trying to find good paint with low VOC levels, make sure that you read the labels and do your research before purchasing. A good, low VOC level would normally be around .5 mg/m3, with .3 being an even safer and lower level of VOC. When you paint a surface in your home, VOC is released into the air as the paint is drying, hence that strong, distinct paint smell that you can detect. However, there is a smaller, additional amount of VOC that can be emitted from the paint even after it has completely dried. Sometimes, paint will release harmful chemicals for years after the paint job has been completed. Prior to reading this article, you may not have been aware of the health risks associated with VOC levels, resulting in a lack of caution with regard to paint that has recently dried. Using low VOC paint in your home can help to prevent any possible health risks or complications that could occur from the chemicals in VOC.

What Are the Best Low VOC Paints to Use?

If you often shop for paint but aren’t used to looking at VOC levels first, it can seem a little bit stressful. You might even procrastinate your next painting project so as to avoid buying paints with VOC that could be potentially harmful to you or your family. True, if you don’t know how to tell what paints have low VOC, you might avoid buying paint entirely. Luckily, there are certain paint brands that consistently use low VOC levels, making their products safer to use in any type of environment or residence. Some brands even omit VOCs entirely, making their paint products much less stressful to use. One of these trustworthy brands is Vista Paint. Vista Paint has a huge variety of trendy and attractive paint colors. Their paint shades are vibrant, durable, and long-lasting. Best of all, they have low VOC levels, which makes them great and safe to use for any project in need of a little pop of color. Their manufacturing team has taken great measures to carefully create their paint products in a way that won’t put you at risk when you use them.

So, next time you’re gearing up to work on a home improvement project or give new life to an old piece of furniture, remember these tips about VOC levels and paint. If you don’t want harmful chemicals to be released into the air that you breathe, then don’t use types of paint that have high VOC levels. This will help to keep you, your family, and your home environment safer and healthier. To further simplify things for your DIY project planning, try to consistently stick with paint brands that consistently create paints with safe, low VOC levels. Using paint brands such as Vista Paint will leave you with a gorgeous, vibrant paint job without any accompanying unwanted health risks.

Metal is one of the more difficult surfaces to paint because most paint doesn’t adhere well to it. It also is prone to rust and oxidizing, so any paint you choose must be able to protect the metal. Preparation is also key to protecting metal with paint. Luckily, Vista Paint has a line of paints specially formulated for use on metal.

Spray paint is the usual go-to for metal painting, but the application is uneven, which results in a streaky finish. Brush-on paint takes longer but the finished product is much higher quality.

What supplies do I need for painting metal?

Brushes and paint trays are ideal for painting metal since they make for even application. If the metal has been painted in the past, it will need to be scuffed and cleaned to remove old paint and oil. An N-95 mask is handy here to protect your lungs from particulate matter.

Rust remover and acetone may also be required if the metal has visible rust. Painting over rust will cause the rust to bleed through your new paint, so it should be treated and removed.

You also need to identify your metal as ferrous (containing iron) or non-ferrous. Ferrous metals are steel, cast iron, wrought iron and are often prone to rust. Non-ferrous metals include aluminum, copper, zinc and stainless steel.

Finally, you need the right primer and paint. Vista Paint recommends 4800 Metal Pro Primer for non-ferrous metals. It protects them from rusting and improves adhesion so the paint doesn’t peel off after application. For ferrous metals, Vista Paint recommends 9600 Protec Metal Prime. This is not recommended for galvanized surfaces, but it does protect ferrous metals from corrosion and improves the overall finish.

For paint, Vista Paint recommends 9700-9800 Protec Metallic, which is formulated especially for interior and exterior metal surfaces. Take care not to shake the container and don’t store it near any open flames.

How do I paint metal?

Once you’ve identified your metal, any old paint will need to be removed with a wire brush. A heavily rusted area needs rust remover applied to the surface to eliminate any remaining rust and allow it to be scrubbed off the surface.

An acetone-dipped rag can remove grease and oil from the metal’s surface, making it ready to receive primer.

Scuff the metal if it’s smooth with a scuffing pad. This gives the primer something to cling to. Scuffing isn’t necessary for corroded surfaces as they are already rough to the touch and will hold primer readily once prepared.

Galvanized metal has zinc in it, so scuffing galvanized metal can actually remove the zinc layer, leading to further rust in the future. Galvanized metal shouldn’t be scuffed or sanded. Wear an N-95 mask while scuffing metal to avoid inhaling particulate metal.

Priming metal seals away any rust and protects it from future damage. It also acts as a moisture barrier, preventing the introduction of new rust. Make sure to choose the right primer for your metal. Make sure your primer is compatible with your intended paint.

Read the label carefully to review drying times and cure times. If you paint over the primer before it’s ready, then your paint can peel or flake. By following the instructions to the letter, you will get the best results out of your paint.

Metals going outside may need a second coat to provide extra protection against oxidation. Apply the primer evenly, making sure that everything is covered. Primer can be white or rust colored.

Once the primer has dried fully (out of direct sunlight and wind), you can add your paint. Apply the necessary number of coats for the coverage and color saturation you’re wanting. Allow the paint to dry between coats. It will need at least 36 hours to fully dry. Make sure it’s not exposed to direct sunlight while it dries.

Highly pitted metal may not be structurally sound enough to take paint.

Benefits of painting metal

Metal paint both decorates and protects metal from further corrosion. For metal paint indoors, the environment is generally regulated unless the metal is stored in a bathroom or garage. Metal outdoors is exposed to varying levels of moisture, sunlight, temperature swings and more.

By painting the metal, you are protecting your item for the long term. Furniture with metal parts will resist corrosion and rust, making them structurally safe and sound.

Choosing colors

While most metal primers are either white or rust-colored, you have a lot of options when choosing a color for your paint. Metal paint tends to look better with a matte finish so it looks powdery. Some pigment can include iridescence or a little gloss to add a shiny finish.

Consider how your chosen color will look in different lighting and how it will function. Metal furniture, for example, may need a lighter color so it’s less hot to the touch while metal frames can use darker colors to best effect.

Painting tips

Prepare the metal outside if you can – that includes scuffing. This makes for easier cleanup. If you have to scuff indoors, then use a drop cloth and a shop vacuum to clean up any residue so your final product is clean and easy to paint.

If you’re painting outside, avoid painting in direct sunlight. Heavy sun can dry paint too quickly, leading to your final product drying with streaks. Avoid painting in the wind for the same reason. Wind can also blow debris onto your wet paint, giving you a new area you may have to sand and repaint.

Metal paint is a colorful alternative to clear coats and can customize your outdoor furniture, interior decorative pieces and wrought iron fencing to your liking. A fresh coat of metal paint not only preserves your items for future generations, but it improves the appearance and texture. Think about the times you’ve touched rusty metal – or worse, sat on a rusted chair. A fresh coat of paint will make everything more visually appealing and practically useful.