Sealing the lids on paint tins

Possibly not, but I don't use bigger than 120 rollfilm, anyway.

Another excellent reason. Which reminds me...

I know for a fact that the detail inside the silhouette couldn't possibly be reproduce on *any* digital printout. Black on darker black, it is, and *very* subtle.

Try this technique:

1. Swish brush in 100% mineral spirits ten times. Remove excess (I use a brush spinner).
2. Swish brush in 50-50 mix of mineral spirits and alcohol ten times. Remove excess.
3. Swish brush in 100% alcohol ten times. Remove excess.

Done.

For latex or water-based paints, add fabric softener to the water in which you swish the brush.

Well yes they can now - my printer has 4 blacks, three are used at anyone time, which enable you to reproduce a very good grey scale.(Epson

He must be made of money unless he uses cheap brushes and by using cheap throw away brushes how does he produce a decent finish. This painter can't value his work very much.

Stephen.

I buy semi expensive brushes. Can't imagine throwing them away after every job. It does not take long to clean a brush specially if you use a paint cleaning comb.

Don't forget to exhale ten times.

The only disadvantage (as I pointed out upthread) is that this creates a bit of a mess when it has to be removed.

Back in the days before digital cameras, we used to use collapsable plastic jars for chemicals used to process film and prints. Same reasons - keep the volume of air contained inside to a minimum.

Less of a mess than the skin? :-)

Sure you can. Put your computer desk in the darkroom.

What's half an hour of time worth? For a DIY job you can mabee forget about it - but commercially that buys a pretty decent brush.

For day to day, the cling wrap in the refrigerator works well. And the same painter, when doing apartments etc - all the same colour - DOES stretch a brush - uncleaned - that way.

He buys his brushes in bulk from a brush distributor - and his roller sleeves.

RE: Subject

That's why propane torches and dead weight hammers exist.

Haven't had a can of paint skin over in years.

Lew

And spin around three times whilst scratching your ear.

For cleaning brushes, a spinner is mandatory. Something like this:

Save the old dirty thinner, and next time, all the heavy pigments settle to the bottom and the old thinner is now clean.. Use the old thinner to clean next time, only using a bit of new thinner for the last couple of cleans. This is really easy, uses almost no thinner and really keeps your brushes nice.

You need 3 cans/jars to do this, one for storing old thinner, one to clean the brush, and an intermediate one to store the newly dirty thinner. When done, pour the dirty thinner into the old thinner storage can. You can use lacquer thinner but lacquer suspends the pigments forever, while turps or mineral spirits lets the pigments drop to the bottom, leaving clean thinner.

Don't use your good oil brushes for water based paints (hide them from your wife). Clean the cheaper plastic water brushes with just water and the spinner, or throw them away after your wife paints (and never ever cleans a brush)...

That works.

I also save dirty thinners and allow the pigments to settle.

By Lacquer thinners do you mean Cellulose thinner? However using Cellulose/Lacquer type thinners will destroy the natural spring in the brush resulting in a useless floppy brush.

You have described the above method the wrong way round though, Turps will coagulate the paint whereas Cellulose or as you call it lacquer thinner will draw the paint completely out of the bristle stock, as does mineral Naphtha but Naphtha will not destroy the spring in a natural bristle brush.

Stephen.

I heard THAT. I've had more than one $20 Purdy brush ruined by the wife...

Dead blow hammers?

Plastic non marking hammer with a shot filled head.

Available in bright colors at a low price.

Lew

Never heard the term "dead weight hammer" used to describe a "dead blow hammer" before, just wanted to make sure I knew what you meant.