"Joseph Meehan" wrote in message
...
Jeff Ishaq wrote:
Hello,

I'm painting a square room, and one wall is to be red; the other walls
should be white. All the walls are spackled. I am having trouble
getting a perfectly straight vertical line in the very corner of the
room, where the red paint of one wall ends, and the white paint of
another wall begins. The slight protrusion of the spackle makes this
transition look very jagged, as it also causes paint to bleed
underneath the masking tape when I try to mask off a nice line.

Is there a trick to getting a nice straight vertical line that
transitions from one color to the other in this situation? Someone
suggested to me 'gum arabic', but I haven't the slightest idea what it
is, or what I might do with it.

Thanks!
-Jeff


I suggest you don't try to paint in the corner. Move out a little,
just
far enough to find a nice smooth surface. Then paint your line there. It
will look like the corner even if it is not. I suggest putting the line
on
the light wall so the corner will be the darker color.

What he said. People who I have watched do this, professional painters or
just artsy-craftsy folks, didn't use tape or guide board, or any of the othe
common tricks. They cut the joint in by hand with a signpainter's brush,
like they used to use for lettering commercial signs back before everything
became computer-generated peel-offs. Looked about an inch or two wide, with
an angled tip so they can keep a clean point. Takes practice and a steady
hand (I couldn't do it), but they made it look easy. Just followed a very
light pencil line with long smooth strokes, and an almost dry brush. They
did contrasting door and window trim the same way, inside and outside.

What the hey- it would only cost you a few bucks to practice, either on the
part of the wall that will be the darker color anyway, or on a scrap board.
Get a sign brush, a small can of the same texture of paint, and draw a few
lines and see if you can color and stay inside the lines. :^)

aem sends...