bamboo paint color?

I read an earlier post by Pariarts Paul that prompted me to start trying to make PVC-Boo. Thing is, what color spray paint do you use for the base?

Rustoleum Number WHAT?

Also: do you have any tricks like drybrushing brown on there after the base coat? My experiments just aren't yielding stuff that looks as good as yours...

A thousand blessings upon your Camels.
Or Lucky Strikes.

-TIKIPHONIC-

I'm not sure about Rustoleum codes, but I have mixed oil-based paints from cans and had them put into spray cans at auto paint stores. You might consider that if you don't want to use the old Rustoleum or Krylon standards like Gloss White, Forest Green or Flat Black.

Aloha Tikphonic,

For the base coat, I use an ochre rustoleum quart can from Home Depot, (not spray paint! - if you don't find rustoleum brand, any kind of oil based enamel paint will work) and I don't spray it, I just brush it on with an old cheap brush and then let it dry for a few hours in the sun before I start the other colors.

For the other colors, I mix up my own in little cups using the rustoleum colors. I buy these basic colors to mix with: ochre, a bright yellow, a cream or white, a brown, and a black - that should give you enough of a pallete to mix up all the tones you find in bamboo. Sometimes it's hard to find all the base colors you need because rustoleum has a limited color selection to begin with - and then some stores don't always stock every color, so it's kind of hit and miss. If I can't find a good ochre, sometimes I mix something up with yellow, brown, and cream until it looks right. Oh and if you want sections to look like fresh bamboo, you can sneak some green in here and there. I always have a nice piece of real bamboo handy and use it as a guide when I mix.

So I mix up a natural looking medium base and brush some on the long areas between the nodes. Using a piece of wood or cardboard to work on I mix the paint with a brush right there as I go, I add a little brown to it and work it up to the nodes getting darker right up to them - and blend it real nice. I let it set for a bit and then work in some hilights on the long section. Sometimes I drybrush a little more highlights on after it sets up. I come in with a teeny brush and paint in fake cracks with black after everything is dry. And sometimes I highlight the edges of the cracks lightly with a creamy light color and you'd swear it was dimensional.

Other than that - the best advice I can give you is have that real bamboo next to you and use it as a guide when you paint - and if you can get your colors close to the real thing, you'll probably end up with something that looks pretty good. It's mostly trial and error, but you can get it to look so good it will fool anyone.

Good luck with it and post some pictures when you get a chance!

[ Edited by: pariartspaul on 2005-06-16 12:54 ]

On 2005-06-15 12:14, Sam Gambino wrote:
I'm not sure about Rustoleum codes, but I have mixed oil-based paints from cans and had them put into spray cans at auto paint stores. You might consider that if you don't want to use the old Rustoleum or Krylon standards like Gloss White, Forest Green or Flat Black.

I had no idea that you can have this done. This may come in handy in the future.

Awesome explanation, Paul.

I was wondering how to do it myself and you've just saved me hours of trial and error. Nice easy-to-understand explanation. Thanks.

Sabu

Mahalo, Y'all!

Sam, I didn't know you could do that, either!

Paul, your work is amazing. I love that other World (capital intended) you've built in the backyard.

Thanks for the tips from the masters.

I had no idea exactly how much art went into your bamboo! Since you're pouring your hearts into it like that, any chance we could see some close-up detail pix so we might ooh appreciatively?

TikiPhonic

Om my last visit to Disneyland, I took a few shots of their structural bamboo (support poles, fencing, handrails, etc.) as reference for future projects (i.e. my home decor). However, the home projects are on hold for a while until we get situated in our new house and setteled with our second daughter (2 mos. old).

The Disneyland bamboo appears to be fabricated of steel poles with a bead or two of welding wrapped around to create the joint then painted.

These shots may work as a color reference

Mahalo again, ZM!

Those are great shots, and will really help. It looks like they do it the way Paul already discussed here (of course!), and then seem to drybrush vertically to accent the "grain".

My experiments are starting to yield results! Pictures soon, I hope!!

Dern! On our last trip to WDW (in Feb), my pictures, for some reason seem to have been concentrating on the steamboat. Looks like I may need to schedule another fact-finding safari to Orlando...

TikiPhonic

Here are some pictures of a bamboo waterfall that I made using Pauls techniques with fence posts and bamboo.
First one is working with the bondo
second one is after some painting
third one is finished painting
last one is finished waterfall (not on)

Thanks Paul for posting these techniques

slight correction to my last post - that should be "using fence posts and BONDO"

Aloha alpha50 -
This bamboo stuff is really fun. It looks like you did a good job on your project but I can barely see what's happening with the teeny pictures! The bondo job in the first picture looks beautiful I think.

I think I mentioned in a former post that I built a shade structure in the back about a year and a half or so ago, and I used steel poles sunk in concrete to make it, then did the bondo/bamboo treatment. Well, I have this trumpet vine and a potato vine growing up and over it and they are as big as trees now - they look beautiful. Then I have some nice big clumping bamboo here and there and a special clumping variety of giant Chinese moso bamboo on one side of the shade structure and it also is doing great this year. That giant moso bamboo will make poles 6" in diameter believe it or not - and this year it's just made some poles maybe 20 feet high and about 3 inches in diameter. I put it in about two years ago from a five gallon pot and it's growing great. I got it from a special bamboo nursery up in Sebastapol, Ca called 'Bamboo Sourcery'. You can see there website at http://www.bamboosourcery.com A real nice site for good general bamboo information.

So the yard is coming our real nice so far and everyone is loving it. Haven't got to building the lava pond yet. I'm thinking of naming the yard "The Bamboo Grotto" and making a nice sign for it. The real bamboo and the fake bamboo are blending in so well that everyone things the structure is made of the real stuff - until they are told! There you have it.

Really wanted to see these pictures. The tiny ones looked cool!!

[ Edited by: Moki 2005-09-03 08:59 ]

Thanks Moki,

I used the recommended Shutterfly.com to post the pics and don't know where I went wrong. Thanks for making them bigger!

Awesome pics in this thread. And to think I overlooked it cause I didnt care about what colour bamboo is...

Im having images of a bamboo steering wheel :)

Looks like a beautiful job!

I am a retired scenic artist from Seaworld and have painted my share of PVC 'bamboo'. I sanded and primed the PVC first, painted on yellow ocher color (usually made with raw sienna & white) then I used tinted glaze to faux the top colors. The shop I worked in always had bottles of tint and we used Behr clear glaze in either mat, satin or gloss.
Just mix the tint into the glaze until you get the color you like and you can either use a sponge, a brush or whatever works best for you to apply the glaze to the PVC. I always started out light handed and added more color if needed. When the top color dries you can go back and with a paint brush, paint on the 'nodes' or whatever those sections are called. Be sure to add highlights and shadows on the nodes for realism.
The faux bamboo poles that I painted were covers for existing poles in the parking lot of Discovery Cove so they were outside 24/7. I never used oil based paint because the glaze seemed to protect the paint.

First welcome sfj54!
AND You're the guy I have been trying to send people to for years.
That is a person who has done this type of work for a living for a park
that knows what works and what doesn't work.

If you could do a thread with photos and how to info this would be very
helpful to all.

Now if we could only get a guy like you that works in a crappy cold
spot like say Ohio to give us info on how to make tiki like environments
last in the frozen tundra we live in.

Please post more!!