Silver Fire mix - Page 14

Materials available at Michaels Arts & Crafts or most any Artist Supply or Hobby Stores.

Last Updated: March 23rd, 2009 Edition:


"SILVER FIRE"
* use 3 oz. of the 'color components' and add/mix it to the 'base & viscosity components'

(base components)
30 oz. Delta Ceramcoat Pearl #02601
15 oz. Delta Ceramcoat Silver Metallic #02603
10 oz. Behr Interior UPW Flat #1850 (or Exterior #4050)
6 oz. Folk Art - Champagne Metallic

(viscosity components)
24 oz. Minwax Polycrylic - Satin Finish @Michaels & Home Depot
12 oz. Distilled or Filtered water

(color components)
50 ml water to rinse the color pigments from the measuring utensils.
20 ml - Liquitex Basics - Naphthol Crimson - (PR170)
10 ml - Liquitex Basics - Phthalocyanine Green - (PG7)
6 ml - Liquitex Basics - Primary Blue - (PB 15:3)
6 ml - Liquitex Basics - Cadmium Yellow Deep Hue (PY 83)



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Silver Fire - L (Lite)**

** use 2 oz. of the 'color components' and add/mix it to the 'base & viscosity components'

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Silver Fire - SL (SuperLite)***

*** use 1.25 oz. of the 'color components' and add/mix it to the 'base & viscosity components'

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"SILVER FIRE HG" (High Gain)****

(base components)
36 oz. Delta Ceramcoat Pearl #02601
12 oz. Delta Ceramcoat Silver Metallic #02603
8 oz. Folk Art - Champagne Metallic
7 oz. Behr Interior UPW Flat #1050 (or Exterior #4050)

(viscosity components)
same as above

(color components)
same as above

**** use only .75oz of color components.

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here's any example of how the color components and completed mix should look.



on the left is the 'color components' before it's added.
on the right is a completed silver fire sl mix.
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Well aLrIGHtY tHeN.

Just mix to the ratios provided on the rest of the illustrated Post and off you go....right where you really want to be.

pb,

Thanks for the phenomenal work. I have purchased all of the ingredients. How many screens can I paint with these measurements and how many coats should I use on laminate and on mirror? I plan to spray on.

Thanks.

Thanks Pb_maxxx and MM for all your hard work

If I can collect all the item here in Ottawa (Canada), I might give it a try your formula, as I find BW a little too dark from the very limited testing I performed. Based on my needs/setup, which you can find in this thread.... which SF mix should I go for?

My setup

should I go for Silver Fire Lite or Super Lite? Also will regular Silver Fire mix give me better blacks without sacrificing whites?

BTW...I'm using HD65 (refurb) 1280x720 resolution DLP, 1600 ANSI lumens, 4000:1 contrast, 1.10:1 zoom

Also I hope I'll be able to use your mix on fresh drywall using a roller.

TIA...

My silver fire mix (I just painted onto test panel) is pushing neon blue or maybe purple...the color component looked kinda purple.

What should I do?

What ratio of Colorant to Reflective/Viscosity Base did you mix? for such a effect to be present, you'd have to have overshot by a good deal.

If it was only a small amount...adding a small extra amount of the Champagne Metallic Gold will correct such a push. Start out with just a few drops, mix completely, observe, then continue if necessary.

If you need to call for real tome advice, check your PM

Hey MississippiMan,

Was I supposed to get a PM from you? All I wanted to know what SF mix should I go for?

TIA

Thanks a lot for your recommendations

BTW... can I use a roller (I do not own a painting gun)? and how many coats of SF do I need to apply on a primed drywall?

Just in case I cannot get paints locally, do you or anybody else knows a good online store who will deal with Canadians?

Another 'stupid' question, is there a shelf life to the mixture? I have two little ones and I wondering if I can store leftover paint for touch ups?

Silver Fire Lite.

Rolling is possible using Low nap rollers, but spraying is a far better way to go because it disperses the metallic content at more varied angles, reducing the chance of seeing "sparklies' and/or any degree of "warm spotting".

Spraying virtually guarantees a perfect finish idea for projected imagery. Rolling....not so much, however if done with care and using the proper technique and rollers...it's very doable.

But prepping the Drywall with Primer...and being certain that the primed surface is free of texture is important. That is why using 6" Foam Rollers and diluting the primer with 25% water is necessary.

Get a Wagner CS and get the best results.

Strange how I could not see PB's reply to you above until after I posted mine?

Shelf life? I've kept and used pre-mixed SF for over a year (I made 5 gallons ) with nothing needed except a good stirring and restraining. The water will make it separate but no harm comes of that.

Me too.

BTW...the BW's Black levels in the illustration are NOT natural in hue. They are the results of too much attenuation, which of course also affects the Whites and Colors in comparison to the SF.

It's not so much a case where BW is failing to do what it should, being the type paint it is...as much as it's a case of it's doing "too much" for Blacks at the expense of maintaining "too little" of the vibrancy and luminosity of the Colors and Whites.

Still, for any "Gray" screen to show decent color while deepening Black levels is an accomplishment in and of itself. BW is no slouch...just a little "stooped" at the shoulders.

I'm starting over for several reasons.

My Silver Fire was way too blue in the color it pushed. I tried hard to get the green to mix but no matter how long I mixed it, it just wouldn't mix in...it was stringy strands in the paint that must moved out of the way.

I've been using the new formula the whole time, the one with liquitex colors and I'll try again. I used veterinarian syringes 12ml to very accurately measure the colors....I didn't take as much care measuring the base components but I will this time around.

I see the base components went from 24ozs and 16ozs to 15ozs and 30ozs.

This makes it harder to measure because the containers come in 8oz increments. In the old recipe, just make sure you rinse out all of the stuff and you're fine.

I'm going to use a syringe to take out exactly the amount needed to be taken out. So I'm going to take out 2ozs (59ml) from the 32ozs (8*3) of pearle to make 30ozs. Then I'll take out 1 ozs (29.6ml) from the other one 2*8ozs to make the 15ozs necessary.

The color components I will measure again with syringe as I did before. I will take MMan's advice and soak the bottles in warm water to make the colors a little more fluid in the syringe.

If there is anything else I need to do please let me know. Hopefully this will come out better the second time around.

Are you using a "Squirrel cage" drill-powered mixing tool or a simple "Stir Stick" ? a "powered mixing tool" is absolutely required. There is no way anything can escape or avoid the "turbine" effect of that type of mixing tool.

Use a variable speed drill and increase speed until you have a good "whirlpool" but not so much that your getting a "sucking sound" that denotes the mixing of copious amounts of air (bubbles) into the paint. If you get bubbles, straining will remove them...but try to avoid them in the first place.

I mix it ALL up at the prescribed speed for at least 2 minutes, which is the same as 20 minutes by hand.

Thanks for your feedback

So I guess it is a little tricky when using rollers...darn it LOL !!!...

TIA

Long story short, I ended up mixing the color component and diluting it with water to 1/10 strength. Then I added 10 ozs of my color component (or 1 oz original strength) to the base and viscous components. I could never get the green to mix all the way into the color component. Even with the mixing tool you recommended, it just created a little tornado with a smaller green tornado in the middle.

Anyway I added the 1 ozs equivalent to my mix and it came out not as blue. It did come out too shiny though. almost like someone sprinkled glitter on the screen. Could this be because I didn't layer the paint enough over the mirror? Also it was very bright so could this be because I still need to add more color component?

I just added some more color component....maybe about 4 or 5 ozs or .4 to .5 ozs original formula strength. I also added another layer to the glittery panel before changing color concentration just to see if it only needed another layer of paint.

I'm going to look and see how that comes out.

Well I still have blueish whites and desert scenes (like at the beginning of Iron Man). Also faces looking purple.

Now I squirted some yellow into a glass, mixed it and added it to some of the mix (the mix that was in the spray gun. Going to see if that overpowers the red/blue or not. I'll be happy to see a yellow colored white background.

It would be better to see a perfect color mix!

I like the way to picture looks in the wall. If I can get this screen to that level of color neutrality and also increase contrast, that would be great....I'm just really really really struggling to get this mix close to neutral.

With the additional yellow, still looks purple for skin tones. I have the screen frozen with my panel over one guy's eye and it looks like he got in a fight, purple skin around the eye.

I have now added even more yellow. At this point the gray mix is no longer gray....its yellowish-gray. I'm going to see if this can eliminate the purple skin.

This new mix I've sprayed to a test panel is visibly yellowish-gray. It will be interesting to see what the image reflected off of it will look like and whether or not skin tones will still be purplish. I'm almost ready to give up and call it a ~$250 loss. With the $170 mirror and lots of paints, and restock of paints for additional attempts. I've taped up the window and the image looks really good on the wall. I may just use the wall for a while and then get the Wilsonart designer white laminate.


I should be posting in about an hour on how the yellowish panel's image looks.

I think your Mix caught what I've got. Let's hope neither are terminal.

Don't despair no matter what. Failure is not an option, nor should you quit now because your having trouble. Contact pb_Maxxx and follow his advice. You'll get through this and get the results your expecting.

Myself....I'm now officially retired for at least 2 days.

Great, have a nice retirement. Sometimes its nice to get away.

My screen is yellowish gray...not slightly yellowish....its really yellowish gray. So how did the image come out?....It seems balanced!!!!! Really crazy!!!!

Amazing I had to turn my Silver Fire yellowish-gray to get it to reflect a balanced image.

I now have a fairly balanced picture with my yellowish-gray screen sample. I was able to see the brighter whites with equal darkness for blacks (to that seen on my wall). I'm watching in a pretty dark isolated room. The picture looks pretty great on the wall. So what is the problem. Look at these three pictures. I have a panel of the Silver Fire. I took the first picture from where I would normally sit to watch the movie:



Here this second picture I moved to the side (without changing anything in the setup):



Here in this third picture I moved the Silver Fire panel over further to the edge of the image. I am back to the place I sit to view the movie:





Do you see the problem? My wall has a duller image than silver fire when silver fire is in the middle of the screen but as you move out to the edges, silver fire loses its brightness. Toward the edge the wall is brighter than silver fire and makes the silver fire look dull.

Don't pay too much attention to the dullness of the image. It looks great...was just the flash of the camera, but the pattern seen in the images does match what you see sitting there.

It should be noted that my seating is closer to the image than most people would have, so that does make the angle slighter steeper to the edges of the screen. My seating is probably about 9.5 feet from the image. Image of about 115'' diagonal.

BTW, yes that other panel (the blue one) is the original formula. The really dark blue spot above it is just painter's tape that was holding it to the wall.

Camera flash?????

When I don't use the flash....my image is blurry.

Bud, please allow me.

Are ya outta yer mind !



Here's the skinny.

Take you camera and set it on a secure supported area, or Tripod if your so equipped. Set the camera to "Auto" everything...including White Balance. If there is not "Auto" White Balance, turn it "OFF".

Turn that frickin' flash off.

Set the lighting at whatever level suits the demonstration, from totally dark to High Ambient Light.

Set the Focal length so that you employ approx 30% of you zoom range to show the Screen and just enough boarder to allow one to see the light level...or lack thereof. Too show the most area, move as far back as you can and zoom in to show "just enough".

Set the timer for 2 or 10 seconds delay, press the Shutter lightly to engage the Auto metering / Focus, then press the Shutter release and step away. The Camera should open or close it's aperture and compensate for everything as good as it possibly can. If the Room light - projected Light - Camera's settings are effectively balanced, you'll get pretty accurate screenies...leastwise as accurate as they can be, and represent a known and accepted standard of how to take 'em, and everyone employing that standard to equalize out the playing field.

The use of Zooming attenuates the incoming light to offset the intense glare many screens present Digital Light sensors. Either that or the opposite happens, and 'on screen' images are overly attenuated to compensate for the less intense room lighting. To take close ups, simply move closer, but still zoom in to get the selected area. ALWAYS use something to set the Camera on or every shot will be blurry.

And when I think of it, your "Blurry" comment strikes me as being just odd enough that if I guess correctly, your thinking that using the Flash will stop the action "On Screen". Well it will, but not as you intend.

Flash Dancin'

Using a Flash presents a burst of light that in fact is brighter than the Sun at 'center' and the resulting wash of directed light onto the screen will wipe out virtually all projected light, even that from 5500 lumen monsters. You'll be amazed at your end results if you just consider these few tips.

To stop the "action" you "Pause" the DVD, or Freeze the Video. THEN you set up and take your shot.

(I was almost embarrassed to say that.)


Just like finding the right application to use, and painting a screen, taking good screenies that closely represent 'what the eye sees' is a question of "balance".

Screenies are not considered "scientific" so in the least most try to take 'em based on the above technique so as to maintain consistency....or do so after getting razzed into it.

Just be honest about what you post being representative of what you see/saw, and use the "Digital Advantage" by moving and adjusting about and comparing different results with what you see in front of you. You'll catch on to what works best with your equipment soon enough to post up examples. But never under any circumstance or temptation "Post edit" them to look different. Let the camera remain the "unbiased' source of whatever passes for "The Truth".

Just stop "flashing" everyone....it's depressing.