painting rainbows on ceilings

[Tater]

hi, it's me again.....

anyway, one of my daughters christmas presents was to paint her rooms ceiling to whatever she wanted (within limits). she decided on blue sky with a rainbow corssing it.

got the paint, got the blue up, but am a bit stuck as how to lay out the rainbow. was thingking of approx 4 inch bands for each color, but the room bein rectangular, we cant lay out a circular arc, nor do i know of a way of doing 10'x5' elipses easily. I suppose i could do the string and two points thing, but i got a hunch that any string i use will end up stretching too much.

and is the red on the inside or the outside?

[<aemeijers]

It&#39;ll never look right on the ceiling. You can never get under a rainbow.

Having said that- the traditional non-artist way is to mock up the art on graph paper, then transfer the key points to wall or ceiling with pencil marks and 2 tape measures to find the grid points. You then freehand, ever-so-lightly, in pencil, between the marks, and paint over. A long PITA. Sorta like how comic strip artists draw comics, starting with a rough pencil sketch, and then inking over. If you have, or can borrow (or buy at goodwill), a old-style slide or opaque projector, that is a quick way to cheat- project the art on the wall, and trace it directly.

I&#39;d paint the long wall in the same blue, and do the rainbow on that, and then add some rag-roll clouds and birds to the ceiling. It&#39;ll give a much better effect.

This sounds like a good parent-daughter bonding experience- and if you foul it up too bad, you can always paint over and try again. My brother, who had actual art training, did similar murals (rainbow in one, desert sunset in the other), freehand, in both my little sister&#39;s bedrooms. I made sure to take slides of them when that house got sold, since I&#39;m sure the new owner painted over them.

aem sends...

[komobu]

If you could get an overhead projector/proxima you could view a rainbow image on the ceiling and paint it that way. google images is the way to go to find the rain bow you want.

Pat

[Tater]

best d@## idea yet, i knew someone could help me out.

now where did i put the opaque projector....

[Norminn]

Hmmmmmmm.......what is best viewpoint for seeing the rainbow? From doorway, lying on bed? Perhaps one arc, from a corner, for the ceiling portion, and another larger arc from the floor that meets each end of the ceiling arc and continues down the wall. If the joins don&#39;t work, perhaps a fluffy cloud at those points?

I would have a faint pencil sketch to mark edges, have colors mixed and ready to go. Squeeze out foam roller with each color and that should allow some blending before it dries.

From inside/bottom of rainbow, colors are violet, blue, green, yellow, orange, red,

[DK]

Put clouds with the rainbows. Rainbow alone will get old very quick, but clouds will appeal forever.

[mm]

Sometimes there are double rainbows, with the colors inverted in the second one. I"ve seen it. But when there is a single rainbow I forget what color is on top.

I think you&#39;re going to have to put part of it on two walls, maybe crossing a third, and only part on the ceiling, fairly near one edge.

If the graph paper or overhead projector things don&#39;t work, you might be able to find aerosol rainbow paint, where the colors come out of one nozzle in the right order. AFter all, they have toothpaste with stripes coming out of one nozzle.

[DanG]

Here is one of the absolute best rainbows I&#39;ve ever seen. It has the clouds, deep blue sky color, and, boy, what a rainbow!!!!!!!!!!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ DanG A live singing Valentine, the most romantic thing you can do with your clothes on [e-mail] (local)

(national)

[Not]

I know wallpaper makers have rainbow borders, but I think they are not curved. If you want something curved, try an online search for rainbow murals, which will probably produce all kinds of kits you could use.

[komobu]

Hi Tater;

I bought a projector on ebay for 25 dollars for doing just this. My daughter is very good at sketches. the one I bought uses an ordinary 75 watt bulb and a couple of mirrors. It will project her drawings on walls and she can then paint them.

Have a nice new years. Pat