Red Paint

[trg-s338]

I painted an off-white wall in my house. I bought Glidden paint from Home Depot, Red color. The wall is not perfectly flat, some very mild unevenness but nothing that I deem needs to be filled. I have thus far applied 3 coats of this paint, allowing drying to the touch between coats. I can still see unevenness in the coating, some areas lighter that others , "holidays" I think painters around here call them. I've painted many times in my house with good results, all of light colors though. I feel I have decent rolling technique and a feel for how paint lays on. What have I done wrong? Does red on a light colored wall require some kind of red primer first? Is it the Glidden paint not having enough solids to cover. I normally use Vista Paints, a high end paint store in my area and have not had problems like this. I noted that the wall "sucked" a lot of paint in the initial coat. It seems to me that more coating is not going fix it. The unevenness is oriented vertically. Any tips? Thanks in advance.

[Noozer]

Did you prime before you painted with the red? You will get an even colour if you keep at it, but you should have applied a tinted primer underneath it. Dark colours can be difficult to get even otherwise.

[Norminn]

The pigments in red and blue paints do not cover as well as others. Ben Moore notes this on some of their labels. I would consider what you are seeing as fairly normal, although three coats of a good paint might have been sufficient. If you are going for more coats, I would let it cure well for a couple of weeks first. A tinted primer might have helped, but primers can't be tinted as strongly as regular paint or they lose the primer qualities. Primers, generally, are not for color; they are for sealing and binding.

[buffalobill]

i once got to 6 coats before i knew the brands Bin or Kilz primer seals the wall first, blocks bleed thru of color already there. your project so far is a waste of time until you put the primer on. choose primer type and tinted base to follow it including complete directions according to your manufacturers of EACH ITEM.

[Big_Jake]

Tinted primer would have helped quite a bit. Usually, I would have primer tinted "half tone" towards the color of the top coat, but I had a professional recommend gray primer for red top coats. Glidden makes a lot of paint, at many different quality levels, but I haven't been too excited about the paint that they make for Home Depot. Kinda too late, but I think you would be much happier with "Color Accents" by Sherwin Williams. If you want to make positively sure that the 4th coat will be the last, I would use that. It will be expensive.

JK

[trg-s338]

Thanks for your responses. I will give it one more coat of the paint I have. If no improvement, then I will get better paint for a final coat. Failing that, I will have to primer and then another coat of the good paint. It is in my living room so I have to have it looking good. Thanks all!