What parts are you most likely to find the blue-green patina of aged copper?

[Baitball Blogger]

I am working on a band of faux copper embellishment for a garden ornament and I know the last step will be to re-highlight the areas where the bright copper should have survived unchanged. The blue pooled along the lip of the the bottom of the band and my thoughts are that I should leave that alone, because that is how it would look in a natural environment. So I am going to concentrate on dry-brushing copper paint on the raised edges along the top and sides of the embellishments.

Does that sound about right?

[cilla4progress]

1. No idea -

but sounds beautiful!

[Baitball Blogger]

2. Thank you!

[mr_lebowski]

3. I'd think that the parts where water would tend to gather should have the blue tint

And the areas where it'd naturally run off would be more likely to remain shiny.

[Baitball Blogger]

4. That's my hunch too.

So hard to find pictures of natural aged patina because artists are enamoured of the combination and pock mark their work in pleasing aesthetic ways. Not necessarily natural, but beautiful.

[mitch96]

5. You gave me an idea about a copper iguana

The copper would oxadise to green. I think that would look neat..... with ruby red glass eyes..
I'm thinking a wall hanging and more of a characture look to it... Hummmmmm

[Baitball Blogger]

6. You cannot go wrong with this process. It's beautiful.

Here is how I did mine:

Painted the base in black (Some people don't. They just spray paint the entire project in metallic copper.) With the black paint, you'll get layers and depth. Allow the black to dry completely.

Then I used decoart metallic copper to dry brush the edges. I had to go over it several times to make it shiny. Allow the copper to dry completely.

Another technique might work better for your gecko: get a sponge with lots of little holes. I cut up a sponge that is no more than one inch in size and used undiluted paint to pop in some of that copper around. Decide how big you want the holes to be and be selective when you buy the sponge.

Then I mixed real teal, nano white and just a small dab of miami grass to get my blue-green patina. Looks beautiful! Watered it down and let it drip on the embellishment. Also kept applying less watered down patina and popped it on with an old chip brush that was very splayed. If I thought I went too far, I just sprayed it down with water in a spray bottle.

Love how it's going, so far.

[kas125]

7. I just looked at an old copper tea pot that I use as a planter -

you're right, the green starts in the crevices and moves down following the path of water falling on it, the round parts of the pot are where it still looks copper colored.

[Baitball Blogger]

8. Thank you!!!!

[kas125]

9. I took a picture in case you want to see it. I'll send it to your messages.

https://kas125.imgbb.com/

[Baitball Blogger]

10. That's very helpful.

My artwork looks exactly like that!

[kas125]

11. Oh, good, I'm so glad it helped!

I almost threw it away because a puppy got ahold of it so it's now full of dents and tooth holes and the handle is gone. But it still holds flowers, so I kept it. I'm glad I did now.

[Baitball Blogger]

12. It's a beautiful piece.

Definitely a keeper.

[Collimator]

13. I once worked for a company that made faux aged furniture.

The trick to keep in mind is to think about how difficult the different areas of a piece of furniture or other household item would be to clean. We even had colors like "soot" and "dust", and I was very adept at applying those paints/glazes into the crevices because I was (still am) a notoriously bad housekeeper.

Another tip for a possible project. If you are applying a finish like silver or gold leafing and want the piece to look worn, glaze the crevices with a thin solution of gray or burnt umber and sand/distress the higher areas of any moulding/carving to keep it from gleaming bright and new.

If working with chair legs remember that the back of the back legs get banged against the wall--so that's where you would distress for a worn look--and the front of the front legs get kicked by the shoe heels of the person sitting on the chair, thus another area for distressing. The inside of the back and front legs would look the least distressed.

Of course, you could do what I did when I was assigned a chair to age--if possible, sit on the seat and vigorously kick the front legs with rubber soled shoes. Why meticulously apply paint when you can literally sit down on the job for a more authentic look?

[Baitball Blogger]

14. Brilliant.

I'm all self-taught in faux painting. My interest began in the strangest of ways. In Harry Potter world in Universal in Orlando the walls of the women's room are distressed, faux hues in greens and grays, from what I remember. There is one part in particular that fascinates me. A spot in the wall that looks so natural it's hard to believe it was fauxed. I now know that they probably sprayed rubbing alcohol on wet paint to get that effect.

[Collimator]

15. I painted my bedroom to look like a cave.

First I started with crumbled up brown paper. The torn paper pieces are then pasted to the wall and overlapped. If they don't go on smooth or creases show up, that's fine. The more texture the better.

After I finished papering the wall, I lived inside of what looked like a brown paper bag for weeks. Then, I used natural sea sponges and two shades of taupe "oops" paint colors to get the basic coverage. Once there was virtually no brown paper left to be seen, that's when the fun began.

I decided that my cave would have veins of silver and rubies running through it, so I spray-painted sweeping squiggles of chrome silver and metallic red paint around the walls. Then I played with grays, taupes, blacks, whites and duller-looking silvers. I used natural sponges, car wash sponges gouged up into rough textures and a variety of paint brushes. And, of course, for any stone strata look, a feather comes in handy to paint veins.

The key trick is to stay loose. The more controlled the painting effort the less natural it looks. The obvious streaks of ruby and silver only shown through as subtle highlights. But of course, I could always hand paint a new vein of color if I chose.

When it was done, I loved it but something seemed a little off. I prefer cool neutrals which is why I chose a gray rock cave rather than an orangish clay cave. And yet, it was too cool. So I mixed up burnt umber paint with lots of water and swooped it on with a big brush and sponged it into the crevices. Then I stood back and gazed a my "baby" for what seemed like months.

As you can imagine, the brown craft paper and the "oops" paints were dirt cheap. The only expensive item that I splurged on was a clay-based wallpaper paste. I had used that in my paint studio days and was sold on the value of a product that was thick and easy to work with and that had a little bit of wiggle room in the drying time.

Oh, and my interest in painting my bedroom as a cave didn't come directly from my job. Believe it or not, I was never assigned a stone finish. I only observed. But some friends needed me to paint some stone "doors" and "pillars" for a community theatre "Lord of the Rings" themed play. Everyone was so impressed by my work (including me) that I decided to go for it.

[Baitball Blogger]

16. That cave must have been a huge conversation piece for years.

I started faux painting late in life because I convinced myself I wasn't artistic, and frankly it's not about conventional skill. It's about mixing colors and using effects to come up with magic that fools the eye. For me it's more of a cranial exercise, than an artistic one.

[Collimator]

17. My guy friends at work. . .

. . . asked where the pictures of the wooly mammoth were when I showed them pictures of the finish on my walls.

And don't short change your artistic ability. You are being creative. Many people think that being able to make representative art is the meaning of being "artistic". Working with color, playing with effects, that's art and beauty in my opinion.