Never painted before. I've decided to paint my studio, which is a 770 sq rectangular space.
I'm going to need to paint the ceiling as well as the walls. I am planning to follow John Burbidge instructional videos on youtube. I'm going to paint the ceiling first then the walls. I'm going to use a roller for the majority of the work. I have several questions:
When painting the walls do I "cut-in" just the areas I'm going to paint or do I cut-in all the walls?
For example:
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if I were going to paint the right side of my studio on Friday night and the left side on Saturday would I still cut-in the all the corners and edges? Or just the ones connected to the wall I'm planning to paint that day?
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what if I were going to take 3 a hour break between painting the right side and the left side?
As you can see, I'm trying to figure out when I should cut-in the entire room as oppose to cut-in only part of it.
Could you also explain how the "frame/border/halo" effect happens? This is where the cut-in area is a different shade? Is really because the "cut-in" area had dried before you painted the area?
Best Answer
It really shouldn't matter. In the end, it's the exact same paint so it should match.
What can cause the halo, though is if your brush vs. roller technique lay down different amounts of paint. In my experience, it's easier to lay down a thicker coat of paint with a roller than brush, so after doing one coat of cutting in, and then one coat of rolling, you may notice the edges look lighter because there is less paint there. That said, I've yet to find any magical wall paint that only takes one coat so by the time you get the second (or sometimes 3rd coat) on you shouldn't notice it.
The only reason you may not want to cut in well before you roll is if you want to reduce the amount of brush marks as much as possible. While the color won't change based on what you are using, the texture may.
What I typically do is do them both at the same time. I'll cut in around a window, then roll as close as I can get safely with the roller to even out the texture. Then I'll cut in the ceiling on the same wall, then roll that, repeat.
Also, if you just hate cutting in, or have so much to do it's daunting, consider not doing it all at the border of the ceiling and walls and instead roll close to it, then when finished, tack up some crown moulding. It doesn't have to be fancy moulding at all...even a 2" bit of slightly tapered door casing can look sharp.
That's the technique I usually use on already painted rooms that I'm repainting. Often the previous paint job at the border is just sloppy enough that even if I carefully go to the edge, there's enough spots of the old color that creep out that it just looks tacky. In those situations I go get the pre-finished window casings from Home Depot (can be found for less than a dollar a foot) and tack them up with a brad nailer. For a slightly more modern look you can use plain dimensional trim (such as a 1 x 2).
Yet another technique to avoid all that cutting in at the corner of the ceiling and wall is to simply paint them the same color. I'm redoing a bath that needs new paint on both the walls and ceiling so I'm going with a very light gray for both.