Ok so I used semi flat black (krylon fusion) paint on my pack, and semi gloss silver through an airbrush on the weathering.
Its all a bit shinyer than I imagined it would be, and even though its been painted and done for weeks now, its starting to bug me.
So the question posed here is:
Is your pack shiny? Semi flat? flat? or any combinations of the three, and what do you prefer.
Cam
well, I haven’t actually painted my pack yet but I am shooting for a very flat dull look. I’m not really a fan of the “brand new pack” look. Even in the first scenes from the movie the packs looked like they had some age to them.
I am actually using a paint I found called Ultra Flat… and I plan on using a trick that I found in one of the sets of plans here. He reccomended using very fine steel wool to “polish” the paint job. I think that probably will give a nice flat look.
Just my two cents.
Yeah I am thinking of shooting the whole pack with a dull coat spray just to take some of the shine away.
It looks weathered and great already so i’d rather not go through the trouble of repainting the whole damn thing this far into it..
Looks like I have quite a bit of masking ahead of me.. It’s Miller time!
Cam
Hey well i’ve painted two of my packs flat black because i felt it gave it more of a real feal as appose to the shiny new car glow lol i aged one pack and left the other all black they look good and are so easy to touch up when your done with a good party because for the post part flat black can be sprayed over itself and come out seamless and it dries really fast so you can touch up before a party as well but the pack im making right now im going to try with semi flat from what i’ve used there are four different grades Gloss Semi Gloss Semi Flat and Flat and yes there all different and only semi gloss and gloss are close to each other semi flat has a shine to it but it doesn’t look like glass its more of a faded glass look and that what im thowing on the pack im working on at this point. Im just doing this to see how it looks and it will be fully painted and assembled in probably 3 or 4 days since im waiting on electrical parts plus doing all the wiring takes me a good day but as far as flat is i say its good but very dull looking (it tends to look really dirty if theres even a bit of dust on it.
This it was she looks like painted flat
I painted mine flat black with drybrushed silver weathering. I leave mine laying flat in the basement so it naturally pics up dust in the cracks and crevaces 
Cam, you could probably use a flat clear coat to dull it up a bit, maybe even blow some dust on it while its still tacky.
Irri
Yeah i am going to mask off everything and ‘mist’ some dull coat onto it from the most atomized setting i can get with my airbrush, from about 2 feet away.
Failing that, i’ll suck it up, tear her apart, and cram a re-paint in before halloween.
Thanks Everyone!
Cam
A light coat of Krylon Crystal Clear Flat will take care of that.
Darrin
Yeah I spray-painted my pack with a camouflage flat black but it doesn’t look good when light hits it, the ridges and indents and corners and such don’t stick out as much as they should. The paint job on the real packs remind me of the paint jobs on grand pianos, next time you’re near one, check it out. I’m a concert pianist so i’m always around one heh. John Vandergriff told me to buff it with a rag and it makes it a little shinier, i’m going to try that…
Also going over certain parts with Testors flat black makes a slight color and reflection change. I over-metalisized my wand and went over the silver with the Testors and it looks cool. More depth.
Just me though, anybody figure out what they did in the movie? Let us know
-Thiago
I used Testor’s flat black paint. I think that is for models. It worked pretty well, it’s quite dull looking on both metal and plastic. Not shiny at all. I don’t know about wood.
Krylon fusion only comes in a satin black that I’ve found. However the way around the shiney is to use a clear matte finish used for charcoal drawings. I used it on my goggles when they were shiney and still sticky after two weeks, dull coated it and dried it at once, which was absolutely boffo.
Fine steel wool will also help knock down the shine.
Darrin
I used some semi-gloss gloss on my pack, I don’t know if there’s a difference between that and a semi-flat? But anyway… On most of my pack I used flat black and didn’t really care for the results. Especially, like Thiago said, when light hits it. Taking pictures with a flash is the worst. The parts that I think look good are the ones that were semi-glossed, but still, it doesn’t look exactly like the movies.
I’m not sure what the answer is… There are some older weight machines at the gym I go to and they’re painted black. They actually look exactly like the same black used in the movie on the packs. Don’t know what it is though? But since they’re old, the edges are “weathered” just like the packs too. :lol:
Well theres actually at minimum 5 different kind of blacks, atleast thats how many i’ve found. Gloss Black. Semi Gloss (still shiney but not quite as much as gloss Semi flat (you can tell its flat but it has a nice little shine) Flat (we know this one and Ultra Flat (this looks more like a really dark grey to me) I just used krylon semi flat on my pack im working on and i posted pictures yesterday. It had the shine but its a really dark black and i think it looks pretty good had a tiny blue tint at angles but other then that its really nice the other pack that i posted here was flat black and it was walmarts 86 cent cans of flat tooo and it gives it an old dirty look pretty fast but that pack looks faded. Anywho those are the kinds of black that i’ve found, there may be more i’ve used them all and there all basically different but then again different brands are different shines and dullness as well
Well here’s the pack as she sits today… you can see its not gloss black by any means, but it does have a little sheen on it when the light(especialy the flash) hits it. I have just stared at it for the past few days since first posting this and still can’t decide.
how bad is she in a regular light? Like when your at a party or out in the sun? I agree with the idea of steel wool and it will give it a more used aged effect with little lines around the pack. My flat black packs i made have the same shine problems with pictures as well, that and the clyclotron lenses shine like a mother, even with the lights off. I do see your shine your talking about, but i’ll tell you this… Your pack looks awesome! I notice some standing out labels on the n filter and HGA coutner label. They look perfect, what did you do to make them like that?
Anyways the pack looks awesome and im sure with its shine or dulled down it looks good.
It’s not bad in regular light…
The paint dried to sort of a machined metal ‘grainy’ look, and the silver weathering blends in nice…so its a natural looking black/silver, hense my aprehension to change it.
The labels originaly were those ones you can get off ebay, but the color all ‘dog eared’ and peeled away from the foil. I made my own by printing on a frosted transparency sheet and layering that on wide foil insulators tape. (same tape used right before the wand tip in the pic)
Cam
I’m a fan of the worn look myself and none to keen on a really glossy look. I tend to paint all my stuff with a semi-gloss black and then both sand it very finely to cut down the gloss (and add some variation) and dust it with a flat black. Since that can make it a bit too flat I also buff that some to give it a bit of shine. Then weather liberally.
Dude thats a killer pack!
I may try the sanding and dull coat combo. Since I can get a fairly controled spray from my airbrush, i should be able to keep everything still looking like steel while reducing the shine.
Cam
That looks great to me!!! :shock:
I agree with ecto_skywalker. Its pretty darn well put together to be worrying about the shine. Maybe a touch of dull coat here or there if you want otherwise you seem pretty well off 
Or as an alternative you might pick up some weathering powder/pastels. They will help dull shine and can be applied with a brush. Thats a plus since it won’t mess with yourr pack or finish like trying to reapply paint or even a clear coat can(they can fog and make stuff look frosted).
IMHO she looks to good to mess terribly with.