Random knots visible from afar provide knotty pine its distinctive look. Re-creating this impact essentially is two jobs in one: creating a faux wood grain and adding knots as desired. A wood-grain rocker tool manages both jobs through different ways of moving it. For the most realistic effect, create the knots, with a few close together and a few far apart, as it is how they look in nature.
Cover the work area with newspaper, then place the project slice onto it. Set the paper up against the wall if you’re painting complete on a wall. Cover any places you don’t want to paint using painter’s tape.
Scuff the endeavor surface with a fine-grit sanding block, then wipe the dust off with a soft rag. Skip this step if you’re painting a wall.
Ventilate the area. Apply a coat of latex primer to the project surface by means of a paintbrush. Use a primer made for plastic or vinyl surfaces if the project piece is constructed of plastic or laminate. Allow the primer to dry fully.
Open the lightest of their latex paint colors and stir it with a paint stirrer. Pour some of this paint in a paint tray, then brush the paint over the project surface with a paintbrush. Enable the paint to dry fully. Apply a second coat of paint when the primer nevertheless is visible and allow it to dry.
Pour some of this second latex paint colour — the dark one used for knots — into a paint tray. Mix in a few latex glaze with less glaze than paint. The glaze used, the more translucent the knots.
Dip a paintbrush into the glaze mix and put on the solution over the project surface utilizing parallel brushstrokes, as if creating a straight wood grain. Work on only one facet of this project or a single small area at a time if you’re painting a large surface such as a wall.
Pull the wood-graining rocker tool vertically through the glaze, or horizontally if you would like the grain to be flat. Rock the tool slightly up and down to create variations in the grain as you transfer it over the project. To create a knot, move the instrument down and up quickly once for a single knot. Insert as many knots as desired in this way.
Reposition the rocker tool so it begins a second line parallel to the very first, pulling it vertically and rocking it up and down a bit again. Continue until the whole project surface was faux grained. Allow the glaze to dry for several hours. Cover the present tray of mixed glaze with plastic wrap pressed into the fluid to keep it from drying out, if any is left.
Remove the plastic wrap from the glaze and dip an artist’s brush into the fluid following the area has dried. Paint arcing lines across the artificial knot places to accentuate them.
Dip a stencil-pouncing brush into the glaze mixture, getting only the tip of the brush wet. Wipe off excess glaze on a paper towel. Put the brush against an present faux knot or in a region where you want to create a fresh one, then tighten the brush slightly to create a circular knot pattern. Repeat the process wherever desired, adding random lines around it with an artist’s brush.