As expected, a smoothwall job requires alot of mud work. Some of the structure involves difficult shapes/transitions and crisp corners. A high build primer was sprayed, not back-rolled, up to 4 coats in places. The walls were vacuumed and dusted very well initially. Using 1000 watt lights on stands, you can still see very minor sanding scratches that are telegraphing through the primer coats. There is still minor patches of pin holes showing which they referenced using caulk to not have to re-vacuum/dust. The painters perspective is that there will never be 1000 watts of light other than now and that the paint will finish-off covering the light scratches. Some of these are on the ceiling which will be painted flat white and I'm being told they will never be noticed. I am gun-shy currently as there has been much rework lately. They have lightly sanded between several of the primer coats as well as intend on back-rolling the color coats. If you are wondering, the painter and finish taper is the same contractor. Thanks paintguy

Shee & Co., Sorry it took me a while to get back to this.... Skewing: I shouldn't have mentioned this goofy little point, but now it's out there! It's only relevant in a few "Real-life" scenarios. It mainly pertains (to ME anyway...) paint applied too thinly, therefore revealing a hint of the primer color. * Example: If someone uses a "pink" primer under Burgundy, the whole paintjob can appear too light, 'cuz the primer is too white. * To ME...Gray is more appropriate, 'cuz it alters deep colors the "least", if paint is applied too thin. * Gray primer has its limits though! If you're painting a vivid "Lemon Yellow" or "Basketball Orange", THEN you'd need a primer that's almost the final paint color! A medium-gray primer COULD give a grayish-cast to bright, vivid tones. Curing/Bathroom use: * Sorry Shee.....you'll have to smell for a month.........;-) * JUST KIDDING! * After 2nd paint coat has dried for a day, use bathroom as normal. It needs that 24hrs. to get the initial surface-dry so steam doesn't re-soften the paint slightly. * "Full Cure-Out" mainly refers to the complete dry-thru/hardening of the applied film...SO IT'S WASHABLE. "Sweeping": * If you're working L-to-R, the RIGHT edge of a "swept" section will be the wettest. * Therefore, you're OK to slightly work into this section. When sweeping your 2nd column, start from its left edge, overlapping into 1st column slightly. * Ease-off the pressure on your rollers left side just a hair when overlapping a previous sections' final sweep. Faron

Well, it's not an option at this point to remove it. We have wallpaper in all the rooms in our second floor, and the walls would need to be rebuilt behind the wallpaper. We can't rebuild all our walls on the second floor right now, for financial and other reasons. We plan to do one room at a time eventually. For now, unfortunately, we have to make the best of it. Can you recommend a good acrylic general purpose primer? (For what it's worth, the person at my local paint store said I should use Gardz, which sounded a bit like overkill to me, especially, as christophern noted, the wallpaper is already painted. But I haven't been able to find any good information about whether Gardz is appropriate for surfaces that are already painted). Whenever I go to prime, do I spot prime first over the joint compounded areas, and then go back over the wall? Or should I just do the whole wall in one go? Thanks for the advice!

wryorwhite -- Don't be scared by all this talk of yellowing. It's exaggerated. Bear in mind that oil-based paint was essentially all that was used in American homes through the 1980s -- so unless you're a teenager, you were around when any house you'd walk into (including the one in which you grew up) had its walls painted with oil-based paint. Trust yourself and your own experience...do you ever remember walking into a house and thinking to yourself "My, these walls are awfully yellowed!"? I sure don't. When's the last time you've heard someone say "Oh, look at those walls! They've gone from looking like snow to looking like Big Bird! This is certainly oil-based paint!"? Never. Yes, oil-based paint yellows very slighly with time. So do all oil-based products, including the clear polyurethane with which wood floors are most often finished. This "yellowing" effect is minimal, and it's not something that jumps out at you or is offensive or anything like that. You have to actively look for it, and the only people who do that are (a) homosexuals, and (b) people who work in the marketing departments of latex-based paint companies. The drawbacks of latex-based paint have largely been resolved in the past few years. The latex-based paints of 2008 are a far cry from the ones of 20 years ago. This is especially true with the high-quality brands like Pratt & Lambert. Modern high-end latex pains bond to drywall well, hold up to moisture and cleaning well, etc. However - latex-based paints aren't as good as oil-based paints when it comes to moisture and dirt resistance, standing up to scrubbing, and bonding to wood. They never can be, because oil (unlike latex) naturally resists water, and naturally soaks into wood (rather than just sitting on top like a skin). Think of what happens when you mix oil and water -- they don't mix; instead, they just separate and keep apart. So moisture and dirt don't bond to the oil-based paint, so it's very easy to clean without damage. In addition, oil-based paint soaks into wood -- unlike latex-based paint, which forms into a skin that you can peel off. This is one of the big drawbacks of using latex paint on high-traffic wood items (like kitchen cabinets). My house has latex-based paint on the walls and ceilings, and oil-based paint on all the wood trim (including the doors and windows and cabinets) -- this is a time-tested and popular arrangement, and it has held up very well for me and my neighbors. Speaking of polyurethane -- there are two types, oil-based and water-based (latex-based) - same as paint. ALL of the manufacturers -- Minwax, Cabot, etc. -- recommend strongly in favor of using the oil-based polyurethane on floors. It's tougher, it holds up better to traffic and moisture, and this "yellowing" effect that the self-proclaimed experts yammer on about are so minimal as to be non-existent. The same is true with the oil-based vs. water-based (latex-based) paints. Again, trust yourself and your own experiences -- how many times have you walked into a home and thought to yourself that the painted walls and ceilings, or the wood floors, were yellowed?