A sort-of custom paint how-to...

I thought I'd share these photos of my first paint-job...they may be helpful to some

I painted graphics on the car myself back in May in my father's 2-car garage using Dupont Chromabase 2-stage paint. Here are some pix of the steps in painting it. Hope you enjoy them...

Here's the car taped up and ready for paint. This was one of the most time consuming parts. After taping it up I scuffed the whole thing with a grey Scotch-Brite pad to roughen the surface...
http://www.satanclauz.com/~ynot/01_taping_up_blue.jpg

The next most time consuming part was laying out the graphics. I started with a mylar "template" which I taped on the car and drew out (prior to painting) so I could get the graphics fine-tuned the way I wanted them. After getting the "template" in place, I used blue 1/4" fine-line tape to tape off the graphics.
http://www.satanclauz.com/~ynot/07_l...t_graphics.JPG

Here it is, ready for the gray paint...
http://www.satanclauz.com/~ynot/10_ready_for_gray.JPG

Here's me spraying the bumper. Dad followed me around with a little spot light to double check paint coverage...
http://www.satanclauz.com/~ynot/11_s...umper_gray.JPG

Using the blue fine-line tape, here I am taping off the area to be black...
http://www.satanclauz.com/~ynot/13_t..._for_black.JPG

Here's the car ready for the black paint...
http://www.satanclauz.com/~ynot/14_ready_for_black.JPG

After this, I sprayed the clearcoat with blue "flake" over just this black area...
http://www.satanclauz.com/~ynot/fina...ke_closeup.jpg

Then I removed all of the tape and cleared both sides and back of the car. No pix of this, but it turned out nice and shiny!!

Here's me wet/sanding and dad doin' some buffing...this part seemed to take forever. My clear was kinda rough on this side so I ended up redoing this side a couple weeks later. (A little tip...be sure your air pressure is up high enough when shooting the clear)

http://www.satanclauz.com/~ynot/20_sanding_buffing.JPG

Here's the final project all complete...
http://www.satanclauz.com/~ynot/fina..._rear_side.jpg

All in all it was a fun experience for my first paint job. I've got well over 65 hours in this and I can say that I truly appreciate what custom painters do. Anyway, let me know if you have any questions or comments. I'm hopin' to flame the wifes Mustang this spring.