Bill Nunn: Hi! I am Bill Nunn, Painting Consultant for The Family Handyman Magazine; the leading magazine for Do-it-Yourselfers. Today we are painting walls and right now I'd like to explain a little about how to brush, and cut in as we say with the paint and preparation for rolling. For brushing, paint, instead of working out of this full can, I am going to pour off a little bit into my container, just maybe about an inch or so of paint in the bottom will be enough to work from. It makes it a lot easier to load and unload brush and it's also a lot safer than working out of a full paint can.

Quite often I find that paint is too thick to brush straight out of the can like this. If I had any doubts about that, I would add a little extender, and there are several in the market, which is a great thing to have on hand to just loosen up the paint that you're working from in your paint pot. And it makes it brush out better and will stay open longer on a wall which is an advantage for brushwork.

So now we are set up to brush let's cut-in our wall. So let me explain about loading a brush. I would dip it into our paint. We've got about an inch at the bottom here, not more than half the bristles is all, and then just tap it lightly on the side of the paint can to get off the excess paint or you can wipe it lightly on the rim, on the inside of the rim so paint doesn't run off the side. So there we are, let's take it to the wall.

I am going to start at the ceiling line and brush along the ceiling. If you just hold your arms stay and move your body, that's a big help. It's also very helpful to get your body up where you can see clearly. You probably won't get a perfect line on the first pass. So I am just going to take a second pass here to kind of broaden my painted line. And also, you can see at the bottom of my brush here it's kind of feathering off, making a gradual transition between the new paint and the old, and that will help when we come to roll into this or up to this painted line. Feathering your edges is always a good idea. It just helps things blend together smoothly and eliminates any ridges or abrupt stops from one color to another.

Next, cut-in corner of your wall; it's okay to overlap on to the adjacent wall a little bit since we are going to paint it too. Make sure you feather as you go just as we did at the ceiling line. Next, cut-in your baseboard just as we've been doing up above. Just draw it along up against that masking tape and again kind of feather it off. I make a point of keeping paint off the outlets and switches that I come across, and so with your brush, you can just cut-in around the opening, and leave them pretty well unscathed.

Now we've come to a window, and we'll cut-in along the left edge. Just follow the line down. Remember, you'll get a second chance to fill in the blanks, and feather up, and that looks pretty good. Continue with this all the way around the room, and with a little practice and a good brush you'll have great results with your cutting in.