Has anyone painted their camera themselves?

Paul Howell · Jun 14, 2021

Huss said:
We're still talking about a Nikon FG?

Yep, I like it, light, good meter, nice motor drive, and TTL flash. My son has it, dont he has used in many many years, doubt it is still working, next I see him I ask about it.

John Koehrer · Jun 14, 2021

fire arms paint is a two part paint in a spray can,($$$) apparently you mix the paint just before use.
As my imperfect memory recalls the hardener is in a second section within the spray can it's also short lived <24 hours.

gone · Jun 14, 2021

That's what I'm thinking, an airbrush. The only idea I have on keeping the paint on the camera is to coat it w/ clear acrylic gloss. Nail polish would work better, but the fumes would be worse than dealing w/ darkroom chemicals. Think I'll practice different styles of painting w/ this dead silver FG. There's nothing bad that I could do to it, its electrics are obviously fried. The camera looks like it's barely been used, which should have given me a clue. Back when I would optimistically buy FSU cameras, the lesson was: if a camera looked beat up, it worked right, and if it looked nearly new, it had sat on a shelf it's entire life because it didn't work.

MFstooges · Jun 14, 2021

I painted metal body with black and clear coat. It didn't protect the paint, it is wearing off now. For plastic you may want to soda blast the silver paint and coat with special primer for plastic before painting, at least the paint won't peel off easily..

RalphLambrecht · Jun 15, 2021

logan2z said:
I don't know what your paint and mechanical skills are like, but I'm sure if I tried this I'd make a huge mess of the camera and it would never go back together properly again. If it were me, I'd just buy a silver one and call it a day.

painting plastics properly is not an easy task. with some plastics (such as PP)it's close to impossible; flame-treatingtheareaprior to painting helps a lot but gain, not an easy task;on top of that,I find black cameras ugly.

removed account4 · Jun 15, 2021

its might be easier to glue something on the camera instead of painting it. putting paint on something like plastic / vinyl never works unless for me, you might have to do something to open its pours. the problem ( fun problem ) with plastic is it reaches a certain temperature it loses all rigidity like jellyfish until it cools off again. I've heated plastics and changed their forms, its a good time, but probably not useful with something that needs to close light tight

I could be wrong though, fabulousrice seems to enjoy modifying his cameras this way, maybe he can suggest paints and adhesives you could use.
https://www.photrio.com/forum/threa...zenobia-in-its-luxurious-gold-edition.181995/

Arthurwg · Jun 15, 2021

Suggest you simply cover the silver body with black electrical tape. Or buy a black camera if you must have black.

Carlini Fotograf · Jun 24, 2021

momus said:
I'd like to buy a black Nikon FG to shoot my one Leica R lens, but the prices are just crazy. A working silver one can be found for half the price, so you can see where I'm going w/ this. I have acrylic paints, and since these are plastic bodies (around a metal frame, I think) ,I figured that a plastic sort of paint might work. Would this just flake off even after roughing up the old surface w/ sandpaper or steel wool? Maybe put a coat of clear over the paint to try and protect it? If it has to be painted, I have this crazy idea to paint it like a Grateful Dead T-shirt.

Ive restored many cameras. Painted and also redid the leatherette. I mainly use Acrylic paint. It works great, esp on faded Leatherette.
But If the leatherette is cracked or pealed half off . I usually just strip it all off the camera and redo it. You can buy faux leatherette with
an adhesive back. I get mine on Amazon. I just posted these pics in another thread.. Here's a Mamiya C33 I just painted the other
night. The third pic is Yashica I stripped all the leatherette off and applied new.

Before and After

BradS · Jun 24, 2021

I've both black and silver camera bodies. I've never noticed the color of the body to have any significant effect on the photographs.

Paul Howell · Jun 24, 2021

When in the Air Force during the Vietnam war our team had black Nikon Fs, silver Leica M2s and 3, if given a choice I always took a F or if I had to use a Leica taped it black, least amount of metal glinting in the sun the better I liked it, also used a sun shade to keep reflections from the lens down as much possible. If shooting in today's world, I use a Nikon rather than a Canon, the gray L glass lens same with Sony's G lens, make an easy target, not that I've read or been told that PJ are concerned at all.

RLangham · Jun 30, 2021

I have a DTL 1000 that someone did an absolutely asinine job of painting black (dark grey in actual fact). Looks like they took the casing off and sprayed it all with vehicle primer and then touched it up with wood paint... which scratches off at the touch of a fingernail. They also chipped the peak of the prism.. Hey, it was five dollars!

I would never try it myself, having seen this atrocity.

Paul Howell · Jun 30, 2021

With metal you can a have it powdered coated, lots of shops, not sure of the cost, the finish should be durable to a degree, my guess it will cheaper to get a black version of what ever camera you are interested in.

Has anyone painted their camera themselves?

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