I was the paint supervisor at "the beard auto arts" off Holgate in Milwaukie, Oregon during the late 70's and early 80's. Jack sold the business in the early 80's. At that time he was almost totally blind. Jack considered me his protégé. I had the honor of painting the custom job on Jack's personal car. I also developed the technique for spotting white pearl (previously thought impossible) and did most of the custom painting at the shop. We would have other people like Dale Figley come in to help with special projects such as the zoo/omsi/tri-met bus. During that time Burrell prepped the jobs and painted guitars in his spare time. Marty was from Texas and was the only other painter. Marty took pictures of everything we did and had a huge photo album. It was a very special time. Jack always said, "Enjoy it while it's happening because they forget so soon." I lost track of everyone after Jack sold the business. I can answer most questions about that time (late 70's to early 80's)
It's easy if you know how. First you take the white color and mix enough pearl in it to match what is on top of the original. This takes a lot of pearl. Once you have enough pearl in the paint to match what is on top, the you add low strength black: one drop at a time and mix, then check for match. Go slow one drop at a time and test match by spraying on large putty knife for comparison ( take a wide metal putty knife and spray the same color primer (grey, red oxide, yellow etc.) on it that is under the white pearl that you are going to match, and let dry. Now your putty knife is ready to spray with the white color and pearl mixture, then spray clear over the top and check for match. Keep repeating this process after each additional drop of the low strength black.(clean putty knife after each comparison) After approximately 1 to 5 drops you will have a match. (remember that it darkens a tiny bit as it dries so take this into consideration) The low strength black creates false depth. The reason it was thought impossible was that nobody took into account the depth and what it entailed of the original pearl on top of the paint. If you look at a pearl flake under magnification you will see that the edges of it are black. As the pearl is laid on top of the white these black edges build up randomly thus creating depth. The low strength black fools the eye into perceiving this as a match. Thus, creating false depth and a perceived match to white pearl. Go slow! It is very, very easy to go too far (with white once you go too far you can never get it back and must start over)
awesome, thanks...... if you have the urge to share start a custom paint thread for all of us that are trying to learn as much as we can
Hello. Just picked up this VW bus in Vancouver, and was told it was painted by Beard. Having a challenge finding info on him...even though he seems very well known.
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