In November, Bill Van Loo showed off his custom-painted Apple QWERTY keyboard for controlling Ableton Live. He’s been painting again, and has now completed his live Live rig with a beautifully-painted Peavy MIDI fader unit.
Peavey PC1600x MIDI controller re-paint [Flickr set]
Detailed, step-by-step instructions and an explanation of how this all fits into a music gig:
adventures in spray paint, plywood and velcro: my new controller board
And all of this fits atop a sizable MIDI keyboard and Line 6 PodXT Live on the floor. QWERTY keyboard aficionados will no doubt also appreciate the custom paint job on an IBM Model M. Not many computer QWERTY keyboards can be considered classics, but to us typing geeks there’s nothing quite like the feel and satisfying “clack” of IBM’s best.
How did he manage to paint this without it winding up a mess? Here’s painting 101 with Bill:
My painting tips are pretty straightforward – use a ruler and right angle when you’re masking off the pieces you don’t want paint on, and follow the directions on the can. Make sure you’re using lots of light coats of paint, not one or two big gloppy coats – otherwise you’ll get runs and the paint will look poor.
I have considered painting my Trigger Finger, but for now I think I’m satisfied…if pictures of an orange or light blue or brown Trigger
Finger start showing up in my photostream, you’ll know I got antsy, I guess!
Remember, if you have a project or gig photos, feel free to share them with fellow CDMers on the Create Digital Music photo pool. Don’t worry about quality — really, we’ll all feel better if some stuff doesn’t look so hot!