The Right Way to Touch Up Scuffed Wall Paint

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Walls can get scuffed up and nicked over time, but opening an old can of paint probably won't get the job done right. Learn the right way, step-by-step.

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Video Transcript for "The Right Way to Touch Up Scuffed Wall Paint"

David Lupberger on the Right Way to Touch Up Scuffed Wall Paint: Hi, I'm David Lupberger with ServiceMagic.com. Look at this wall, see the scuff marks? Most homes have areas where there has been a high amount of wear and tear and activity that degrades the paint. So what we want to talk about today is how to do touch up painting and do it the right way.
Lupberger: What you'll see that I've done is I've taped off the area to paint. And I'm doing this for a specific reason, if you have a wall that's been there for several years or an older gallon of paint that you're using for touch up, I've got to tell you if you just come in and just hit the spots you may find an hour later those spots will stand out because the gallon of paint is old the wall has been through all these activities. I'm going to recommend that you paint corner to corner so that it all blends in.
Lupberger: Here are the materials you're going to need. Painter's tape, spackle, to fill holes or gouges. Paint brush, roller, I've got a screwdriver to take off covers and then I've got the caulking gun and let me show you what I'm going to do with that.
Lupberger: Now to keep the paint from bleeding under the tape, and onto the opposite wall, I'm going to show you a painters' trick. And what a good painter does is actually put up the tape but then comes back and creates a seal under the tape so once that dries, I can come back and paint to that corner and when I pull that tape it will be a nice sharp corner.
Lupberger: So I'm going to start what painters call "cutting in", which I'm going to work my way around the outside of the frame. So now that I've trimmed out the perimeter I can take my roller and hit all the open spaces. And because I've prepped this properly, the rolling of the space goes very quickly. So I'm going to let this dry. After it dries, I'm going to take a box knife or carpenter's knife and I'm going to score that caulking so that when I pull that caulk off I'm going to have a straight edge. This is the way to do trimming because when you have old paint on an old wall it may not match. By doing the entire surface, everything blends.