Monday, November 23, 2015

Pointless graph

 
Doing a little painting this weekend, I spotted this graph on the side of the can. I'm assuming it was drawn by someone who thinks graphs are just clipart because it's meaningless.
 
Essentially, what it says is that gloss paint is shinier than eggshell. Who'd have guessed that? Disappointingly, matt paint doesn't make an appearance as I'm fascinated to know how it would score.
 
I wonder what the methodology is to produce these results? There must be some science surely?
 
I'm imagining boffins wearing lab coats shining lights on specially prepared painted panels and then using the glare-o-meter to measure the reflected sheen. The glare-o-meter will have a readout, probably a big swinging needle, that points at the three universally agreed levels of reflection.
 
All this will explain why Satinwood doesn't reach the giddy heights of High and misses by more than Eggshell fails to reach Low. At least Gloss has gone all the way through High, although there's no indication of how many coats of paint are required for this, nor the colour chosen. Silver paint would presumably be glossier than black for example.
 
Or maybe the glare-o-meter can tell the difference between different sheen's. Must be quite a tool.

3 comments:

Michael Campbell said...

At work we have a device that measures smoke trapped on a filter paper by shining a light on it, the less reflected the blacker the paper. To check it the calibration dept have a set of stone like objects of different shinyness known as "reflectance standards". Never tried the device on paint though!

neil whitehead said...

What an interesting introduction to a new weeik! Of course, the levels will be influenced by the application technique - airbrush, roller or brush so there is another opportunity for an infographic.

Unknown said...

Unfortunately it's more of a sad representation of current society, next time you find yourself in a paint store/department ask the person behind the counter about some of the ridiculous questions customers ask and you will soon understand why such a basic graph is printed on the can. As they say, common sense is not very common!