Poor Hiding of Colors

What Causes it?
Poor color hiding is most often caused by:

• Overextending your paint spread
• Changing to a drastically different color of paint
• Applying paint unevenly
• Excessive thinning
• Inadequately mixing paint

Be aware that certain paint colors - such as yellows, reds, and oranges - inherently offer weaker color hiding. 

How to Solve It
Most paints are designed to be applied without thinning.
If necessary, only minimally thin your paints.

To hide a past paint color in most cases, apply an additional coat of the same material and color with a good-quality tool at the recommended spreading rate.

When you are making an extreme color change or are painting on an extremely porous surface, apply a primer coat tinted to the approximate color of your finish coat.

For help on selecting colors for this task, Benjamin Moore color samples, chips, and color cards can help you identify deep or clear colors and can recommend the best primer for achieving good hiding for your particular project.

Note: Images provided by The Rohm & Hass Paint Quality Institute.