# Hollywood Flat Seams



## Debra P. Holmes (Oct 14, 2018)

I'm doing a box set and would like to know what y'all use to cover seams between hard cover Hollywood flats. I've used masking tape, but I'm not quite happy with the results. The walls will be 10' tall, so I have a seam near the top and in between 4' sections of wall. 

Thanks!!!


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## gafftapegreenia (Oct 14, 2018)

Our standard procedure is drywall compound. Sand and paint.

In high school we’d Dutchman our Broadway flats. I don’t redommend it.


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## RonHebbard (Oct 14, 2018)

Debra P. Holmes said:


> I'm doing a box set and would like to know what y'all use to cover seams between hard cover Hollywood flats. I've used masking tape, but I'm not quite happy with the results. The walls will be 10' tall, so I have a seam near the top and in between 4' sections of wall.
> 
> Thanks!!!


 *@Debra P. Holmes* In my amateur days in the 1950's I learned to orient the lower horizontal seams two feet above the floor where most of them were concealed by couches, furnishings, kitchen counters, refrigerators and stoves, et al rather than up high where lighting called more attention to them. 1.5 or 2.0 inch white masking tape NEATLY APPLIED wrinkle free in continuous lengths prior to painting pretty much concealed any remaining exposed seams and was quick to sever with a sharp razor knife on strikes rather than ripping it and making it more difficult to conceal next time. 
Toodleoo! 
Ron Hebbard


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## kicknargel (Oct 14, 2018)

Try some searching in this forum. Lots of discussions. Here's one: https://www.controlbooth.com/threads/flat-seams.15292/#post-146481


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## RonHebbard (Oct 14, 2018)

gafftapegreenia said:


> Our standard procedure is *drywall compound*. *Sand* and paint.
> 
> In high school we’d Dutchman our Broadway flats. I don’t recommend it.


*@gafftapegreenia SANDING* _drywall compound!??_ The folks cleaning and maintaining your lighting instruments must've maintained a stock of anatomically correct dolls and stuck pins in them after a few hours of convection coating your FEL's or 750T12's and baking dust onto your reflectors. 
Toodleoo! 
Ron Hebbard


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## Debra P. Holmes (Oct 15, 2018)

Turning them over, now that's a grand idea! Thank you all for your thoughtful suggestions! I looked at the other tread, as well. I appreciate you sending me that way.


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## RonHebbard (Oct 15, 2018)

Debra P. Holmes said:


> Turning them over, *now that's a grand idea!* Thank you all for your thoughtful suggestions! I looked at the other thread, as well. I appreciate you sending me that way.


 @Debra P. Holmes Not only a grand idea but affordably CHEAP too! (And with zero dust to clean up.)
Toodleoo! 
Ron Hebbard


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## RonHebbard (Oct 15, 2018)

Debra P. Holmes said:


> Turning them over, now that's a grand idea! Thank you all for your thoughtful suggestions! I looked at the other tread, as well. I appreciate you sending me that way.


 *@Debra P. Holmes* Another thought or two for you.
Locate a horizontal seam 30" above the floor and run molding along it as if it was chair rail. 
Locate a horizontal seam 30" above the floor and add a layer of bead-board below as wainscotting then cap the bead-board with molding for chair rail. 
If / when you get into building taller flats you might consider plate rail up closer to the ceiling, although optimistically the ceiling is imaginary in the interest of lighting. Obviously the majority of these molding and / or bead-board treatments are era dependent. Toodleoo! 
Ron Hebbard


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## kicknargel (Oct 16, 2018)

RonHebbard said:


> *@gafftapegreenia SANDING* _drywall compound!??_ The folks cleaning and maintaining your lighting instruments must've maintained a stock of anatomically correct dolls and stuck pins in them after a few hours of convection coating your FEL's or 750T12's and baking dust onto your reflectors.
> Toodleoo!
> Ron Hebbard



Who let a lighting guy in this forum, anyway? When we have to do this on stage, we use a drywall sander with dust collection.


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## RonHebbard (Oct 16, 2018)

kicknargel said:


> Who let a lighting guy in this forum, anyway? When we have to do this on stage, we use *a drywall sander with dust collection*.


 *@kicknargel * "*a drywall sander with dust collection*" 
If I believe that you'll tell me you store it next to your _silent terrazzo grinder_. 
Seriously, some of the best dust extractors I ever worked with were a system from Hilti for their range of hammer drills from 3/8th inch to over 2". The drills and core-bits generated dust like crazy but as long as you took the time to adjust the spring-loaded housings and drilled at 90 degrees to your surface the extractors did a truly AMAZING job of containing and collecting the dust. I often used them in finished lighting control rooms and especially in audio and / or video booths with RTS and / or bantam jack-fields and routed the extraction hoses to the Hilti vacuum outside the booth in a less dust sensitive area. Powering my drill via a receptacle on the vacuum meant the vacuum only spooled up while I was actually drilling. Dust containment is a major concern when working in finished control rooms, similar to core-drilling poured concrete ceilings in a paint shop when they've drops laid on the floor. 
Toodleoo! 
Ron Hebbard


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## JonCarter (Oct 16, 2018)

For smooth drywall joint-compouinded joints, try (first) teaching your crew to use a 12" joint knife & work carefully, and (second) use a damp sponge.


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## Eric W. (Oct 17, 2018)

I've dutchmanned, spackled, and used masking tape. Masking tape is my favorite, but as mentioned in other threads, it'll really show itself and also wrinkle when you paint it, because it absorbs the water in the paint differently than the wood around it. A trick I was taught to overcome that is to "paint" the tape first with simple elmers glue. It takes paint much better after that and then from the audience you can't see a thing.


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## jonliles (Oct 17, 2018)

Eric W. said:


> I've dutchmanned, spackled, and used masking tape. Masking tape is my favorite, but as mentioned in other threads, it'll really show itself and also wrinkle when you paint it, because it absorbs the water in the paint differently than the wood around it. A trick I was taught to overcome that is to "paint" the tape first with simple elmers glue. It takes paint much better after that and then from the audience you can't see a thing.



@Eric W. Do you thin the glue out? If you do, what ratio water to glue?


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## gafftapegreenia (Oct 18, 2018)

JonCarter said:


> For smooth drywall joint-compouinded joints, try (first) teaching your crew to use a 12" joint knife & work carefully, and (second) use a damp sponge.



Indeed, the trick is teaching people how to use the minimal amount of compound on a seam, and not just glob it on because “it can just be sanded down later”.


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## GreyWyvern (Oct 18, 2018)

JonCarter said:


> For smooth drywall joint-compouinded joints, try (first) teaching your crew to use a 12" joint knife & work carefully, and (second) use a damp sponge.


+1 for wet sanding. No dust, no mess, just easy and clean. And +1 to this as well,

gafftapegreenia said:


> Indeed, the trick is teaching people how to use the minimal amount of compound on a seam, and not just glob it on because “it can just be sanded down later”.


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## Captain Audio (Oct 19, 2018)

We usually use 2" tape that is applied very patiently. We also try to keep the 2' section down closer to the ground to be obstructed by furniture like someone else already mentioned. We did Harvey a while back with 12' flat so we put the 4' section at the top and did a picture rail over that seam. 

I would also say that usually the tape is fairly well hidden because there are no lights focused down on to the wall and we almost always do some sort of texture or break up pattern for our paint treatment. This really helps lose those seams.


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## jonliles (Oct 23, 2018)

gafftapegreenia said:


> Indeed, the trick is teaching people how to use the minimal amount of compound on a seam, and not just glob it on because “it can just be sanded down later”.


Do you know how many sheetrock "installers" I've had to teach that to? My pet peeve with joint compound / platster is the use of too much!


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## RonHebbard (Oct 23, 2018)

jonliles said:


> Do you know how many sheetrock "installers" I've had to teach that to? My pet peeve with joint compound / plaster is the use of too much!


*@jonliles* As a retired member of two international unions and three locals I can feel lightning bolts about to descend upon me for typing this: If you want to see mudders who know how to efficiently apply tape and fast setting drywall compound with their "banjo's" as smoothly as possible and exactly when to make a second pass if / when required, WATCH an experienced team of non-union rockers _sweep_ through a building and *LEARN*. The non-union crews, especially if / when they sweep through a site between midnight and four a.m. when few general contractors and inspectors are on site, know tricks with four and six step stair units and adjustable length stilts that their unionized kin would NEVER utilize. I'll NEVER forget watching two guys rock and mud a 100' x 17' wall with two layers of 5/8" fire-rated panels with staggered joints on the layers using a combination of 4' x 8' and 4' x 10' panels and with precious little waste and VERY little sanding. I was running BX and flex through walls for a non-union general contractor who was a close friend for decades (he's now well into his eighties) and I had to pay close attention to avoid the fellow towering above me and galloping along on stilts especially when his feet were elevated higher than my head. I'll NEVER forget those two guys and how fast that wall went up in ONE night. 
Toodleoo! 
Ron Hebbard


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## Eric W. (Oct 30, 2018)

jonliles said:


> @Eric W. Do you thin the glue out? If you do, what ratio water to glue?


You can thin it a little. Just enough to make it “paintable.”


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