Due to the building boom of a few years ago. There was a high number of people who got into the painting industry with little to no Experience. If your house was painted by one of those, theres a chance you may have some joint banding.
Joint Banding or Telegraphing is the visual difference in the painted wall surface area, where the Joint compound is applied on the sheetrock. Either along the edges, seams, or nail heads, anywhere the joint compound is. In low light situations the wall may seem fine but if you have a large wall area that is lighted or you have a lot of natural light, this difference will show up easily when not properly finished. A drywall finish Level 4, is what is required for house walls. This produces a smooth and level surface to the touch, so even though you see the difference in the wall surface, when you run your hand across it, it feels smooth to the touch.
The problem is produced by the 2 different surfaces. First the actual sheet rock, and then the Drywall compound. You may have noticed that sheetrock is paper coated, and the surface of the drywall mud is different. When there is no primer/sealer applied, to these two surfaces, prior to the top coat, they will absorb the wet paint differently, and dry at different rates. Therefore they reflect light light differently, resulting in the visual difference that you see. This shows up in Shiny finishes more than Flat finishes.
The Fix!
Paint another topcoat! This will usually do the trick in getting enough coats of paint to cover and blend. A tited primer/sealer should have been used prior to top coating. Always get you primer color tinted.
If you had a Flat paint on your walls and see this, then your builder or painter used a cheaper product than they should have. Normally 2 good quality coats of flat paint will cover and not show any telegraphing. We would recommend Porter Paints' - Vinyl Flat, or Bher Premium Plus for flat paints.
More than likely though, you have a shiny paint finish, Egg shell, Satin, or Semi gloss. The highest sheen wall paint we recommend for inside houses, is a Satin finish. When painting walls, shiney finishes show any type of banding or Drywall mistakes much more readily than flat finishes. For a residence, when putting a shiny finish on, you may choose to either Prime/Seal the wall prior to putting 2 finish coats on it, or you may have to paint a third top coat as I recommended above. If you choose not to prime your walls, then once you have painted 2 coats on (always paint 2 top coats) then you can judge as to whether it needs that 3rd coat on it to cover it up. Sheet Rock in residential houses does not necessarily have to be primed. For Historic houses and buildings, and commercial properties, the walls are always primed/sealed, and then painted with 2 top coats.
Another option is to use the self priming paints. Always be aware no matter what you originally choose to do, some colors just plain do not cover as good as others and may need another coat. It is normal that the higher the paint sheen, the less pigment the paint has in it, and therefore does not cover as well.
This is exactly what we have on our living room wall. This is a new house only 1 year old. Thanks for info.
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