By Ranjan K Baruah
Whenever we think of painting, many things come to our mind. Painting is an important form of visual art, bringing in elements such as drawing, gesture, composition, narration or abstraction. Paintings can be naturalistic and representational, photographic, abstract, narrative, symbolist, emotive or political in nature.
As the understanding differs unless we become focused, so, when it comes to career connections there might be confusion. Well, there are many opportunities with painting and I would like to mention a few options. Options may be paint technology, painter, artist and even digital painting. We are going to discuss about paint technology to start with.
Paint is any pigmented liquid, liquefiable or mastic composition that, after application to a substrate in a thin layer, converts to a solid film. It is most commonly used to protect, colour or provide texture to objects. Paint can be obtained in many different types such as water colour, synthetic etc. Paint is typically stored, sold and applied as a liquid, but most types dry into a solid.
Paint Technology is the discipline in which one studies about the various ingredients — resin, polymers, pigments etc — which are used in making paint. It is like a division of chemical technology. Some of the main areas of paint technology include oil and paint media and paint application. It is a course of study in which one comes to know about various ingredients used in the making of paint.
We study about different kinds of paints, their manufacturing, the use of various kinds of paints and the techniques used for the application of paints. After passing senior secondary in science, students may opt for courses in paint technology. This course is also offered as a subject/paper in chemical engineering by most institutes.
The course covers technology of oils, resins, polymers, pigments and dyes, organic solvents, paint additives, powder coatings, high solids coating, electro-coatings and other paint application techniques.
The paint industry is booming in our country and in many other parts of the world which is mainly dependent on automobile and real estate industries. A paint technologist is required in different domains of the industry and they can find work in departments of paint manufacturing companies which include research and development, quality assurance, production, marketing and technical assistants/executives who work on clients sites. Some of the leading companies where aspirants may get jobs include Akzo Nobel India Ltd, Asian Paints Ltd, Berger Paints Ltd, Kansai Nerolac Paint Ltd, Pidilite Industries Ltd, Jenson & Nicholson India Ltd, Shalimar Paints Ltd, British Paints India Ltd, Snowcem Paints Pvt Ltd, Jotun India Pvt Ltd, etc. We shall publish more options related with painting in our next edition.
(Ranjan K Baruah is a career mentor, skill trainer, academic consultant and strategic planner and can be reached at [email protected] or 8473943734 for any career related queries)