European Coatings Journal - 14.02.2025 | Thomas Albrecht | SPARKLE OF EFFECT COATINGS

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Effect pigments not only give coatings attractive brightness-and possibly colour-flops, but also texture. The term "texture" is commonly used to jointly describe sparkle and graininess of an effect coating. Both effects are determined by the spatial distribution of effect pigments in the coating, their size distribution, reflectivity, and smoothness. The lighting and observation situation determines whether graininess or sparkle are visible primarily. Graininess relates to the mesoscopic brightness structure of an effect coating under diffuse lighting, which is visible at close range, e. g., under cloudy skies. If the light source becomes smaller, graininess transitions to sparkle [1] - small, ...
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