I don't know what you are making but when I first started playing with concrete I asked a house painter I met the best way to color concrete. His advice: just paint them with exterior latex paint. Made sense to me! Concrete houses, exterior paint...must work! Since then, I have just made the pieces with concrete/sand mix, purchased an airbrush and compressor, and used the exterior latex paint with a little water and some bonding agent (which you should also be mixing into your portland/sand/water mix - makes the concrete very clay-like or maleable) after the pieces have cured a bit. The airbrush gives the finished pieces such a soft, realistic look. I am making leaves, elephant ears, seagrape, and if you know your colors, you can give them such a realistic look NO ONE will know, until they touch them, that they aren't real. I took a leaf to Home Depot's paint dept. and asked them to reproduce the color. They scanned it and produced a color I thought was way too pea green, however when we smeared it across the leaf, we couldn't tell where the paint was! Just as important is the undercolor, as I call it. But I digress...what color are you going for? What's your project?

What bonding agent did you use? How much, does the package tell you how to mix it?

I'm using a bonding agent from Home Depot. It is called "Liquid Bonding Agent." Comes in a gallon bottle and looks like Elmer's glue. I have never really measured but use about 1 part agent to 4 prts water mixed together well before adding to portland/sand mix. When painting with the airbrush it is about 1 part agent 1 part water added to the paint and mixed well. I think if I were going to paint with a brush I would use it straight with the paint. 1 to 1. As an artist friend of mine said..."that bonding agent will make paint stick to ANYTHING!"

Buckyforce: MY Home Depot doesn't carry that! I specifically asked them. I found it at a commercial building materials place locally.

Here it is called HORNWELD. It looks and smells just like white craft glue, but its sticking power is phenomenal! Wash your equipment frequently.

'Pup

The mfg of Hornweld is Tamms. You might want to contact them for a local source. Their site says they have other stuff for concrete, but I didn't have the time to check it out.

'Pup

Here is a link that might be useful: Tamms