I've used Krylon paint extensively on jackets, backpacks and pouches. They do tan, olive drab, black. It doesn't flake and requires no preparation.

I think you nailed it. That's about as custom as it gets, and it suits your area perfectly. It doesn't look super pretty up close, but it gets the job done with flying colors. Might steal your idea. Tactical AF.

I think the end result is a great improvement and it seems to work really well indeed.

You Sir just saved me time, money, and a whole bunch of curse words! Keep up the good work!

I agree it turned out much better for your neck of the woods. Glade I can across your video as I had no idea they made fabric paint. I did a chest rig that was black with camo paint it turned out OK for the small amount of use it gets. Here in Florida after many years I found out the very old tried and true Tiger Strips works best 90 - 95 % of the time as we stay green most of the year.

Depending on whether the nylon is waterproofed or not, it would be interesting to attempt another method. The method I'd be curious to try uses 100% silicone caulk (white) diluted down with VM&P (Varnish Makers & Painters) solvent. The diluted silicone caulk could be dyed--I believe you can use an alcohol based dye. Once the proper consistency and color is achieved, you can simply use a foam brush to apply the base color and then dry brush other tints & colors over the top. This method would solve two problems‐‐ 1.) It would waterproof the material. 2.) It would effectively silence the material, especially when it is cold. Nylon tends to "crackle" during movement when it's cold!!! NightHawkInLight channel did a feature of waterproofing a cotton bed sheet by soaking in silicone solution to make a waterproof tarp!!!

in the future if you want to dye nylon, leather dye works great and using a cotton dauber you can make decent patterns. I used green, dark brown, and black leather dye on a coyote tan chest rig to make a M81 woodland style camo

I would to suggest adding some loops to the top and bottom corners of your pack or pack frame. Even just larks head hitches will work. This can be used to attach a pack cover using toggles through the loops. You can make panels of any colour or pattern you want without having to paint the whole pack. Trekking during hunting season? Make the pack cover reversible with hunter orange. Cheers from Ottawa 🇨🇦

Your work on this is invaluable. Keep up the good work

I, too, tried that fabric paint on an IFAK and a GP pouch. I attempted, for a few weeks, to convince myself that the green was like a “Ranger Green”. In the end I just had to face the fact that it was straight up “Alien Green”. Since then I use regular matte spray paint (no prep) and it works great 99% of the time. The other 1% of the time some types of materials just absorb the first 5 coats. Ugh. Thanks for testing out all of that other stuff and thanks for this video!

He walked a long way to find that spray paint.

I have a lot of walnut died UCP! Will be trying this paint method on some of the darker stuff. Thanks again for sharing this great info.

they make special Rit dyes for synthetics

Turns out realy great.

That’s actually a pretty kick ass pattern you made ! Well done

Wow!! What a difference!

That looks absolutely awesome!!! Nice one John!

I would like to see you spraypaint the velcro on your UCP top

1000% improvement & reminds me of a splinter camo

Looks great thanks for sharing

Honestly I dig the dark in the sun it looks like SADF color.

Excellent job!

Looks like British Disruptiive pattern now. It 😊 really looks cool and effective fall/nighttime camouflage

Well done sir, good explanation 👍 thanks

Goes well with the forest floor ! 😮

Certainly looks better; thanks John for the video.

"Problem solved(ish)!" Sir, I'm afraid I have to confiscate this term into my custody.

Damn, that came out really good.

I was skeptical when I saw the original dark brown pack, but you really created some great gear for your needs there.

Big John! That looks fantastic, brother! It weighed heavy in my mind when it all came out so dark in the walnut, too, but that is primo! One question I have, though. How does that paint look under nods? Id it just white washed, or is it even remotely broken up? Thanks, man! Rock on, Brother John! :)

Matches the forest floor nicely, great job.

You can't have it all! I like your idea of maximizing 'quiet.' Target species seem to be more alert to sound and scent. Straight lines are seldom found in nature. Edges should be broken up. Colors may not be everything. In late autumn and during winter, variations of tree bark colors seem to be natural. You found a great reddish brown that is close to some of the leaves...but they are interspersed with other colors. This made for an interesting video.

You just developed Hocking Hills Brush stroke camo!

Good video.Good idea. Thank you.

Good job thanks for the info, gotta try this.

I think that you should lighten up the dark brown velcro on your uniform shirt. That stands out more than anything.

This is amazing

Looks great

Going to have to come back to this video when I have the kit to do the thing. Im working on a cheap rucksack, basically to make my mistakes before I move on to good backpacks. I saw a WW1 plane with a camo pattern that was jigsaw puzzle pieces shaped blocks of colour and liked the idea on top of a nasty digital pattern. It will work as a camo but won't look military. Will use your fabric spray paint idea.

Holy cow that went well!

I tried dyeing some ACU pouches to better match my coyote brown MOLLE battle belt I took on my last deployment in 2014. We’d been issued OCP uniforms. I tried gradually dyeing pouches and let results air dry some to guage the result while I did other tasks. After spending several hours with this process with barely noticable results. So I said “eff it” and dumped the rest of the bottle of RIT dye into the water. I ended up with five pouches that looked like eggplant. So I grabbed a spray can of red primer and some camo paint rattle cans I had on hand and put a horrible pattern on it. It looked like shit but no one at deployed location said anything. It was a very rough finish but after six months of daily handling it looked…..better. Not good but better. 9 years later I use them for training (post retirement) or out in the woods plinking. Another 10 years and they might look good.

I use Hillbilly Battle Dress pattern on all my outdoor sports and tactical gear and clothing. It is cheap and widely available in everything and everywhere. Plus if you're from a wooded part of the free USA it will even work in a SHTF situation if you're trying to blend in as the gray man- everybody else is wearing it around almost year round. You can give it a try and I have a feeling you might like it. When you get the to the store you'll know you have found the right stuff if it has a tag on it that says Realtree. The best part- no more farting around with painting fabric which is going to suck in the end anyway. Leaves a lot more time for more useful stuff like training, prepping, hunting and camping.

The bag looks great in those woods.

I'd be tempted to try the Plasti-dip brand spray paint in camo colors.

Good job with the camo patern

I sprayed mine w/ the paint labeled for plastic. Been 13-15 years, still fine... Nice patterns there, kind of WW2 german splinter.

Wow! Looks great. Thank you for your hard work and showing us the process. A shame that our Government spends so much on Camo yet one smart fella with some spray paint makes a much more effective pattern and color scheme. Also I believe those narrow pouches are flare pouches. Take care.

Krylon camo series and Aervoe mil-spec series works wonders on gear. Never had any issues with it on packs, pouches, etc. Provides IRR camo and adds some waterproofing properties I find.

Would've been interested in seeing the green for spring time colors

Good to see u still kicking, someone on gel alcohol vid said he thought u died😂

This looks Great!! You could mix up the methods for pouches and it would only make it better and better. Great Vid. Thank you. PS. A couple camo patches for your brown sleeve velcro panels would be helpful.

When I went walking in the woods looking for walnuts after watching your video, where I had a sighting of a Bigfoot, I came upon an area in the woods that was outlined perfectly square with trees laying on the ground, inside of them was nuts! A whole pile of some kind of tree nuts inside of this square structure. Come to find out, after making the dye with them , I discovered they worked great to keep chiggers, ticks and mosquitoes from you, as the Native Americans also used these nuts from a Osage Orange tree too. I think they saw me looking for nuts and put those Osage nuts there were I would find and discover them!

Nice! Same method as painting your rifle! Great job! Now if only we could figure out IR reflection lol. One problem at a time tho!

It would be interesting to see results versus night vision and thermal imaging

looks awesome and would be excellent in swamps as well , water fowl even

Your jacket and pants look great. Pack sticks out like a sore thumb though.

Other than the large Velcro rectangles on your shoulders, only your movement made you noticeable. Great end results!

This is pretty interesting because I also like to camo stuff like rifles, shotguns and other stuff. Im getting ready to dye some old ACU uniforms and getting some good ideas. The only environment I can think of that ACU may be effective is in an urban setting- i.e.... lots of rubble and concrete stuff? Ive used something called "Plasti-dip" which is more of like a flex seal type product on the underside of the Alice pack top cover compartment, and it does adhere real good and waterproofs as well. I dont know if "Plasti-dip" is made in different colors, but if it is; I might try it on the outside of an old medium Alice pack and see how it works. Here in WV, the ground cover and other bushes like the briars and stuff can mix stuff up a little bit, but looks like your commo stuff looks much better than many others experiments that Ive seen. Good video- (I remember the days when you had to spit shine your boots).

It looks great 👍🏻😊 Reminds me a little of early german patterns 🤔😅 Merry Christmas 🎄🇩🇰

Otro buen video me acaba d dar otra idea tengo un inpermeable para la lluvia d plastico y con este video lo voy a pintar estilo militar 😃😃👍👍👍

John, that looks damn fine. BTW, check out Ritt synthetic dyes. Works very well on military materials. the only thing is the plastic hardware doesn't take dye much, if at all. Merry Christmas, brother!

Good job

I’m thinking vertical irregular stripes for that environment!

THAT ruck color... is 100% Alabama Red Clay brown!

Something that works quite well is duplicolor's fabric paint. Meant for car interiors and fabric. Was able to paint a full set of alice lbe gear, pasgt vest cover, and pasgt helmet cover with one can. The surface texture does become rough if you're heavy handed with the spray. But its not an issue for non skin contact equipment

Looks a lot like British DPM desert, great Fall colors for midwest deer season hunting those Iowa cornfields and wooded draws.

i had the same thing happen to my ucp assault pack when i dyed it with rit brown , it went super dark like yours.

WOW! 'Vincent van Kamp!' Those colors and those patterns are fine! I think you need face paint next. Everything else looks quite natural.

The brown turd wasnt so bad. Those brown velcro squares have got to go though! Thanks for the video.

I knew you were wearing UCP - didn't know it was dyed and not sure that you needed to for where you are in the video - looks good anyway! Standing against those trees (bark color) with standard UCP would blend in well. UCP gets a bad rap but I really like it for my predominant environment here in the Southwest - any time of year in the rocky and dry low desert areas. Don't get any 'dead brown leaves' in a desert wash - no 'sticks' to whittle, gather or tie around either so you can leave your 'quick deploy ridge line cordage' at home - but bring your knife, two quarts of water and a wide brimmed hat (in UCP). Using small jig saw puzzle pieces I spray painted my 'black' Cordura shoulder holster (I use for hunting) into a UCP pattern to match my ACU jacket and LBE. It came out well and I highly recommend using spray paint to alter colors/patterns on gear. (If you're going to hunt with it - paint early and let it 'air out' to dissipate the odor. I've even dragged it in the dirt a few times before I used it.). I've seen the newer 'fabric paint' but haven't tried as of yet. Your comments were respected. I thought it was widely understood that the Cordura/nylon most LBE and pouches are made of don't take to dye well. I'm fortunate that I don't need to alter UCP for my purposes but I'll vouch for 'rattle can' camo effectiveness. Sometimes 'black' is the cheapest option in gear so I do rattle a can when I need to. Remember - camouflage only works when you're 'not moving' so don't get consumed with the 'perfect pattern' - Mossy Oak and SITKA make a 'fortune' doing that. Boonedockery's 'walnut dye' on UCP (clothing) will save you BIG BUCKS for you guys in the 'brownish' fall sticks. Try 'Peacock Green' (not sure which dye brand) for a 'greener' sage color - good for spring in low and high desert terrain. Checked the price of 'anything' in Multicam/OCP lately - SHAZAM! BTW - MOLLE Medium Rucksack ROCKS! It's perfect - but opinions vary.

There's a bunch of different Fabric spray paints I see. I've been considering a custom look for my pack in Urban like Brick and Ivy.

just hold a branch with leaves over what you are spraying and change up how you are holding it to get natural patterns

When I was in core marines we was tasked to be cleaver so I brought a 3 m adhesive spray. And had fellow spray me down here and there. Rolled in sand leaves. It worked great. Did our function then ok class done let’s go to lunch. Ummmmm I didn’t bring a second set cloths I lived off base married. Not only did I got poked at on base my wife made me take my now screwed up uniform off outside. It was junk now. All most bad as idea to use permanent markers to make facial long lasting camouflage time. We was some serious nut jarheads.

Krylon and a slight drizzle. I'm sure other water would work. But I accidentally found sorayig in a light right almost dyes the fabric and helps w smell

Thank you very very much for your instructions. I want to paint my molle 2 rucksack in a more civilian way. I don’t want to camouflage it. I would be happy if it’s black or dark brown. All videos I saw on KZfaq don‘t convince me. Now I know how to do it. I subscribed your channel and greetings from Germany. And, by the way, what was going on in the minds of people who developed this UCP pattern? That isn‘t a camouflage. It‘s just a type of colour. Why could they believe that this greyish colour fit in a woodland area, or in deserts with many shades of brown and sandy colours? I‘m very disappointed. It’s unbelievable. They wasted 5 billion Dollars on this, I read. And I don‘t want to imagine the loss lives this „camouflage“ cost. This depresses me. It‘s very sad.

May I suggest "light for the artist" by Ted Seth Jacobs. Lighting and relationships make a big difference.

have you not tried the idye fabric dye?

Excellent Video, gear turned out great, what did you use to originally dye it walnut brown

Awesome video per usual. I was wondering how it turned out. I love the term you described, looking like a giant turd 💩 walking through the woods….or Call of Duty 😂😂😂

Can you do a sort of Jackson Pollack technique to walnut dye the pouches? I think it'll give you a flecktarn look. Maybe. At least in my head that's how it should work.

interesting did you ever check IR of that painted items? I use NFM colours and those are very good working and deliver IR resorbtion. But they are expensive.

Great video! This works great for Ohio (I live there too). I wonder how IR compliant this is compared to UCP materials before painting. If you would like to, we could meet up so you could borrow my L3 WP RNVG-A to test the effectiveness of your paintjob under IR.

Una ultima pregunta me podria decir el nombre d los colores en camuflage tipo selva

have you tried bleaching or vinegar washing the stuff thats too dark? I dyed mule tape in Rit dye and had to bleach it first. it came out about like your dark stuff so maybe it can remove it too.

hey, really like your colouring experiments. did i understand right, you get that dark brown colour on nylon fabric using walnut dye? the velcro panel on your jacket is also that dark brown because of using walnuts? that´s really great! i like surplus, but i do not like the camo patterns on newer surplus items. this dark brown would be perfect to camouflage the camouflage!

"This made an interesting video.'' So...I keep thinking about it. 'Not Knowin' Nothing', I'm thinking 'dots' of forest colors. Next, I'm thinking 'colanders.' This might save taping as much and it should avoid linearity.

hello my friend i hope you are having a great yule time break. have you thought about using fabric dye through a hobby air brush. use like spray spaint but as a fabric dye it might take better

So what's the solution going forward? Less dye, less time in dye? Can you bleach wash the dye somewhat out?. Would you dye one peice at a time lightly and redye it again if its not dark enough? I have dried walnut dye and haven't gotten around to doing anything with it yet. Your paint job did fix your issue though.

What if you bleached the nylon first, then wash it off real good and then walnut dye it? I think that would work well.

How stable is the fabric paint? Have you run anything through a washing machine?

I think just plain old dirt and use will make it even better. I try to mimic deer. They seem to hide well in all four seasons.

Gotta do the velcro patches on your shirt

Hello fellow Dockery

They have fabric paint at O'Reilly's for cheep. Much better than just pants. I can re do car seat and on vinyl in a BMW it came out great condition like factory dune. Fabric paint has die in it.

I like the idea but at this point you could buy an camo that works... I'll keep it in mind if I find a deal on ucp pants or something

I’d propose getting that pack dirty and dusty to take on some natural hues from your environment rather than painting it. Or go and give it an actual ghille wash.

Can this be done on say an OD green Gortex jacket?…

Have you tried using small amounts of bleach to lighten the tone? Maybe worth a shot so your ucp gear isn’t useless

Look get some cotton rag. Grab few leaves. Trace them and and make plastic cut outs. Then take some what matching paint. Grab some dirt and rub it in.

wash with limestone next you might like the results