Make certain you have your own business cards and never leave home without a supply. Word of mouth is a huge source of potential business; you need to have an easy way for people you meet to find you. Especially at the job site, when the clients friends come by, you need to have a stash on hand. Even better are postcards with an image of your work.
Clients almost always want to know a price right off the bat, and they want it fast. Don't rush off an estimate without making certain you establish specifics about what that client wants. Always require that you work from an image that the client will approve and sign off on before any work on the mural begins. Include in your budget any advance design work you must perform.
As you are a captive audience painting in someone's home, a client may invariably ask you to simply "put some paint on this…" asking you to do something additional, other than your mural. Be careful because you do not want to be led into a situation where the client can expect extras for nothing.
Never rush or cut corners in your initial masking off, covering spaces where you will be working (use plastic as the first layer, and cover that with canvas tarp or heavy paper), and organizing your workspace that you can function efficiently. The worst nightmare is not having your workspace protected when something happens. Unnecessary touching-up is a time-waster.
Be careful to use low tac tape (blue or white tapes) when taping down wood floors, and don't leave tape down any longer than necessary. Floor finishes can come up easily. If you can tape your floor protective covering to a baseboard instead of the floor, you may be in better shape at the end of the job.
When masking off a wall or moulding, try to secure some of the original wall paint from your client and paint the edge of the tape to seal off your area and prevent seeping of your mural paint under the mask. If you cannot get this, drybrush your new paint over the edge of the tape in a couple of layers, before laying down thick coats of paint.
If you don't use EasyMask to mask off your areas (it is a thin brown paper on a roll that has adhesive on one edge), make sure you have plenty of paper attached to your tape, that is, your masking material is wide enough to prevent splatters or overpainting on connecting walls. The adhesive on Easymask is not a low tac material, be advised that it should only go over areas that aren't in danger of pulling up existing paint or varnishes.
Two of my favorite resources for painting decorative finishes are:
Kevin McCloud's Complete Book of Paint and Decorative Techniques, Kevin McCloud, ISNBA 0-684-87434-2 and
Professional Painted Finishes, Ina Marx, Allen Marx and Robert Marx, ISBN 0-8230-4418-1.
Both books are very comprehensive, richly illustrated and very informative. Professional Painted Finishes is particularly helpful with faux marbre and faux bois techniques, giving many examples of types of materials to mimic and step-by-step methods of achieving great results. Kevin McCloud's book is a great read, anecdotal, and really breaks down and defines use of various materials to their most basic properties.
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