Help Needed: Make My Car Dusty

[Taylor Martin]

I know this isn't the special effects department, but I need Oppo's help:

For a video I and my roommate are shooting to celebrate Christmas in 2020, I need to make my car dusty, as if it weren't driven in weeks (due to a two-week quarantine, but exaggerated). Take a look at this post for reference, these were pictures I took after a long drive down a gravel road. If it were local, I'd just drive down it again, get the car nice and dusty, and go back home.

Or just take a look at these:

Is there anything at Home Depot, soot or sand, that'd give a similar effect? Has anyone ever tried to dust their car? The anti-svenders?

FINAL EDIT: I found a gravel trail a half an hour away, so all the knowledge you've bestowed upon me is pointless. I'll get my car wet and moist and then drive down it for a grand total of 3 bucks. I took a really deep look because I didn't feel like spending 50 bucks on supplies after spending 3x as much on Christmas presents.

Thanks!

[Dr. Zoidberg]

Don't use sand, no need to fuck up your paint for a video.

Why not just hose down the car in the driveway and dress it with potting soil, or topsoil, or immediately go for a drive?

[jminer]

If could find some flyash that would do it. It's lightweight enough to not likely damage your finish either. It's used in the production of concrete - but have no idea where you'd buy it retail.

[SilentbutnotreallyDeadly]

@taylor-martin try a mix of cocoa and rice flour or corn starch. If you want to go more minerally then you can use concrete pigment powders which come in quite a range of colours...

[Qaaaaa]

I like the idea of mixing cocoa and some other white flour. Might be a big darker if you use an unbleached whole wheat flour?

[MisterButtercup]

Flour has my vote. You've got your whole wheat and white for different textures, it's cheap, and should* wash off easily.

*Should because if it gets wet then dries again it'll take lots of gentle persuading to get it off

[kleebrz]

maybe something that dissolves rather than cakes up.... so you can wash it off cleanly?

substitute powdered sugar for the flour/starches.

also try the spice section at your grocery store.

[ibRAD]

That poor GN

[ITA97]

Could you do something like park your car in a dirt lot and have a friend do some donuts up wind?

[Taylor Martin]

@ita97 The issue is I don't have a lot of dirt lots nearby, at least not any that are public roads, and I'm not driving hours to find one. But donuts upwind do sound fun.

[Taylor Martin]

@misterbuttercup I'd like it to wax on wax off pretty easily, which is why I'm a bit hesitant on flour, but it certainly could work. I'm going to test my car today, just in small spots, with various different materials.

[Jarrett]

What about brown chalk dust?

[Taylor Martin]

@dr-zoidberg I'd go for a drive, but there isn't anywhere that dusty, at least not nearby.

that being said, I really like potting soil. Easy to get in bulk at Home Depot.

[Taylor Martin]

@jminer There's a place called Cemex nearby, which might have it. Is it not in places like Home Depot or Lowes or Ace Hardware?

[Taylor Martin]

@silentbutnotreallydeadly I'm liking the cocoa idea, but the flour could get too sticky. Fly ash, as jminer suggested, could work well, or concrete pigment powders...

Also, as much as I like chocolate, I don't need my whole car smelling like it haha.

[Taylor Martin]

@jarrett There's this Testors spray chalk that I've been looking at, washes away with water, but part of me doesn't trust it to wash off my car as easily as it washes off concrete (the ads say its safe for any surface, including vehicles, but I don't know how I feel about spray paint anything).

Chalk dust isn't readily for sale here, at least not in store.

[jminer]

@taylor-martin said in Help Needed: Make My Car Dusty:

@jminer There's a place called Cemex nearby, which might have it. Is it not in places like Home Depot or Lowes or Ace Hardware?

A hardware store probably won't carry it as it's used on the manufacturing side of cement making at the plants, not on the homeowner side.

I did a quick Google and couldn't find it retail but you may have better luck.

[MisterButtercup]

@taylor-martin agreed, and flour may not. I know someone in this thread recommended powdered sugar, which might...? Great plan testing out smaller areas with various materials! That should eliminate a few options at least

[Jarrett]

@taylor-martin Oh that seems way too hardcore. I was thinking about taking 2 erasers to a blackboard and then clapping them over the car lol

[Taylor Martin]

@jarrett You know, that would work brilliantly. Sometimes the simplist answers are the right ones. All I'd need is brown chalk and an eraser, we already have a blackboard at home.

[trivet]

This post is triggering my car OCD. My car is currently wearing a weeks worth of 3 hour commuting road grime and it's almost keeping me awake at night. TRYING to make a car look dirty is just...unfathomable.

[Taylor Martin]

@dr-zoidberg I found a gravel road, dusty and ready to be driven, only half an hour away. It's the cheapest solution for sure!