A painting question

[steelhead]

I bought various sizes of mesh from Walmart the other day and have been messing around with adding scale effects to my plugs. I was wondering if anyone has any tips. When I spray over the mesh after it'd been stretched over the plug, the paint tends to collect along the edges of the mesh thread, as opposed to filling in evenly. I'm using rattle cans and I'm beginning to wonder if they don't give me enough control. Either too much seems to come out and things get a bit runny or if I hold the can back, there's over spray, etc. In either case, I don't seem to be able to get even coverage. Any suggestions? Also, any hints on when you know that the paint is dry enough to lift the mesh off the plug?