Bored with my old motorbike and too poor to buy a new one, I decided to take the plunge and trust my baby with a professional motorbike artist.

As I browsed the internet for design ideas, I came across Kzak's website, full of sample images of design that can be sprayed on motorbikes. I was sold.

The following afternoon, I visited Kzak's showroom on Kim Ma Street, hoping to leave with a more beautiful ride.

As I feasted my eyes on the array of motorbikes, helmets, computers and car panels gleaming with freshly painted dolphins, ocean waves and flowers, I knew I had come to the right place.

The images looked so real that I could imagine plucking the roses right from the motorbike. Kzak's slogan rang true: "Results that will leave you speechless."

Who needs brushes?

These detailed designs are especially impressive given the precision required to create them.

"A skilled artist will examine the surface of his medium before beginning a project to determine how to ensure a smooth finished product," said Le Tuan Hung, one of Kzak?s founders.

The more I learned about the process, the more I respected the airbrush artists. Hung explained that his craft left no room for error, meaning that chatting or eating while working could not be tolerated.

"Before beginning, we have to format and envision every detail of layout and colour, because once we start spraying, we have to continue," he said. "That's why each work must be painted by only one artist."

The artists take on a great deal of responsibility every time they pick up a paint can.

"All the products we receive from customers are expensive, so each work requires a high level of concentration to control the paint. We cannot throw pieces away if we make mistakes," he said.

Instead, even a minor error requires stripping off all the paint and starting from scratch - bad news for the rookie who haphazardly puts a hand on the bike panel or car hood to steady it.

The time needed to finish a job generally varies between three and five days depending on the size and level of difficulty of the project. Weather also has an influence, with heat and humidity lengthening the time needed for paint to dry.

Seeing Kzak's finished products bolstered my confidence that my motorbike would be returned to me looking sharp, but I feared trouble from the traffic police as my bike's appearance would no longer match its description on my registration.

Hung explained that owners were required to re-register vehicles after changing the colour on over 70 per cent of the surface area.

Etching out a name

Clearly I'm not the only one impressed by Kzak's products: the business has earned a reputation nationwide in its first two years of existence.

The idea for the shop was planted three years ago, when Hung, then a student at Ha Noi University of Technology, saw a show about airbrushing on the Discovery Channel.

"Despite my family's initial protests, I begged my friends living abroad for help in acquiring instructions and tools from the US and UK. Then I set out to teach myself by practising on random household items," he said.

Now business is booming, with the shop taking in over 200 items a month. Kzak's four-member team handles the workload, with Nguyen Tien Hoang and Dao Duc Hai covering landscapes, Hung taking care of caricatures and detailed images and Nguyen Thanh Nam concentrating on basic images.

To ensure top quality, Kzak usually uses imported oil paints and tools.

"We hope to minimise our costs in the future as the art develops and domestic products improve," Hung said.

Another branch of Kzak has opened in HCM City, as the company expands its reputation and that of the art.