This was a commission for the guitar player in my band. this one was slightly different, as instead of engraving a raw wood guitar that my buddy would whitewash first, then i would engrave, we started with a light cream colored guitar with a lacquer finish already on it. not sure i’d recommend that to others, i took the risk. it smells awful, thank god for a really solid venting setup (and having the external fan to run for another 5-10 minutes after the job was done). and i demasked outside. anyway, i think because of that you see less “char” in the engrave and the wood is much lighter than it was in the first one. the “gradient” portion of the engrave (it’s a variable engrave with grayscale to create the depth curves) doesn’t show any gradation of char going into the depth, so it appears lighter than the original. that could also be because of wood type. they’re def not the same. not sure what this is under the lacquer, but i doubt it’s the Paulonia i did the first time.
and if you wanna hear what it sounds like, here’s what Charlie posted after he got the guitar yesterday morning. guitars always sounds better when a phenomenal guitarist plays them. he worked with my buddy to get exactly the pickups/electronics and setup he wanted.
it’s open. neither of us has done resin pours before. but i spray several coats of crystal clear acrylic enamel into the engrave before i demask to protect the wood.
That is beautiful. A telecaster is such a wonderful canvas for this sort of thing. It’s such a basic iconic shape that fine details really jump out. Lovely work.
thanks. the next paisley is on a black strat copy body.
he is! i’ve been lucky to have been in multiple bands with him over the past 25-30 years. he can pretty much play anything. from hardcore 80s punk (he was in a band called Happy Flowers back then) to alt-country (he plays lap and pedal steel) to heavy metal to blues to classic rock to funk. and even randomly annoying us with celine dione sometimes.
Probably Swamp Ash. It’s the go-to material for luthiers but it’s getting stupid expensive (because everyone wants it and it’s over-harvested as a result). You can tell because it’s typically much lighter than regular ash or most other woods.
I do the bodies on my CNC and then crazy numbers of lacquer coats - it takes 3 months to finish a guitar with all the coats and the dry times (you’d think it’d be quick because lacquer flashes so fast but you need to get a hard cure). My son is still playing in various bands long after his dreams of being a rock star were supplanted by a career in IT It’s good because I can make a million guitar themed things for birthday & Christmas.
It’s good because I can make a million guitar themed things for birthday & Christmas.
