Official Luthiers Forum!

So I wanted to pick some of your brains and knowledge base regarding translucent colors and how to achieve custom design work. I have done one so far and it came out pretty good. I attached a picture below. I did this one by first spraying the red transtint to the entire top of the guitar. I then cut the shape of the 'drill bit' design from tape and stuck it to the top of the guitar. I then sprayed the entire top again, but this time using black transtint. Lastly, I removed the tape and the red driller design is still there in red.
Okay - so if I want to do something more elaborate, or want to do this a different way, what should I do? Fortunately the customer wanted a really dark black guitar, so I was able to cover the red easily enough. But if someone wants really translucent colors I won't be able to use this method.

Any advice or direction would be greatly appreciated..

_________________
Barron Wesley Guitars

I'm getting started on my first project similar to what you are doing so I'm no expert. From what ive seen people will start by transtinting the whole guitar in black. Then sand off most of the black leaving it in the grain. Then whatever you put over the top of that will pop the grain and make it stand out quite a bit. Go to youtube and look for guitar finishing clips and you should see several examples. Hope this helps.

What you did is about the only way to do it. If you have 2 different colors that you want to do a design like that, but one can't cover the other one then you would have to tape off both colors. It would be a lot of work. If it is solid colors it would be a lot easier. I haven't done a design like that with translucent colors, just bursts, but I can't think of any other way to do it. That is a nice looking guitar by the way, what kind of finish is that?

_________________
John Thiessen
http://www.iszacguitars.com

Thanks - I completely understand the grain popping thing, but was wondering about doing designs like pin stripping and other multi-color designs and how to do them.

_________________
Barron Wesley Guitars

I was afraid this would be the only way. It certainly would be a lot of work. Holy crud!

By the way, the finish is KTM-9 on all of my guitars. I'm getting very comfortable with it the more I use it.

_________________
Barron Wesley Guitars

Rusty actually there is another way to do it and it allows you complete design freedom. You have to have clearcoat on the wood and it level, but other than that, you do it like the custom car painters. Do a google search for "how to paint custom car graphics", and I bet you will be amazed at what you find.

I would do you a sample piece and illustrate it, but I am currently taking care of my very sick wife. I almost lost her last Sat due to a cath procedure going bad and ...well!

Mike

Thanks for the heads up. And I am really sorry to hear what happened. I hope she is doing better at this point and getting better still.

_________________
Barron Wesley Guitars