Clavin

Why not just get silver sheet stock in .05 or so thickness, and cut it with a jewelers saw like a regular inlay? It's easier, and more accurate as far as the image goes than routing a most likely non-perfect hole, and filling it with some type of mix. Silver is CHEAP, easy to cut, and easy to polish and keep clean. Just be careful when you are sanding it down because it heats up fast, and will rise as it does. It's easy to sand through so test it for warmth, then let it cool down before doing any more sanding.

Craig

Thats great!

I like the contrast the brass adds to the image.

Craig

Hi Rye.

Just keep in mind the important thing about knot work isn't how complex it is, it's how the pieces fit and flow through each other so they look like they are lined up properly. They should all be the same width if possible. I did a celtic cross that has about 110 pieces in it, mostly gold pearl knots. It took a week to get it done. It 's in my gallery pages.

I am sure you'll do great! If you have questions let me know

Craig

I didn't itemize everything. I should have, BUT, I didn't

That was a guess- it most likely is high. I had the guitar commissioned-I didn't build the guitar.. so that cost me over three thousand, that is part of my materials! I have purchased many multiple hundred dollars in other materials. This was my first major inlay, so I also spent on tools to set up to do this as well. That doesn't cost into the guitar, but it did cost.. If I wound up breaking it down It would probably come out around a lower number, but I don't have time for that right now as well. I also don't think it will be THAT much lower.. I also don't know the retail vs. wholsale value, or the collectible value. It has taken in the multiple hundreds of hours to make. When this is finished I will be as curious as anyone to the actual appraised value. Black pearl costs $50.00 an ounce, white pearl about $20.00, gold pearl about $25.00 red abalone heart $75.00 an ounce, gold wire about $20.00 for a few inches, depending on the weight, then silver, fossil ivory is about $25,00 an ounce, etc.... Recon stone costs about $15,00 a slab, and costs $5.00 per slab cut. It adds up!

Hope this helps..

Craig

Thanks Rich- Heres a shot of the back..

There's even more than this.

The ebony tuners are all inlaid with 14K gold stars, and the electronics cover plate has a 70 piece deep sea hatchet fish inlay on that as well.

Hi all.

Here are some new pics of the inays after the days engraving. Just this little amount, for the corals around the pickups, (which is neither complex, or really all that good, in my opinion, took almost 10 hours.

The heel cap is engraved and filled with silver dust. I don't have time to cut a signature out of gold or silver for this one, and inlay it into ebony like I would normally do. This guitar has a few trips to make, and needs to be ready to show by June 2! I hope you like it. I threw in an better shot of the truss rod cover too.

If you want to see full images section by section of the fretboard they are on my site, at the botom of the first gallery page.

Thanks for looking, Craig

Hi Guys and Thanks.

It will be completed soon, although it took over two years to get here...

ryeisnotcool, I saw your first inlays, and I was very much impressed! They are better than my first inlays were by far!! Just keep looking at other peoples work, and get ideas from them. I spend many hours searching for inlays to get ideas from. Don't be afraid to try complex pieces either. It's easy to get bogged down with "that's too hard looking" or "I can't do that yet" thoughts.

When designing your art don't worry about how long it may take, or how complicatd it is. Just go for it! Start practicing engraving NOW as well. It adds a lot to the inlay.

Your sun inlays reminded me of a fretboard I just completed for Dave Howard.

More pictures soon.

Craig

Don't worry, it's not for sale

I don't know how much money I put in really.. I can tell you that black pearl costs me about $50.00 an ounce, and it's also made of 14K gold, mother of pearl, silver, fossil ivory, about six types of recon stone, gold pearl, paua shell, plastics, pink mussel shell, opal, green abalone, white river pearl, red abalone, copper, brown lip pearl, all real, no abalam.. etc...

The time I spent on it ranges in the hundreds (maybe a thousand?) of hours, given design, cutting, engraving, etc.. My luthier also put in a ton of hours. It's built from scratch. No Warmoth parts, etc... (not that they are not excellent, I have a lot of repect for their materials).

I guess I spent over $6,000 just in materials if I had to guess. The truss rod was a gift from a friend because he wanted to be a part of this project. He also made my wife a matching necklace! Some people are just plain nice.

This is my "coming out" guitar. I have been cutting inlay for just over two years, and I wanted to take someting to shows to "show" my work. I was told to bring around a board inlaid with my art, but I thought that was a waste of effort, so I started on this.

It's not even done yet.

If I had to guess a price, I would have to say that a PRS dragon ( pick a year) has a 220-400 piece inlay, and it's all abalam for the most part. And they go for about $20,000 This guitar has an over 1,500 pieces of inlay, and it's also got a 5A flame top, and a 1/4" solid ebony back (from joined pieces). Plus all the inlay is done by hand, at every stage.

This is the sister guitar to Living sea-2 ( guitar of the moth ) So they go together if the go at all!

Craig

Here is a a picture of the truss rod cover made for the living Sea guitar. Black pearl, paua abalam, mother of pearl, the seahorses are solid gold, one has a ruby eye, one has a sapphire. The algea fronds are opal. I cut the shell, my jeweler friend made the other parts. I have spent the whole weekend so far engraving the corals. I'll put up another picture when it's done, hopefully by tonight.

Thanks for looking. Craig

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Hi Brian!

So far I have used mainly Stew Macs- liquid flow CA glue.

It's great for getting into the gaps, and it leaves very little bubbling to pick out. The one drawback I find though is that it does shrink a little after leveling. That has started to bother me a lot, so I am now looking into epoxies. I am starting to think Epoxies are better for fretboards, especially when you are inlaying against a fret slot, or a bound board, where re-slotting is dangerouse, or impossible. You can work the glue to the slot, but not go into it, with epoxies. That is impossible with the Stew Mac liquid glue.

I don't use filler on any inlays at all.

The most I may do is mix a little ebony dust and glue which works nice on an ebony board, to fill some areas, and even act as part of the inlay.

For routing into maple, or any other light wood, I just take the time, and go down to a 1/32 carbide downcut bit. I also scribe using the razor and chalk tecnique, but in Maple- say for something like the manta ray on the face of Living Sea-1, I took a photocopy of the cut inlay from the top side, sprayed some adhesive to that, placed that where the inlay goes, then cut out the the pattern with an exacto knife. This leaves the rest of the paper border as a routing guide. It gives such tight results that the inlays may crack being pressed in, so you may want to file them back a little as you go. Take a look at it in my gallery one page, (until I can figure out howpost pics here ) You can see there is almost no space between the inlay and the maple in some areas. Craig

Hi Everyone.

Just thought I would join in and post a hello to you all and thank you for checking out mine and Dave Howards Living Sea-2 guitar.

I actually comissioned Dave to build it, I'm not a luthier, however all the inlays are by myself. Yes there is a Living Sea -1! (if you were wondering why the "2". You may not be wondering, or even care! That's fine as well... It consists of over 1,600 inlay pieces, of about 20 different shells, stones, metals, etc..

I will post pics of it when it is completed later this month. It has taken 2.5 years to get to this month, finishing it.

Thanks again. If anyone has any questions about inlay I am more than happy to share info.

Many kind thanks to Brian for the great site, and for choosing the guitar as guitar of the month!

Craig Lavin