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| Copying the shape of a guitar http://luthiersforum.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=10101&t=37477 |
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| Author: | escpg [ Sun Aug 19, 2012 5:54 am ] |
| Post subject: | Copying the shape of a guitar |
I don't know if the same happens to you, but sometimes I just fall in love with something and I can't explain why. It is the case with a guitar from Froggy Bottom. Model P12. I like it so much. I would like to make one but how? I think he might have loosely taken inspiration from Martin 0 model, but it's not the same. Froggy bottom is better to my eyes. Another beautiful shape is the A12. I guess that if I might find a front image, taken perfectly from the front with no angle I might use autocad and raster image. Otherwise there is no chance right? |
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| Author: | Darryl Young [ Sun Aug 19, 2012 7:13 am ] |
| Post subject: | Copying the shape of a guitar |
If you have access to one, you can trace the body. I think John Hall has a YouTube video with tips on how to do this. |
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| Author: | DennisK [ Sun Aug 19, 2012 7:32 am ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Copying the shape of a guitar |
You need at least one measurement, and a reasonably straight-on photo. The Froggy Bottom web site has a bunch of measurements, plus one good photo of a rosewood back on that model, so that should make it easy. My process for duplicating a shape is to first use the known measurements to calculate a conversion factor from pixels to inches. Use that to figure out the upper bout, waist, and lower bout widths. Then figure the vertical position of the widest/narrowest points of those. Tape 4 sheets of typing paper together, and mark out those critical points (top center, bottom center, and widest points of upper and lower bouts, and narrowest points of waist), and then just freehand draw the curves to look like the picture (usually with lots of erasing involved). Imperfect, of course, but I don't build with moulds so the actual guitar usually doesn't match my drawing 100% perfectly either. |
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| Author: | Billy T [ Sun Aug 19, 2012 11:08 am ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Copying the shape of a guitar |
I don't know how good your trig is but if you know the outside dimensions for the guitar you can take a picture to a print shop and they can enlarge the photo and stretch the difference if the photo is less than straight on. You can do the same thing with Photoshop or Autocad. Do you have a link to the photo of the guitar(s)? I like the shape of the Taylor jumbo and did the same thing comparing them with prints I got later and it came out very well. |
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| Author: | escpg [ Sun Aug 19, 2012 1:33 pm ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Copying the shape of a guitar |
Yes, I found a nice picture at wildwoodguitars.com. There is a picture that looks taken perfectly from the front. I imported with autocad and it was easy because I took the scale length as a reference. I scaled it and it looks ok. At the end the other dimensions looked to correspond to the original one, except for the body length that was about 1/2" shorter on my drawing. Possibly because the picture was a bit distorted or I don't know. But I guess I can live with that. |
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| Author: | Dave Stewart [ Sun Aug 19, 2012 3:47 pm ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Copying the shape of a guitar |
If you have the body length & lower bout, you can fit a perfectly cropped front body shot into a rectangle exactly that size & all other dimensions will be correct. |
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| Author: | escpg [ Sun Aug 19, 2012 4:04 pm ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Copying the shape of a guitar |
Ok, I did that. Silly question. Body length means the whole body starting from heel not included? Because if I include the heel all measurements correspond. That looks weird though. I always took for granted that body length did not include the heel. Now I am in doubt though. |
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| Author: | Dave Stewart [ Sun Aug 19, 2012 8:32 pm ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Copying the shape of a guitar |
escpg wrote: I always took for granted that body length did not include the heel. Now I am in doubt though. You've always been correct, body length does not include the neck heel (and since you shouldn't be able to see the heel in a proper frontal shot, that's helpful). |
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| Author: | dberkowitz [ Mon Aug 20, 2012 8:44 am ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Copying the shape of a guitar |
When I was an apprentice, I was in love with the Santa Cruz F body. It was what I wanted to build. My boss, Chris, asked why I wanted to copy their guitar -- make it your own. And so I did. My bodies are evocative of that look, but they aren't that body. Might I suggest that you start with the proportions you can get from Froggy bottom, i.e., length, width of the lower bout, perhaps even the width of the waist and upper bout, and draw your own version of it. It won't be the Froggy Bottom, but it will be your own. |
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| Author: | escpg [ Mon Aug 20, 2012 10:07 am ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Copying the shape of a guitar |
This is a very intersting point! I thank you for saying this. I gave it a lot of thoughts. The easy answer is that every time I tried to change something traditional, coming out with my own design, maybe at the very first moment I liked it. But then with time there was something that I could not appreciate completely and I ended up with admitting that the original one was much better. Sorry, I am no artist and my aesthetics level is quite low. But what you said helps me to stop worrying about few inches difference and try to do something very close even if not identical. |
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