~Last year 2015 I got the idea to do my original art onto a ukulele. At xmas Ukulele Magazine was advertising kit ukes for sale to 'build your own'. Then I found on Amazon some higher grade kits and one piqued my interest. A spalted mango arched back tenor with a spruce top. Purchased from Germany, then drop shipped from China. I thought real hard....Paul was skeptical.... so I ordered it. Took three weeks. The box arrived and after I opened it with so much hope I realized I knew nothing of how to finish it. I was rather crushed. And due to being very ill from what we later learned was 7 years of acute radon poisoning in our house I just squrriled it away into a case I got off of Amazon to keep it from drying out in the Kansas winter.
Spring came, the house was mitagated and we got our lives back... my head cleared, radon -a radioactive gas- really messes up your brain besides giving you lung cancer. I pulled out the Uke one day and got some guts to start inking on it and doing this! Why Ink? well, it does not dampen the tone of the wood. And the wood tones is the reason we pick our instruments for their beauty and their sound. I also wanted the wood grain to show through the ink color. (paint would have blocked that and also blocked the tone) I wanted to merge or meld them together. It's an artist thinking thing.
I had previously spoken to Steve Mason a Luthier of Kaw Valley Guitars and purchased a piece of guitar spruce wood top to practice inking on. The ink runs in the wood grain causing a feathery effect. I learned how to contol that some and that an outline helps stop it. This was perfect as my ink artwork uses an outline first so that was comfortable. And the fret board comes down to the sound hole on this uke so there is an area there that I used as a practice spot as it would later be covered by the fret board when it is mounted.
After penciling in my design very precisely, inking the outline was the biggest step of fear to overcome of ruining the uke. I took breaks and through out the weekend Paul and I would set it up and look at it long and hard......there was so much thinking going on.
Steve had told me to wet the head stock to see the color of the spalting when finished, a deep dark brown. So the outlines are a brown ink to match the spalting and then a lighter redder brown for the detail in the fish fins and tail. What color of fish? What color for the water and bubbles? Must keep this design simple I kept repeating to myself. The etched design around the sound holes was inconsistent and I just left it alone. Guess what? I was right, the finish filled it with color tones and it looks totally planned. Whew. Now later, I do wish I had put a small fish on the head stock though....
Off to the luthiers as once it was inked it was so good that I did not want to mess this up. So we waited about a month as it worked its way through the line up at the shop. During that time my art framer Korey showed me my 'Bubbles' on his phone. I loved it! Kyle who was doing the actual uke work at Kaw Valley Guitars was posting it onto Pinterest! All the stages of the mountings and glueing and the wet sanded high gloss finish. Very exciting to me as I used to build Pipe Organs. In fact I tried to get hired building ukuleles while living in Hawai'i, but I was too hoale . That means 'white', but I digress...
Now in the Pinterest posts Kyle called my uke by another name, Little Fucker and it kinda stuck.
So here she is. I would love to find a small ukulele company that would have me do my images into thier brand of ukes, like in a limited edition. Dream Job!!! But even if I never ink another ukulele again, this little instrument brings me such joy as it is the sound of my home. And I know I am not the best uke player as I struggle to learn Hawaiian slack key....
Meanwhile I am in love and very happy I have guts.
Spring came, the house was mitagated and we got our lives back... my head cleared, radon -a radioactive gas- really messes up your brain besides giving you lung cancer. I pulled out the Uke one day and got some guts to start inking on it and doing this! Why Ink? well, it does not dampen the tone of the wood. And the wood tones is the reason we pick our instruments for their beauty and their sound. I also wanted the wood grain to show through the ink color. (paint would have blocked that and also blocked the tone) I wanted to merge or meld them together. It's an artist thinking thing.
I had previously spoken to Steve Mason a Luthier of Kaw Valley Guitars and purchased a piece of guitar spruce wood top to practice inking on. The ink runs in the wood grain causing a feathery effect. I learned how to contol that some and that an outline helps stop it. This was perfect as my ink artwork uses an outline first so that was comfortable. And the fret board comes down to the sound hole on this uke so there is an area there that I used as a practice spot as it would later be covered by the fret board when it is mounted.
After penciling in my design very precisely, inking the outline was the biggest step of fear to overcome of ruining the uke. I took breaks and through out the weekend Paul and I would set it up and look at it long and hard......there was so much thinking going on.
Steve had told me to wet the head stock to see the color of the spalting when finished, a deep dark brown. So the outlines are a brown ink to match the spalting and then a lighter redder brown for the detail in the fish fins and tail. What color of fish? What color for the water and bubbles? Must keep this design simple I kept repeating to myself. The etched design around the sound holes was inconsistent and I just left it alone. Guess what? I was right, the finish filled it with color tones and it looks totally planned. Whew. Now later, I do wish I had put a small fish on the head stock though....
Off to the luthiers as once it was inked it was so good that I did not want to mess this up. So we waited about a month as it worked its way through the line up at the shop. During that time my art framer Korey showed me my 'Bubbles' on his phone. I loved it! Kyle who was doing the actual uke work at Kaw Valley Guitars was posting it onto Pinterest! All the stages of the mountings and glueing and the wet sanded high gloss finish. Very exciting to me as I used to build Pipe Organs. In fact I tried to get hired building ukuleles while living in Hawai'i, but I was too hoale . That means 'white', but I digress...
Now in the Pinterest posts Kyle called my uke by another name, Little Fucker and it kinda stuck.
So here she is. I would love to find a small ukulele company that would have me do my images into thier brand of ukes, like in a limited edition. Dream Job!!! But even if I never ink another ukulele again, this little instrument brings me such joy as it is the sound of my home. And I know I am not the best uke player as I struggle to learn Hawaiian slack key....
Meanwhile I am in love and very happy I have guts.