@Boo - there you go, just imagine that explorer with a tasteful flip-flop sparkly paint job ...

Preferably, just imagine it.  Don't actually do it.

😉

Being serious - briefly - I'm guessing that the silver sparkly paint, or any paint, on the soundboard of an acoustic would suppress the vibration of the soundboard and so destroy the sound of the instrument?

OK for show, but useless as a real instrument??

A thick flake coating would probably not be a great idea for the top (might work fine for the sides though, Ovation have made theirs out of composites for decades after all), but I wonder if a light coating of glitter in a thin lacquer would be a problem.

Not that I'd ever play the thing, but the world is more fun when people do crazy things.

https://culturehustle.com/collections/powders/products/dazzle-the-worlds-glitteriest-plant-based-eco-glitter-pack-5-x-10g

Those acoustic Explorer and V’s are made in Germany (where else?) by Boris Dommenget Custom Guitars. They ain’t cheap either! I saw him years ago at the first Holy Grail Guitar Show in Berlin, I didn’t say hello but watched him talking to people. He was pretty animated and very German! 😆

My exchange with boolean universe on the live stream today brought up these two guitars which he asked for links to

@jonhodgson Ahh, that’s me, thanks Jon. 👍 

The Phil McKnight build is superb and the acoustics are just crazy. 🤣

Being serious - briefly - I'm guessing that the silver sparkly paint, or any paint, on the soundboard of an acoustic would suppress the vibration of the soundboard and so destroy the sound of the instrument?

@tv101 You are right, I wouldn’t put sparkle on an acoustic. Having said that, if it was an electro acoustic then maybe I would as, by design, it would be used going through amplification etc and it’s tone can be shaped that way. A fully acoustic guitar needs the least amount clear/lacquer as possible so the soundboard can do its thing. 

I saw him years ago at the first Holy Grail Guitar Show in Berlin, I didn’t say hello but watched him talking to people. He was pretty animated and very German! 😆

@mattbeels Sounds like fun. 🤣 

A thick flake coating would probably not be a great idea for the top (might work fine for the sides though, Ovation have made theirs out of composites for decades after all), but I wonder if a light coating of glitter in a thin lacquer would be a problem.

@jonhodges A fine flake could be used in a thin layer of clear but more clear still has to applied over the top. Sanding that back and polishing could be done after that but it is quite tricky and risky. Also, the bigger the flake particles are, the more clear lacquer is needed to accommodate it. Small flake needs less clear but the smaller it is, the less it looks like flake and the more it just looks like metallic or pearl paint (it loses a lot of the effect). 

I would do a flake job on an electro acoustic if it wasn’t too important that the actual acoustic tone was that important. If it was being plugged in to amplification, the tone would be shaped that way so paint on the soundboard wouldn’t matter too much. 

@Boo
The Phil McKnight one could so easily have been tacky and gaudy if they'd overdone any element (glitter paint and gold leaf sounds like something Elvis would have played in his Vegas days, probably on a Gretsch) but the combination of that colour (with just the slightest bit of burst at the edges), the bleached maple "binding" and the gold pinstripe work really well on that PRS body shape.

The rosette is rather fun

http://www.guitarmaker.de/acousticEX.htm

The rosette is rather fun

@jonhodgson It’s cosmic 🌟💫

Sounds great...the video you posted is too good.

Posted by: @jonhodgson

And this is the explorer acoustic (with a double necked acoustic flying V for extra fun).

So not traditional X bracing then?!!