Black or cream neck dots more visible?

[Eisenhower42]

Hi all,

I have had a roasted flame maple neck for some time with black marker dots. I find the combination of tan/brown wood and black dot marker to be very difficult to see in anything less than good light. Some stage lighting, combined with my vision, means the neck pretty much ceases to have dot markers at all.

I need to get a new neck for another project and I'm thinking about doing the flame roasted maple with cream dot markers.

Has anyone tried this combo, and can you tell me if you found the cream dots to be more visible against the roasted maple?

Thanks,
DeWayne

 

[mayfly]

Yep, there's another thread around here with some photos.  Do a quick search and you'll find it.

 

[rauchman]

On my first Warmoth build (Tele), I have an all roasted maple neck that has black dots.  I lightly tinted it with black dye and 2 light coats of TruOil.  I'm sorry I didn't get white dots.  The black dots can get hard to see.

 

[BeagJon]

Cream dots on Roasted Maple for Reference

 

[elstoof]

Cream on roasted maple is a strong look

 

[Eisenhower42]

Excellent, thanks guys. And thanks for the pics, BeagJon.

 

[musicispeace]

Here is a Bubinga neck with cream dots. Flash photo but the neck itself has a similar color tone to roasted maple, a bit more red probably.

 

[DustyCat]

I have a similar question...

Got a sweet W neck with mother of pearl dots on the side of a roasted flamed maple core.

I was thinking of taking a sharpie with dual tip (one regular tip and one super fine) and very very carefully tracing the outside of the mother of Pearl dot on the side with the Super fine tip of the sharpie (so that the contrast would make the fret positions more visible in varying light conditions).

Has anyone tried this?

Does the ink sink in and stay if I let it set with a good chunk of time or will it wipe away with sweat and friction?

 

[elstoof]

The ink will “bleed” into the grain and look pretty bad, I wouldn’t recommend doing it

 

[BeagJon]

The ink will “bleed” into the grain and look pretty bad, I wouldn’t recommend doing it

I'm gonna second this, but if you had to... ABSOLUTELY had to.. I'd maybe see how well it would work with a Panel Lining technique that is common in Plastic Modeling. https://youtu.be/T16MLd1f1X4?t=141

 

[DustyCat]

The ink will “bleed” into the grain and look pretty bad, I wouldn’t recommend doing it

I'm gonna second this, but if you had to... ABSOLUTELY had to.. I'd maybe see how well it would work with a Panel Lining technique that is common in Plastic Modeling. https://youtu.be/T16MLd1f1X4?t=141

Better than I can do, but yes that is the idea!  :sign13: