Hi! Thanks for the compliment...I thought it was pretty cool myself! I went on to tattoo sites and art sites, like Deviant Art and did a ton of Google Images searches for the images I was interested in...I spent days looking at thousands of different styles of images and finally decided on either a Pegasus or music notes symbols...Tattoo sites have a lot of finely drawn images which translate well...some of the designs on these sites are free, some you must purchase. I happened to find one that was free and modified it to work for a sound hole design. I tightened up the patterns, eliminated some aspects and then sharpened and darkened the pattern by hand and sent it to my dulcimer builder (James Jones Instruments) who sent it out to be cut with a laser... As you know if you do sound holes, the design must be connected with the rest of the wood body, so some designs that I really loved just didn't work...but there are tons of images to choose from out there if you look...
I can send you an image of the design, but prefer to keep it a one of a kind and only on my instruments...it took me so long and I worked really hard at making it mine, so I hope you understand. It might inspire you to come up with one that is uniquely yours.
I actually don't think the design would work for a mountain dulcimer anyway, I think it would have to be too small and would be too delicate to stand up to strumming...on the hammered dulcimer there is no chance of accidentally hitting the design, since it is under all those strings. The treble clef part of the design is VERY delicate, and James was actually concerned that it might be too delicate to work in a 2 1/2 inch pattern, but he made it happen!
I would be happy to try and help you with a design, if you send me some ideas, rough drawings, or images that you have in mind. I will look through some of the images I was thinking of using and see if there is anything that i think would be interesting to you, but I recently discarded a lot of them. Whew, sorry for the long response, but I wanted to give you a thorough answer! Anyway, let me know, and I will try and help...only problem right now is next Monday I am going in for a major surgery and will be out of commission for a few weeks...but will be able to look at anything you send, I just might not be up to responding right away..Cheers, Vivian
Hi! Thanks for the compliment...I thought it was pretty cool myself! I went on to tattoo sites and art sites, like Deviant Art and did a ton of Google Images searches for the images I was interested in...I spent days looking at thousands of different styles of images and finally decided on either a Pegasus or music notes symbols...Tattoo sites have a lot of finely drawn images which translate well...some of the designs on these sites are free, some you must purchase. I happened to find one that was free and modified it to work for a sound hole design. I tightened up the patterns, eliminated some aspects and then sharpened and darkened the pattern by hand and sent it to my dulcimer builder (James Jones Instruments) who sent it out to be cut with a laser... As you know if you do sound holes, the design must be connected with the rest of the wood body, so some designs that I really loved just didn't work...but there are tons of images to choose from out there if you look...
I can send you an image of the design, but prefer to keep it a one of a kind and only on my instruments...it took me so long and I worked really hard at making it mine, so I hope you understand. It might inspire you to come up with one that is uniquely yours.
I actually don't think the design would work for a mountain dulcimer anyway, I think it would have to be too small and would be too delicate to stand up to strumming...on the hammered dulcimer there is no chance of accidentally hitting the design, since it is under all those strings. The treble clef part of the design is VERY delicate, and James was actually concerned that it might be too delicate to work in a 2 1/2 inch pattern, but he made it happen!
I would be happy to try and help you with a design, if you send me some ideas, rough drawings, or images that you have in mind. I will look through some of the images I was thinking of using and see if there is anything that i think would be interesting to you, but I recently discarded a lot of them. Whew, sorry for the long response, but I wanted to give you a thorough answer! Anyway, let me know, and I will try and help...only problem right now is next Monday I am going in for a major surgery and will be out of commission for a few weeks...but will be able to look at anything you send, I just might not be up to responding right away..Cheers, Vivian