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Making Plans from Pictures

4K views 20 replies 9 participants last post by  stuart 
If you want to build a Highboy, you may be starting out the hardest way possible.
The proportions for these are what makes the difference in a Highboy and a boy doing woodwork.

Go look at a prime example and measure it, or get plans for one, or find out the proportions and draw it your self (not the best).

Why?
Highboys are advanced work and hacking at the sizes can not only be a work of something almost like "what you wanted" it can also be a waste of time and perfectly good trees.
I'd take the time to get good measurements from a prime example of one.
jim
Gosh, I guess you are strictly a "plans man", don't believe in artistic license. What about the guy who "invented" the highboy he was not working off a plan, or the people who improved it they threw away the previous plan ? What about the differences between French/English highboys ? The Japanese had their own version which is just an beautiful and functional (more in my opinion). Are they a waste of wood ?

I am not picking on you. Just saying there is more than one way to skin a cat AF1 showed his.
 
I don't know, but I am guessing AF1 is not a hack. I have seen some (I have a mirror :laughing:). Maybe math is his thing, doesn't have a tool he knows how to use ? I think the proof is in the pudding, got any project pictures AF1?
 
I work off my own plans that were drafted around STRICT guide lines for guitars. Frets,bridge placement,ect....

A non-traditional hi-boy would look funny, no???
A non-traditional hi-boy no, maybe even "unique" and $$$ (IMO) A guitar that sounds like a cat with his tail stuck in a screen door :thumbdown:. I understand your bias, that is why I have never built an instrument...to constraining. Kinda like building chairs, I don't like that. It is a simple matter if it "works" or not, not how pretty they are. They can be great looking...but if they hurt your butt, you failed. I would build a guitar that hurt your ears.
A hi-boy just has to hold some stuff and please the buyers eyes.
 
I guess I'm going to have a big bond fire at my place tonight
Might as well :laughing:. I have a story about a woodworker I know. I have told this story before, don't remember if it was here.

This woodworker is my Dad. He is retired now (pipefitter/welder). Several years ago we went to a street festival in Indiana as a family, Mom/Dad and my wife/I. It was in the middle of town. On the main drag there were some antique shops and other places of interest. We are walking in and out going our separate ways. I pop into one shop and my Dad is eyeballing this tall sideboard-buffet thing. I could tell he was really into it. I walked over and said "What's up?" He replied "I am studying this thing, I like it, when I get laid off I am going to make one" and took a picture of it. We left the store.

So anyway work was good for a couple years, he was working steady and never got laid off from his construction job. It can be kinda seasonal around here, a guy may only have 10-11 months work a year in that trade.

Fast forward 2 years (or more). Work dried up one winter and he got laid off till spring.

I dropped by for a visit one day and he was in the wood shop. I had not been over for awhile, I thought I would see what he was up to. He says "Remember that thing in that antique store in Indiana"...I sorta did, just because of the interest he took in it and the fact that was a fun day over there. We don't take many family trips now that I am married.

Well here is the end to this long story. There it sat. An exact replica of the piece he saw 2+ years earlier. From memory and one picture, which was now taped to the wall above the workbench. :thumbsup:
 
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