Pickguard Bench
An interactive previewer for trying body finishes and pickguards on an original offset-style guitar.
Context
A pickguard is chosen against a body color you never see next to it until the guitar is built. Pickguard Bench puts an original offset-style body on the bench and lets you try every guard in the drawer against every finish, with the hardware to match.
Finish, guard, cut and hardware, one change at a time.
Finishes
Eight body finishes in four kinds of paint: gloss poly (Conch, Tidepool, Bone, Sodium), metallic flake (Ink Metallic, Oxblood), satin (Graphite) and a two-tone Ember Burst. The finish under the guard is named in the corner, the way a booth would chalk it on the wall.
Conch, Tidepool, Ink Metallic and Ember Burst.
The drawer
Six guard materials, each with its ply edge and thickness in inches: tortoise, mint pearl and white pearl at 4-ply .090, parchment and black at 3-ply, and gold anodized aluminum at .040. Three cuts: a full sweep, a teardrop, or no guard at all. Nickel, gold or black hardware finishes the build, and the pickup covers follow the guard.
Tidepool with a black teardrop and black hardware.
Ink Metallic, gold anodized, gold hardware.
Light
The guitar is inline SVG with no image assets. Tortoise and pearloid are generated with turbulence filters, so every guard has real grain. Body shading, metallic flake, clearcoat gloss and an edge vignette are layered over the paint and clipped to the body’s outline, which is what makes a flat drawing read as a lacquered guitar.
Ember Burst: the burst, the gloss and the vignette are all separate layers.
Build ticket
Every combination writes a build ticket: finish, guard, cut and hardware, with an order code built from the spec. Shuffle picks a random combo, and the last one you made is still there when you come back.
On a phone, and the ticket for Ink Metallic, gold anodized, full sweep.
Dark
The bench follows the system theme. In the dark, the booth goes black and the guitar keeps its light.
Oxblood and parchment, in the dark.
Graphite with no guard.
Try it
This one is live. Pick a finish, open the drawer, and shuffle until something looks right.
Not a recording. Or open it full screen.
Summary
Pickguard Bench answers the question every guitar build stalls on, which guard goes with this finish, before anything is cut.