Jun 26, 2015 | By Alec

While 3D printers have already previously proved that they can be used to manufacture instruments as well, few results were as beautiful as the amazing guitar you can see above. This gorgeous creation has been designed by the Italian Francesco Orrù, who hails from the Mediterranean island of Sardinia. While 3D printing a functioning guitar itself is already impressive, Francesco has added a second layer of difficulty by modelling the body after HP Lovecraft’s groundbreaking artwork.

If the name of Francesco Orrù sounds a bit familiar, that’s probably because you might know him as one of the in-house designers at MyMiniFactory.com, where he specializes in Zbrush digital sculpting. In the real world, he is also a master’s student at Kingston University and an avid guitar player. As he explains to 3ders.org, this creation came about out of a love for both of these specialisms. ‘I've decided to create this second guitar to carry on my collection and studies about 3D printing instruments. I also wanted to test a new model with a better electronic on it, mounting Seymour Duncan humbuckers this time instead of cheap Wilkinson,’ he explains, referring to an earlier project.

Using that previous project – a guitar modeled after HR Giger’s fascinating drawings -  as a base, much of the basic design work was already done. ‘The software that I've used was Zbrush during all the workflow, apart from an optimisation for the joints areas that my collegue Cemal Cetinkaya did in Rhino. He basically worked on the gaps and tolerances between each parts choosing a 0.3mm distance between the sockets and the joints,’ he explains.

But the real stuff began with the exterior, which was largely based on the two Lovecraft greats Godfish and the Necronomicon. ‘I've tried to emulate a scorpion’s pincers for the bottom part and I've sculpt couple of figures in relief inspired by Lovecraft Godfish story and the Necronomicon art cover. I've always liked bones structures and designs, in particular sculpts. So I added on a side a lion skull inspired from an album cover of a drone rock band called Earth,’ Francesco explains. ‘The remaining creature on the top right corner of the guitar body is another personal concept that I did couple of months ago for my second module at university in Computer Animation. It consist in a lion anatomy, apart from an alien design for the face and a dragon tail.’

This amazing creation was subsequently 3D printed in eight different parts: six for the body, 1 pick up cover, and 1 volume cover. 3D printed with a Delta Wasp 3D printer, it took about 80 hours to complete, with the central parts for the pick ups taking most of the time. ‘These two pieces need to be printed horizontally in order to keep the layers much stronger, as well as the holes for the screws that I've inserted in the middle to connect them. The pick up recesses were printed with 40% fill wheather the remaining parts with 20%, to assure a good compromise between quality and printing speed,’ Francesco says. The volume cover and the pick up cover were 3D printed separately using a Replicator 2.

If you would like to recreate this fantastic guitar for yourself, you can find all downloadable files here on myminifactory.com. To actually make some noise with it, you will need to purchase separate pick ups, a neck, a bridge, strings, volume and tone pots and knobs, a neck plate and a machine headset, but Francesco has helpfully provided links to all of these items on his page as well.

But the real question is: how does it sound? While Francesco hasn’t shared a video or anything yet, he is very positive himself: ‘About the sound I should say that the test went definitely well, because I've notice a drastic increase in term of sound quality. The humbuckers that I've ordered in Amazon were Seymour Duncan, a really well respected brand in the music industry,’ he says. ‘I've compared the sound of the HR Giger guitar with Wilkinson humbuckers with my last concept and the difference is quite clear for a good ear.’

 

 

Posted in 3D Printing Applications

 

 

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