BRIGHT SPARK
Scott Cameron of Golden Era Aged Guitars is keeping the art of the sparkle finish alive in 2022
With a new product dropping on its website at 7pm every Friday night, you never quite know what might be coming out of Scott Cameron’s workshop at Golden Era Aged Guitars (previously SC Relics). Ranging from classic custom colours to metal flake finishes, Scott’s skilfully aged Fender-style bodies and necks are works of art in themselves.We asked him about some of the ins and outs when it comes to the tricky business of sparkle finishes. Many people have found refinishing their own guitars to be a satisfying experience. Would you recommend DIY-ing a sparkle finish? “Sparkle finishes are pretty niche and I wouldn’t recommend doing them in your garden shed. This isn’t a case of buying an aerosol from Manchester Guitar Tech or Halfords for a weekend project.”
Run us through your process.
“When I get the bare body, I put a sealer on it, which is clear, so that there is a flat surface and something for the metallic basecoat to adhere to. I’ll spray that on thinly, let it dry very quickly, then it’s ready to be hit with flake. I usually pour the dry flake into the clear lacquer and add a touch of thinner, which helps it all go through the gun a bit easier. But you’ve got to be careful it doesn’t run. It takes a lot of twisting and turning to avoid any sagging or runs. After that, I’ll hang it up overnight. “The next day, I’ll load up the clearcoat gun somewhere in the range of 80:20 lacquer to thinner. With a sparkle finish, you have to put on an excessive amount of clear. It’s very laborious. It takes far more coats and sanding than a regular flat colour. You could probably do three or four flat finishes in the time it takes to do one sparkle finish. Sparkle finishes have a bumpy texture early on in the process because of the flake. But if you start to sand it too early, you’ll scuff the colour off the flakes – your nice gold flakes might end up with weird silver sanding marks. That’s why you need to put more clearcoats on. You could probably get away with three or four clearcoats over Sonic Blue, Fiesta Red, Olympic White et cetera. But with sparkle finishes you’re looking at 15 to 20 coats of clear lacquer over the top. “Sparkle finishes are niche, they take a lot of work and they’re hard to do. But they’re totally worth it.”
What’s the demand for sparkle finishes like at the moment?
“The people who go for sparkle finishes tend to really love them. I find the Champagne, silver and gold sparkle finishes sell really well. Personally, I like the stronger colours like purple and teal. I love them; I just like to see some colour in life. When you’re surrounded by a batch of sparkle finishes it’s awesome. There’s an amazing amount of colour and mess all over the place – my workshop looks like a unicorn has thrown up Skittles everywhere! – but when you look at a rack of sparkle finishes it just looks totally bitchin’.”