Now that I have the templates constructed, it's ime to get to work on the axes themselves. The strat-style guitar will get an alder 2 piece body painted a solid color. For the Tele-style guitar, I'm going to go another route and use up some stock I have on hand. the main body will be walnut, from a 6/4 board I've had for about 20 years, with a flamed maple cap. The flame maple is nothing spectacular in and of itself, but it should look nice enough with a sunburst finish applied to it.
Here you can see the maple cap after its sawn - there's a good deal of heartwood, but I've found that's not always such a bad thing. Finished change the color of wood so much, and I've also found that I like the challenge of working with the natural appearance of woods.
Of course, I'd rather have the AAAAA rated stuff.... but what the hey, I had this on hand.