Originally posted by pstring
Basic inlay is cutting out the shape of your inlay material, then etching the outline of that piece on to the fretboard, removing wood from the inside the outline, and gluing in the inlay, Stew-Mac has some good books on this subject. Incidents if you really are interested in doing inlay work and are willing to put in the time to get good at it, and build a reputation, you'd have more work than you could ever keep up with, not a whole lot of people do inlays, and their are always people looking for some one to do repairs and custom work, are you much of an artist?

i could be, but haven't really gotten into it too much yet.
like you said, take some time to get good at it, im sure i could do that. im assuming it would cost a decent sum of money on 'practice inlays' and etc, but im loaded and it would be worth it.

the inlay thing will likely only be for myself though, it will not likely be a profession , as i am and always will be a better guitar player than artist (it comes easier to me, i like it more, curiousity, etc), but it is valuable to know how to do it, i think.

im probably not going to get into the inlay work until i get a new electric guitar and have a nice sum of money to work with, to buy inlay books, a few guitar necks from warmoth (cheap ones, wont get the real expensive ones til i get good at it). Time is on my side too, being only 14. life is great:)