Skip to Content

Dear Aunt TUAW: What's in Apple's guitar hole?

by Erica Sadun Aug 27th 2010 at 10:30AM

Dear Aunt TUAW,

Maybe I'm completely wrong, but I eventually demystified the Apple 9/1/2010 Press Invitation. I had a look at the press release image I found on www.fscklog.com (it's a little bigger than yours) in Photoshop.

Instinctively the soundhole was very interesting to me, especially the "barely lit" part underneath the strings, where you can see the inside of the guitar back. Classic guitars typically have a label of the guitar maker there and in the image you can barely see something that could be a label.

I found it very interesting that the Apple creative crew was so picky in such a detail, so this again pulled my attraction. Of course, it would simply look odd, if you couldn't see anything of the guitar's inside from a front shot like this, so maybe there's nothing special about it. I then inverted the image in Photoshop and there was a "label" clearly visible.


The label "edges" were not orthogonal but tilted towards each other on the side of the neck. If you then rotate the image 90 degrees clockwise, this reminded me to be the upper part of a stretched "V." I used the path tool in Photoshop to extend the tilted lines of the label and they almost perfectly show a stretched V, at least to me.

After rotating the image, the "T" became also clearly visible to me. It is the bridge and the attached strings. So I found the "TV", but was still missing the "i" like in "iTV". I got back to the Apple Logo soundhole, which then seemed to me to be the point of the glyph "i". If this was true, then visible part of the neck seems to be the line of the glyph "i". Putting it all together, I think I demystified the image which really hints at "iTV". If you are interested, I will send you the press release image (with layers) where I highlighted the "iTV" letters.

As I said in the beginning of my tip, I may be completely wrong, but if the new Apple TV will be announced next Wednesday and it will officially be called iTV, this will prove me right.

Best regards from Germany,

Your nephew, Claudio


Dear Claudio,

There certainly is something in that hole, but it could be as simple as giving the invitation a little background texture rather than leaving the hole completely dark. It doesn't really look to these weak, watery, and aging eyes like the letters you are suggesting. As Uncle Chris rather sarcastically points out, if you zoom in on the guitar strings 1000x, then rearrange the pixels in a double-blind shuffled inverse algorithm, they spell out, "JFK 1963 ROSWELL 1947 OMFG", which proves JFK was assassinated by space aliens from Zeta Reticuli 2!

Unfortunately, there's no concrete evidence on the ground that the whole Apple TV refresh and rename-to-iTV is going to happen, although Auntie would be delighted if it did. Bets on a new iPod introduction, and maybe new iTunes features seem more in line with historic September events, as well as the cryptic invitation.

But Auntie tries not to be prejudiced here. She's going to turn this question over to all her nieces and nephews and ask them what they see in that hole. The comments section is open. Fire away.

Love and kissies,

Aunt TUAW



View Tags

Related Stories

Categories

Apple

Dear Aunt TUAW, Maybe I'm completely wrong, but I eventually demystified the Apple 9/1/2010 Press Invitation. I had a look at the press...
 

Add a Comment

Sign in »
*0 / 3000 Character Maximum

50 Comments

Filter by:
lmasanti

Two thoughts of a not so old man:

1) See the original 1966 Michellangelo Antonini's movie "Blow up," (lots of the readers weren't even born!) about what you see and what you beleive you see.

2) Remember the Simon & Garfunkel's song "The Boxer" that says:
"Still, a man hears what he wants to hear [see]
And disregards the rest."

August 30 2010 at 12:32 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
schoolbook

Let's get back to basics. In the past, Apple used those dancing silhouettes in their September keynote invites. But now they used a guitar. It clearly shows Apple is telling us this event is focused on music. Lol I'll be laughing my ass off when the media and fanboys will be pissed that there's no Apple TV announcement of any kind on Wednesday. Teehee!

August 28 2010 at 11:16 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
sm.edwards

What! what do you mean JFK was assassinated by space aliens?

August 27 2010 at 5:31 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
frank.lowney

The answer is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steganography

Don't be fooled. This is not the simplistic stuff used by Russian operatives in recent months. Apple is far more sophisticated that that.

August 27 2010 at 5:13 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Mark

It's not a label. It's the bracing on the back of the guitar. The two vertical pieces (relative to original orientation of the image) are two of the ribs, which are usually quite narrow at that point (the lower ribs are up to 3/4" wide). The "V' parts are the back graft, which serves to reinforce the joint line between the parts of the back, which are typically only 1/8" thick so there isn't much strength in the glue joint there. In this case, based on the double grafts, this appears to be a 3 piece back, rather than a 2 piece back where there would be only one graft down the center. This "V" pattern is typical when making 3 piece backs. They are usually done when the center piece of the back is a different (and contrasting) type of wood relative to the 2 outer pieces.

In short, they sampled a real guitar with a 3 piece back, then modified the sound hole (that sound hole would be physically impossible because it leaves no room for X-braces on the top to cross each other just above the bridge).

Me, I build guitars... just for fun.

See reference images:

http://www.dailyguitars.com/images/Three-Piece-Back-small.jpg

http://www.chazy.net/Insturments/Make/BackBarce.jpg

August 27 2010 at 4:07 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
SIP

My earlier comment was in response to:


smak said 12:41PM on 8-27-2010

WTF there are some crazy ass apple fans out there. This is nuts

August 27 2010 at 3:11 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
SIP

Exactly why you should pray you never end up buying something made on a Friday...

August 27 2010 at 2:50 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Tim Rosencrans

I looked at the exif data for the photo I says it was taken with an iPad 2!

he he

August 27 2010 at 2:47 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Joe

Actually, the stock photo the Apple creative team used is here:

http://www.istockphoto.com/stock-photo-2147062-acoustic-guitar.php

You can clearly see in the original stock photo the same wooden structural element in the hole.

Now, the only non-Apple-logo difference in the edited image (which, I'm sure will open a whole new list of conspiracies) is the four (4) dots on the visible part of the guitar's neck.

August 27 2010 at 2:29 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Marcus

There are 2 primary designs of Martin Dreadnaught-size (think Johnny Cash) guitar: the 2-piece back (models D-18 and D-28), and the 3-piece back (D-35) which was introduced in the 1960's because of a shortage of rosewood pieces big enough for 2-piece backs.

Inside the guitars, there is always a strip of spruce that bridges the seam between the back pieces. On a 3-piece back, there are two spruce strips. On a D-35 (or any copy by Yamaha or whomever) they will run at a slight angle to each other, following the slightly triangular shape of the back pieces.

Unless you're looking from the grassy knoll.

August 27 2010 at 2:07 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Buy an ad here

Hot Apps on TUAW

Tweets

© 2012 AOL Inc. All Rights Reserved.