Hey all,
I just finished up week 8, and am finally starting to see visible calluses on my fretting hand! They’re in a different place from my guitar calluses, which is probably expected, but I’d appreciate knowing if this looks like the right area for bass calluses.
For comparison, my guitar calluses are at the very tips of my fingers, right under the nails.
If I’m fretting wrong, I’d rather know now than another 8 weeks from now. Thanks!
Seems right to me.
My callousouses are pretty wide on my index finger, and a little more focused on my other 3 fingers, but still a bit wider then I would think guitars would be, as I roll my fingers from string to string, and slide with different finger angles depending on the string and finger. It would be hard to say how your fretting technique is from callouses alone however, its more, do you get clean notes that ring out untul you are done with the note and release the fretted note, or mute it another way?
Do you get a lot of fret buzzing, or none at all?
Even then, you could have good technique and a bad set up and get dead notes and fret buzz, or a great set up and poor technique and sound okish.
I have not played guitar in over 20 years and I remember the razor wite tearing hp my fingers to this day.
I have been playing bass for about 2 1/2 or so years now ( with a long gap between the two) and my fingers callous heavier on bass, but its not nearly as painful from the get go.
Looks right. Seems like you are officially a bass player. Great job!
I play a bit of guitar and bass and my calluses are closer to my nails. I don’t do much finger rolling yet which would probably lower how far down the calluses go, but I generally try to stay on my finger tips on both instruments.
That looks about right you need the meat of your finger to control the strings. Although your fingertips looks wet and shiny, it should be the opposite, lol. I couldn’t keep my fingers from being too dry playing. Sometimes I had to wear glove it gets pretty bad, but wearing gloves makes everything too slippery.
It would not be as thick and hard as the guitar’s fingertips but it would get sandier and rougher if it’s too thick then you are pressing the strings too hard.
Mostly my tone is clean, getting better as my fingers get stronger. I get some fret buzzing, but only on certain frets and usually higher up the neck. Could be my bass needs to be set up – I got it second-hand and have no idea if it has ever been adjusted, except for the new strings I put on. But I promised myself a new bass anyway once I finish B2B 
@Al1885 I think that was just the light – my skin is actually extremely dry! Thanks for the note on texture. I was sort of expecting them to be thick and hard like guitar calluses, so it’s good to know that bass calluses can feel different.
I might actually be fretting too hard right now; I’ll either get a new bass or have this one setup in the near future.
Calluses from guitar steel strings versus bass strings will be different from each other, more often than not.
Guitar strings are much thinner and, over time, sharper-feeling compared to much thicker gauge and duller-feeling bass strings. Also, fingering of each instrument is different from each other, with guitar strings requiring tip of finger pressure
Bottom line, it’s all good. And given more familiarity with each instrument and time playing each, calluses will seemingly fade away. At least they did for me, even though my beginner guitar calluses were really gnarly years ago, they’re gone now. Keep thumpin’!
It would get better as you go. You need dynamic in tones so as soon as you start to relax a bit your finger pressure would naturally reduced.
I take pride in my soft hand from the golf grip as I spent a lot of time with my fundamentals. I have a Sam Snead kind of grip live bird in your hand. Even when I was hitting 2000 balls a week my hands has very little calluses. Some guys I shake hand with on the course have skins like crocodiles. You can see the finger groves on the grips.
The only calluses I have now are from cooking(knife calluses) and basses on the right thumb and index finger from popping and slapping. Lol.
