Cigarette burn restoration

I had this French viola brought into my shop with 2 cigarette burns in the top, which had been given a poor cover up effort at some point (it kind of looks like someone took a dark red marker to it!) The rest of the viola is in great condition, so the owner asked me to restore the front.

Look at the following pictures to see how my restoration of it took place and how it now looks.

Step 1: Take away ‘red marker’ and burn marks

Step 2: Retouch…until the varnish is restored to match the original

Step 3: Set the viola back up, and you wouldn’t know that it had the burns to start with!