Gilding a Panel

I've been forgetting to mention this, but I've been gold-leafing this special panel for a mother-daughter portrait of Kimberly and her daughter Sophia, which as a painting will also be pertinent for my spiritual portrait series, and I did a video clip of myself gilding this panel.  If you haven't already seen it, check it out on my miniature blog, The Ruby Slippers, along with the other posted video clip, a 'virtual visit to my studio.'

Because a short video only allows for highlighting a few aspects of gilding, I want to be sure to mention two more things for those unfamiliar with the gilding process.  It's hard to show the difference in surfaces via online and in video, but I chose oil gilding for this panel because for this particular painting I favored going with it's less shiny, more satiny patina.  The difference between oil gilding and water gilding is that water gilding is burnished with a special tool to a very high shine.  A slow-drying size will give a bit more shine than a fast-drying size, so that's in between the other two options.  Second, I skipped an important but recommended step in my video by not priming my gesso panel first with a venetian red or ochre primer before gilding, because I wanted to expedite my process with this project, but I don't want to skip saying that traditionally this gets laid down first before fast or slow-drying size is added to the panel.  It looks beautiful if a little of the venetian red primer shows through the gold, and it saves gold.

I'll post more progress on "The 'Mary' in Kimberly" later today.