Today I worked on several different pieces and got a lot done.  I spent a long time gilding a new gas mask.  It’s the big one in this image:

Nuclear Family

I’m not happy with how it’s looking. It’s too much like a motorcycle helmet or cheap sci-fi prop.  It has two coats of leaf on it as it was not sticking too well.  I’m going to cover it again with a different, fancy leaf tomorrow – one that has a variegated color pattern.  I liked how it looked in a test area – it looks more weathered like the copper one. Interestingly, I discovered when trying to solder some copper sheet that you heat copper in a flame, it develops all sorts of pretty colors, and I’m thinking maybe that’s the process used in the fancy leaf. A side note – the big mask is Czech made, and though it looks robotic, it’s by far the most comfortable of the group. A veritable Rolls-Royce!  I’ve got a fair amount more to do on this one. I’m not happy with the rest of it either.  You’ll notice I entitled the three pieces together “Nuclear Family”.  To me they look like a man, woman, and child.

In other news, I finished the Rosetta Stone piece “What will archeologists think when they find this?”:

Funny thing –  I realized that the entire piece is a mirror image of what it should be.  I’m going to claim post hoc ergo propter hoc on this one – archeologists would find it more interesting that this Rosetta Stone is backward!  I’m not sure how I like this on a white wall.  Maybe need to paint border and/or darken text.

Last up is a better photo of the fly.  I straightened out the holder a bit: