you French polishing is a very difficult process and it's something that really needs to be learned over a long period of time but I'll go through some of the basics for you now French polishing isn't going to hide sloppy surface preparation so you need to make sure you've sanded the ukulele to a very fine level once you've done this you need to determine where the saddles going to be placed and in this case it's 382 millimeters away from the nut I'm going to apply the French polish before I've attached the saddle which means I need to mask the area where the saddles going to be placed and I'll do this by using some low-tack masking tape and a scalpel to mark around the edges of my saddle then I'll place the masking tape down on the area where the saddle is going to be before you start your French polishing you need to create your own rubber and this is made by getting some fine way of cotton cloth cut into a square and putting some wadding in center of it and wrapping it up you will need chalak flakes denatured alcohol linseed oil some jars some syringes and in some cases brushes and some rubber gloves I've dissolved Marcia lacking what's known as a 2-pound cut and I prepare myself with three syringes one of the solution of the shellac one of the alcohol and one of the linseed oil I'll initially charge my rubber by using equal amounts of the solution of shellac and alcohol I can then begin what's known as a grain filling process this is required to fill all the little pores in the grain to make sure you can get a mirror finish at the end I'll do this over the entire ukulele in nice even strokes to make sure I get even coverage I'll do about five layers of shellac on top of each other and hopefully this will be enough to fill the pores if you want to you can mask off the fingerboard make sure you don't get any shellac on there when you finish with this stage of the process keep the rubber in a jar or sealed container for the next stage of French polishing by now you should have a reasonably good Sheen over the entire instrument and what I'll do next is sand with some very fine sandpaper approximately 600 grit this will give me a very even surface for the next stage of the French polishing you need to constantly check sandpaper to make sure there's no buildup of shellac which can damage the surface you bodying is the process of building up layers of french polish to give a high-gloss finish initially I'll charge the wrapper with equal amounts of shellac solution and alcohol with one drop of linseed oil the French polishing technique can vary between people but you need to find a way that suits you basically you want to apply a number of very thin layers over the entire surface in a very even motion I pad the shellac on in the direction of the grain from edge to edge in an alternating pattern until the piece has been covered the stroke should start off the edge of the board continue across the board and off the opposite side you need to stop when the finish becomes tacky and the pad begins to stick you need to have ample light to see that you're applying the shellac correctly and you need to get yourself comfortable because you'll be here for a while depending on your technique and the size of the instrument that your french polishing you can use small figure eights large figure eights or straight strokes to achieve the desired result as you body up your instrument and add more and more layers you'll thin down the shellac solution until you're using mostly alcohol hopefully if you've applied some of these techniques and done some practicing you'll get a nice mirror finish on your instrument you