I did several tests before I settled on what you see above. One of the tests was to leave the light squares the completely unstained natural leather and use the super shene as a resist on those squares. It produced a very white vs. dark appearance. I settled on the colors above (staining the entire carved board first with tan, then using Super Shene as a resist on the parts I wanted light and then coming back over it with Dark Brown Gel Antique), because I wanted it to have an antique kind of look. I tried on one of my tests to apply the finish coats of Super Shene with a sponge, but ended up having to purchase a cheap air brush kit to keep it from smearing and becoming ruined.
The bottom picture is probably closest in color to how it actually looked. The top 2 pictures make the light squares kind of look yellow. I didn't try painting each square. I could maybe try that with some Angellus paint.