Learning foundational.

[KrzysiekS]

Last year I've tried to learn Italic, yet lack of practice stopped and reversed my progress.
My handwriting came to the following shape, I'm more or less satisfied with.
While my "formal" italic is still not satisfactory.

I would like to try something different, my choice is foundational.

The resources on my hand are

• Sheila Waters' "Foundations of Calligraphy" book
• 3.8 and 2.4 parallels, and few additional italic fountain pens
• stash of paper
• 30-45 minutes per day, 5 days a week

I've found out, I have some troubles with round strokes needed for "o". Is student expected to make that strokes at slow drawing speed, or should I practice to the point where round strokes come at brisk and confident speed (similar to "the rhythm of italic handwriting" mentioned by Lloyd Reynolds in his Italic Calligraphy videos).

[jeanwilson]

Your formal italic is way above average for the time you have been studying.
Foundational is an excellent choice for your next style.
Sheila's book has everything you need - except Sheila, in person.

When you say you have trouble with the round strokes - I am not sure what kind of trouble.
Generally, we have trouble when the natural quirks that we have developed in our everyday penmanship sneak into our lettering. My personal quirks are always lurking and will sneak in if I am not vigilant.
Slowing down is helpful.
Keeping a positive attitude is also helpful.
If you are thinking, "My o's are bad. My o's are bad," as you write, they will be bad.
Talk to your nib about where you want it to go.
With most curves, there is a sequence of more curve, a little straighter, then more curve.
Understand the ovals and talk to yourself about the path you are taking as you go around the curve.

Pay attention to the white shape that you are creating with the strokes.
Looking at the corner of the nib and guiding it along the white space can be really helpful.
Look at the right corner of the nib and you make the left stroke and the left corner of the nib as you make the right stroke.
Those two corners will define the white space.

[KrzysiekS]

Thank You Jean for encouragement and advice on white space.  I'll try to write some pages of words consisting of letters 'oebpqc' and post it in this thread.

EDIT:
I can't get my 'o' round, so I devised the following exercise:
In attached pdf file there is guideline of 4 nib widths hight (pilot parallel pen 3.8mm) and pattern of overlapping circles.
Tracing circles allows me to trace a perfect 'o'. Then I use this "perfect 'o'" as a model for writing my own 'o'. To avoid working from steadily deteriorating model, I repeat a single circle guides and a space for a single 'o'.

[KrzysiekS]

Sorry for new post, but edit feature would hide this post from "Show unread posts since last visit." feature...

This is my first practice after single letters. I'm not proud of it, but I would be grateful for hints on getting it under control, before too much misguided practice will make my errors harder to erradicate.

PDF contains high resolution scan, of the same page as image.

Full list of English words consisting solely of letters b, c, d, e, o, p, q

Code: [Select]

ksm@ksm:~/Dokumenty$ grep -e '^[bcdeopq]*$' /usr/share/dict/words | pr -T -a -5
b       be     bebop   bed bedded
bee       beep     beeped   bob bobbed
bode       boded     boo   boob boobed
booed       bop     bopped   c cede
ceded       cob     cod   codded code
coded       coed     coo   cooed coop
cooped       cop     cope   coped copped
d       deb     decode   decoded deed
deeded       deep     do   doc dodo
doe       dope     doped   e ebb
ebbed       o     oboe   odd ode
p       pee     peed   peep peeped
pep       pepped     pod   podded poop
pooped       pop     pope   popped q

My observations:

• e in ode is too italic
• e in cope, oboe, ode, pope has too long final stroke
• lower right join in be, bed, pope is not aligned and too bold
• I have tendency to draw too long upper stroke in 'e': code, deed
• lemon shape of counter of letter 'd' is missing in: deed, odd

[Myles Ink Calligraphy]

Your script looks near perfect to me. Especially the wedge serifs atop of bs and ds were executed ingeniously.

In my humble opinion, your dissatisfaction with your Os may be related to the instrument that you are using. I assume that you used the Parallel pens for your work. The Parallel pens have two distinctive plates that allow ink to channel on the 4 sides, and for this reason, some writers may find it difficult to make a precise stroke. In other words, the Parallel pen is a bit irresponsible.

My suggestion is to use sharper tools that is more traditional. The Manuscript Italic pens and Brause Bandzug Italic nibs are my favorable candidates. With those tools you may be able to have more responsive strokes and touches.

Your works look lovely. Keep it up!

[KrzysiekS]

My suggestion is to use sharper tools that is more traditional. The Manuscript Italic pens and Brause Bandzug Italic nibs are my favorable candidates. With those tools you may be able to have more responsive strokes and touches.

Than You for your suggestion, I'll try Manuscript pen after I empty cartridge in parallel.
I practice during a break at work. I'm limited to fountain pens as they are more mobile.

The following was written for "Quote of the week" thread on Fountain Pen Network forum.
I've been working mainly on letters shapes. I'm not too proud of g in light, lack of "ribbon joint" in upper left part of es, both ls in will has feet not round enough.
Spacing between straight stroke and round stroke ie. in "like the pupil" looks too generous for me.

[ash0kgiri]

This looks really good @KrzysiekS
Even spacing can really make the letters and words perfect and out of place. Look out for this. Like in your above example
the letters in the first line are generously spaced as compared to the other three lines. These are minor problems and can be tackled with regular practice.

30-45 min everyday is serious discipline. Wow.

Keep writing,
-Ashok

[jeanwilson]

If you can make a photocopy of your exemplar that is the exact same size as what you write with the nib you are using
and then place your paper right below the exemplar so that your lettering is very near the exemplar, you should have better success in matching the exact shapes. Or you might try tracing the exemplar to get the feel of how round foundational is.
Your italics are so nice - but the feel of foundational is quite different. Be patient, as it takes time to get your hand-eye coordination linked up with the rhythm that you will develop.
Because you did so well at italics, I am sure you can do just as well at foundational.
Mastering italic is like learning ballet - and then foundational is switching to hockey.
You need a lot of coordination and skill at both of them - but there are some significant differences.

I work with a person who teaches voice lessons. I asked her one time if she thought there was ever a situation where a person was hopeless. She said, in her opinion, if a person really wanted to learn how to sing, she could teach them. They might not end up a professional, but anyone with perseverance can accomplish quite a bit.

It has been mentioned on the forum that if you have been doing copperplate for quite some time and want to work on Spencerian, you should stop the copperplate and just focus on the Spencerian and not jump back and forth on a daily basis. IMHO the same applies to italic and foundational. Give it some time and keep posting sample pages. It is so helpful for other readers to see the improvement.

[KrzysiekS]

It has been mentioned on the forum that if you have been doing copperplate for quite some time and want to work on Spencerian, you should stop the copperplate and just focus on the Spencerian and not jump back and forth on a daily basis. IMHO the same applies to italic and foundational. Give it some time and keep posting sample pages. It is so helpful for other readers to see the improvement.

This would be very hard for me. I could abstain from italic calligraphy for some time as this is just a hobby for me. But my handwriting is italic based.

I can't do photocopy, but I can work with scanner and resize model to required size.

[jeanwilson]

Italic penmanship during everyday writing shouldn't interfere with the foundational. I meant that sticking to just foundational for your calligraphic practice for a while would give you time to progress and get the rounder feel, without slant.

[Ken Fraser]

Italic penmanship during everyday writing shouldn't interfere with the foundational. I meant that sticking to just foundational for your calligraphic practice for a while would give you time to progress and get the rounder feel, without slant.

+1  Good advice.

[KrzysiekS]

Current progress, or lack thereof

[jeanwilson]

I see tons of progress. Your basic straight and rounded strokes have improved. Most of your spacing is perfect. The letters that pop out as needing work are those with diagonals - which is typical - because nobody ever starts with the diagonal letters, so it always takes them a while to catch up.

You get nice crisp serifs - most of them are very consistent.
The e is tricky - getting the loop just right and yours are very close. Look at the white space on the exemplar and look to the exact point on the first stroke where you want the loop to touch.

The a is also tricky - just keep looking back at the exemplar.

The s looks like it could be a tiny bit wider. On your exemplar, draw a line through the center of the middle section of the stroke to see exactly what the angle is so that you can match the width of the letter - as you draw the pen from left to right.

Check the foot on the p. There is only one on your page - so maybe you don't always make them that wide.

The caps....
I recommend working on caps all by themselves. The proportions are very specific - and after dedicating some time to them, you will be glad you did. But, I think it is too much to try to learn caps at the same time you are working on lower case.
Great work - hopefully we will see some more.

It's nice that you use ink that shows where the strokes are overlapping.

[KrzysiekS]

Thank You Jean for this analysis.
For past two weeks I've been working on 'o' shapes.
I'll focus on 'a' & 'e' this week, but I'll keep in mind that 's' and diagonals require some attention.

As to capitals, I intend to work on them as soon as I learn foundational minuscules.

Ink is a bit of an accident. Few years ago I've bought a jar of standard international cartridges (about 100pcs, probably Herlitz brand) in local supermarket.  It's school ink, washable blue with pretty low saturation. On Rhodia 90g/m², plain notepad it looks like this.

[KrzysiekS]

Today's practice. (19 April 2017).