Author Topic: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2  (Read 60749 times)

Offline Salman Khattak

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Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« on: September 12, 2016, 03:56:51 PM »
Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2

This group has two strokes. The inverted ‘i’ stroke and the compound stroke. These are shown below.

The inverted ‘i’ starts with a hairline midway between the base and the waist lines. As it goes up, the hairline curves slightly in the clockwise direction until it reaches the waist line where the shaded stroke will begin. The down stroke starts with a gradual shade that achieves full width about ⅓ rd of the way down. The nib naturally moves to the right during this stroke causing the right tine to form the curve. The stroke is completed by drawing the full width all the way down to the base line.
The compound curve looks a little tricky but becomes simple when you realize that it starts like and inverted ‘i’ and ends like a regular ‘i’. That is all there is to it really.

The most common mistake with this stroke is that the top curve does not match the bottom one. It is very easy to make the bottom of this stroke heavier than the top - a slight difference is acceptable but ideally the top and the bottom should have the same thickness. Watch out for that when you are practising your groups of 5.

Once you have mastered these two strokes, the following letters will be easy to form.



Here is how the letters are formed:

n - an ‘n’ is formed by drawing an inverted ‘i’ followed by the compound curve. The rising entry hairline of the compound stroke touches the inverted ‘i’ in the middle of the waist and base lines.

m - an ‘m’ is formed by drawing two inverted ‘i’ strokes followed by a compound curve.

h - the ‘h’ is formed by drawing a hairline, followed by a full width downstroke that begins at the 1st Ascender line. This line is uniformly thick all the way to the base line. You can go back and square the top and bottom after the stroke is drawn. This is then followed by a compound curve.

y - the ‘y’ is a compound curve followed by a ‘j’ stroke.

p - the ‘p’ starts with a hairline. The main stroke starts halfway between the waist and the 1st Ascender lines. This stroke continues, with uniform thickness, all the way down to the 1st Descender line. Square the top and bottom of the stroke after drawing it if needed. This stroke is followed by a compound stroke.

v - the ‘v’ is just a compound stroke where the exit hairline goes all the way up to the waist line and is finished with a blob like in a ‘w’ or a ‘b’ from Group-1.

Practice these letters until satisfied. Post the following words for feedback when ready.

bin, mint, nymph, vim and one word of your choosing that may include letters from both groups.

Joins

This join applies to some letters in Group-2. The join for letters that begin with a hairline going all the way to the waist line (‘n’, ‘m’) needs to be a little steeper than normal. This allows for the letters to be slightly closer than if we drew the exit and entry hairlines are the regular angles.

These letters will still be a bit further apart than letters joining from base line to mid-height (e.g. t-i join in the example) but will still look quite acceptable.
Here is what this word looks without the adjustment i.e. drawing both the exit hairline from the 'i' and the entry hairline into the 'n' at the regular angles where they are expected to join the next or previous letter at 1/2 x-height.
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Offline schin

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #1 on: September 12, 2016, 05:30:59 PM »
Fantastic explanation!!! Thank you!!!
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Offline Pittipat

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #2 on: September 13, 2016, 11:43:48 PM »
These are sooo helpful!  I've been on and off in studying coppy - mostly because I tend to go back to square one after skipping practices continuously (which is often).

Thank you sooo much for sharing these!
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Offline Salman Khattak

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #3 on: September 14, 2016, 12:54:48 AM »
You are most welcome @Pittipat - It is just as exciting for me when people use these lessons.

- Salman
I have an opinion and I'm not afraid to use it.

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Offline silvereye

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #4 on: September 16, 2016, 10:03:35 PM »
Salman,  this is really helpful.  Wait till I learn how to upload photos of my handwriting for critique

Offline Salman Khattak

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #5 on: September 17, 2016, 12:06:23 AM »
I am glad you find it helpful @silvereye - I will be looking forward to you joining us.

- Salman
I have an opinion and I'm not afraid to use it.

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Offline Mamashag

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #6 on: October 09, 2016, 12:10:29 PM »
This is proving to be great study and practice for me. Although I am struggling with several details: the hairlines--their shape, start and finish; width of m's and n's; consistent weight on downstrokes; proportion of weight on main downstrokes vs secondary downstrokes. (hoping my terminology is correct) This week my letter slant suffered. The wider spacing on this guideline sheet forced me to widen my view.
« Last Edit: October 11, 2016, 01:09:53 PM by Mamashag »

Offline Anjali N

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #7 on: October 09, 2016, 03:15:55 PM »
Hi Salman, hope you are having a nice weekend!

Here is my go at set 2!

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #8 on: October 10, 2016, 02:01:51 AM »
Wow @Anjali N. You have made great progress. :D

-Ashok

Offline Anjali N

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #9 on: October 10, 2016, 07:52:01 AM »
@ash0kgiri Thanks for the encouragement!  :)

Offline Salman Khattak

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #10 on: October 10, 2016, 07:55:56 AM »
@Mamashag - can you kindly upload a photo/scan directly from the front/top of the writing? The script looks good but I cannot really make out the details I am looking for in the angled shots :-)

@Anjali N - this is a very promising start indeed. Only a couple of minor refinements are needed now.

1. The i-n join is giving you a bit of trouble. The exit hairline needs to turn up slightly more tightly and match the slant at about half way up the x-height. This will give you enough room to make the top turn into the first stroke of the 'n' match the exit stroke. If you look at the i-n join in both 'bin' and 'win' the exit hairline remains steeper than the slant for about 75% of way up the x-height. This makes the top turn into the 'n' too tight. You can see the same in the n-y join in 'nymph'.

For some reason the second stroke of the 'm' in 'mint' also turns too tightly but I'll let that go since the other m's and n's are fine :-)

2. The compound stroke in 'v' needs a bit more work to match the weight and shape of the top and bottom. I too have a tendency to make the top transition into the shade more gradual than the bottom one.

I am glad to see the crossbar of the 't' is nice and level :-)

- Salman

I have an opinion and I'm not afraid to use it.

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Offline Anjali N

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #11 on: October 11, 2016, 10:58:55 PM »
Hi Salman, I worked on my i-n join. The connection is a little shaky / tentative, but I think I made some progress on angle. As always, look forward to your thoughts.

Offline Salman Khattak

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #12 on: October 12, 2016, 02:33:23 AM »
@Anjali N

Hmmm - the compound stroke on the 'v' looks much better balanced but have you stopped lifting your pen at the base and waist lines? Some of the strokes seems to be done a bit too quickly resulting the loss of control. For example, the shade of the 'b' in 'bin' starts tapering at about 1/2 x-height, the shade of the compound stroke in 'n' doesn't start to taper until 9/10ths of the way down to the base line.

The 't' in 'mint' is a beauty though. It's hairline exit would make a nice join with an 'n' or 'm' btw.

I think you will have an easier time of making the i-n (and similar) joins would be to make the join in one go after you lift the pen at the base line after the shade of the 'i'. Also stop and lift at the waist line before drawing the first stroke of the 'n'. You might want to draw a few in pencil before running over them with the nib.

Everything else looks 'within specs' so lets work on a little more precision on the strokes, lifts at the base and waist lines and the i-n (and similar) joins.

Lets work on the words 'twin nib unit' for the next exercise. I will be looking for the following:

1. Uniform shade along the stroke.
2. Proper termination of the shade i.e. don't lift too early, nor too late.
3. Spacing (yours is good btw)
4. Squared tops and bottoms - it is useful to understand that the process of tidying up sometimes makes that stroke longer.

Just focus on the stroke you are making at the time. In the large 'vim' above, you were already thinking of the join to the 'n' when drawing the shade of the 'i' and look what happened to it :-)

- Salman
I have an opinion and I'm not afraid to use it.

Copperplate Tutorial :: Toronto Pen Company

Offline Anjali N

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #13 on: October 13, 2016, 10:21:54 PM »
Hi Salman, here is another go with the words unit, twin, nib. Thanks!

Offline Salman Khattak

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Re: Copperplate Minuscules - Group 2
« Reply #14 on: October 14, 2016, 01:03:23 PM »
This is proving to be great study and practice for me. Although I am struggling with several details: the hairlines--their shape, start and finish; width of m's and n's; consistent weight on downstrokes; proportion of weight on main downstrokes vs secondary downstrokes. (hoping my terminology is correct) This week my letter slant suffered. The wider spacing on this guideline sheet forced me to widen my view.

Thank you for uploading a head-on picture. It does look good on all fronts. You have a tendency to draw the compound stroke a bit further away than is needed. See the n, p & h in nymph. The previous m & n in 'mint' are good.

Move on to group-3 - this is where things get interesting :-)

- Salman
I have an opinion and I'm not afraid to use it.

Copperplate Tutorial :: Toronto Pen Company