Does anyone use exemplars that are written on a guide?
Hi Amy,
I have just started practising copperplate so can't give help with Italics. But the issue of finding exemplars by calligraphers that have guides, has the same issues in copperplate too. There are a lot of Instruction manuals (by old masters) which are available on IAMPETH. You could try there.
As the others have said, it's difficult to find this.
What I do is get an exemplar or piece of writing that I like and use Illustrator to draw guides on them.
This is laborious, but I am a little crazy
and I love doing this kind of stuff.
The trick with learning calligraphy from books is to follow all the instructions carefully, even the boring ones. Rule guidelines, rule slant lines, practice one stroke at a time like it says, even if you want to skip ahead. I learned some very bad habits by not doing this and I'm still not over them ...
Please follow what Moya said. My first few days (pre FF) I jumped to the last page and tried to emulate what was written and snapped nibs and developed lots and lots of bad habits. With the help of the people here, it's slowly getting rectified
If and when you start copperplate, this is one of the many great guides that can help in slants and spacing. It's in French, but the diagrams and pointers are easy to understand.
http://www.iampeth.com/pdf/recueil-méthodique-de-principes-d-ecriture
Happy writing
-Prasad
