Flourish Forum
General Categories => Spencerian Script => Topic started by: RobertFontaine on December 18, 2016, 12:25:55 AM
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I amm working on the copybooks and generally having a good time doodling/scribbling.
I have been alternating between nikko and zebra g with an occasional use of a monoline noodler with higgens calligraphy , noodlers black and apache and speed ball india inks for practice getting a feel with a general pencil universal dip pen. (gillot 303 and 404's are on order)
I think it would help tremendously to see someone doing very basic Spencerian properly with a straight pen (I'm left handed).
The ornamental techniques and oblique pen do a lot to obscure watching the posture and strokes in many of the videos I can find. Others seem poorly executed by people trying to self-teach.
Has someone who has good technique posted a 5 or 10 minute video of upper lower numeric and joins with straight and oblique pens? It would be great to actually see arm movement and posture as well a nib on paper.
It seems like Spencerian isn't as popular as Round Hand or Copper Plate but I find it soothing.
I see Harvest Crittenden has a Beginners course starting in January, That Michael Sull has a video, Learning How to Write Spencerian Script DVD, and that there is a Ron Tate Video.
Are there any youtube/vimeo resources worth studying first?
Thanks again,
Robert.
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Robert, a must-watch for left handers is IMO anything by John DeCollibus.
Also, look up @mjgebhart on Instagram (who is right-handed BTW). Especially his early videos are very insightful, and I think he has the classic writing technique down very well.
You say you are working on the copy books. Out of interest, is this the Mott Media package?
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I took both of Harvest's Spencerian online classes – beginner's and advanced – and if you have no possibility for "real live" teaching, they are a superb option! I found the personal feedback to my work invaluable.
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DeCollibus' name does leap to mind for left handers, but his technique is highly unusual. Off the top of my head I can't think of any videos of someone writing plain Spencerian at all, the more's the pity. Schin (https://www.youtube.com/user/OpenInkStand/videos) has done quite a few on business writing with fountain pens which are very worthwhile, but as for arm movement and posture, sorry - as you suggest the norm does tend to be an overhead view of a disembodied hand at work.
I have heard nothing but good about Harvest Crittenden's courses. Several people I know have taken them, and all have found them valuable. That would appear to be far and away the best option for distance learning. If you do get a chance to meet up with with a very good penperson in real life, however, jump at it, even if it's just for half an hour.
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Not plain Spencerian, but showing a bit more than only a hand:
https://youtu.be/NNTJPMWPrFE
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Some of Hoang's (https://www.youtube.com/user/huyhoangdaoftu/videos) show a bit more too, but once again it's mostly whole arm movement Ornamental, which is not necessarily very helpful.
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Agree! I think this one can be quite informative.
https://youtu.be/JGpplZruSZw
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Robert, a must-watch for left handers is IMO anything by John DeCollibus.
Also, look up @mjgebhart on Instagram (who is right-handed BTW). Especially his early videos are very insightful, and I think he has the classic writing technique down very well.
You say you are working on the copy books. Out of interest, is this the Mott Media package?
Yes. I suspect the originals might be a bit expensive ;)
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Thanks all,
I will spend some time watching this afternoon.
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I took both of Harvest's Spencerian online classes – beginner's and advanced – and if you have no possibility for "real live" teaching, they are a superb option! I found the personal feedback to my work invaluable.
Same here--Harvest is a wonderful teacher, and I also would recommend her online courses. If you really get into it, Harvest runs the Spencerian Saga each year and its great fun and very informative. This year there was a week for beginners and a week for more advanced students. Highly recommended.
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Robert, regarding Workbook 1 of the MM package, you may prefer learning the letters on a grid with slant lines, instead of fitting them into square boxes. When you put your slant lines about one x-height apart, you have a grid that will IMHO better guide you in understanding the geometry of the script.
(https://ih1.redbubble.net/image.147867928.4145/flat,800x800,075,f.u2.jpg)
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Alexander is being too modest: he is the originator of a superb addition to the range of Spencerian teaching materials. This link (http://theflourishforum.com/forum/index.php?topic=4993.msg63648#msg63648) points to the post via which you can download the pdf of New Spencerian Compendium worksheets. I can't recommend it highly enough.
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Thank you so much for the recommendation @AndyT, coming from you that really means a lot!
Robert, should you be planning to check them out, please let me know what you think. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated!
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Thank you so much for the recommendation @AndyT, coming from you that really means a lot!
Robert, should you be planning to check them out, please let me know what you think. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated!
I have downloaded your practice sheets and will give working with them a try. I suspect it could be a few months before I have any worthwhile feedback, if ever. I don't have a lot to compare this to.
A bit of tracing and grid using may speed up the learning curve but I do also enjoy scribbling and seeing the results of my mistakes as well. Some of them look interesting. Having the exemplar on the screen in front of me rather than on the sheet I am writing on is an interesting challenge of itself.
So as you can see I have no idea what I'm talking about so I'm willing to give anything a try for a bit :)
Thanks,
Robert
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I would also recommend any class of Harvest, especially the beginner online class, I think that would really fit what you're looking for - she provides very detailed videos in the class. I'm not sure if you are on instagram or not, and many of these people are doing more ornamental penmanship than spencerian, but I think it's good to see how different people approach the script (I'll add some of my favorites below). Finding videos on their instagram pages takes some scrolling/searching (unfortunately they are all right handed).
- Hoang (mentioned before) has some videos on his youtube channel and instagram that are simple spencerian script - https://www.instagram.com/huyhoangdao/
- Schin has some videos of simpler spence on her youtube channel
- Marcus Carlini - https://www.instagram.com/carlinigraphy/
- Bryan: https://www.instagram.com/simplebc/
- James: https://www.instagram.com/himasf/
- Bailey: https://www.instagram.com/antiquariabailey/
- Michael: https://www.instagram.com/mjgebhart/
- Nina: https://www.instagram.com/anintran/ - Mostly copperplate but if you go back in her feed she has good spence videos on caps and lowercase.
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Thanks for sharing this wonderful resource @Raayynuh. Really appreciate :D
- Ashok