Jim's journey learning the art of calligraphy
Well it’s been a few years, but I’m getting back into the calligraphy game.
I’ve been practicing some more copperplate recently, but I made a reel for Instagram trying some Blackletter. I forgot how much hard this is! Getting just the right amount of ink loaded, getting the nib actually started on the paper, trying not to get too much ink flowing… it’s a very satisfying challenge!
Now for five Latin phrases that feature in five favourite films.
Tried to find more, but this seems to be something of a niche as I couldn’t find too many lists of films with a Latin phrase. Might just have to find other famous phrases instead!
The answers for those who found one or two a bit tricky!
Pie Jesu Domine, Dona eis requiem – Monty Python & The Holy Grail
Libera te tutemet ex inferis – Event Horizon
Vi veri universum vivus vici – V for Vendetta
Romanes eunt domus – Monty Python’s The Life of Brian
Orbis non sufficit – The World is Not Enough
Today’s calligraphy practice in copperplate script comes from a famous tweet from the UK Civil Service back in May 2020 that was swiftly deleted. It made the news!
I’m still slightly out of practice here and you can tell, particularly with the spacing of some vowels up against consonants, like the word “and”, and “you”. Word spacing has improved on the previous work, with only a couple of excessively-distant words in there now (the spacing between “Can” and “you”, I believe is the ideal, where there is only just a break between the trailing stroke of the “n” and the leading stroke of the “i”).
A current affairs-related quote for today’s calligraphy practice. This one is in relation to a comment made by Brandon Lewis MP in the UK House of Commons regarding the upcoming Internal Market Bill.
I’m slightly out of practice, and it’s been a couple of weeks since I last had a practice session. You can tell quite clearly with the word spacing between “does” and “break”, and again on the second line, between “specific” and “and”.
I am using a guide sheet with diagonal lines at 55degrees, however I think my leading strokes into the next letter is making me too liberal with the spacing, and then the first letter of the next word ends up too far away from the previous word. Something to work on!
I believe slowing down between words and being more conscious about the spacing before I start to write the next word will help this. We’ll see how that goes next time!
Today is #WorldCalligraphyDay! So, time for a Calligraphy practice post!
More movie quotes! This time some philosophy from Drs. Alan Grant and Ellie Sattler of Jurassic Park fame.
This one was the second attempt – my first didn’t have any spelling mistakes (a first?), but also on one of the lines I started writing on the wrong guideline, the capital D of the last line was on the wrong baseline, and I even got a word wrong on the first line!
Quite close up you can see a little bleeding in the paper. This is probably either the thinness of the ink, or (more likely), the paper I’m using is marginally too absorbant.
This work, and all the others shown on this blog to date, have all been on my layout pad I got with my very first order (Daler-Rowney A3 Layout Pad) – which is perfectly fine for practice work. The paper is fairly lightweight (45gsm) so my guide sheets underneath show up really well – though sometimes ink bleeds through to the other side sometimes (particularly when ink flow has been a tad too high off the nib).
I do have a pad of heavier paper ready (Bienfang 207 Calligraphic Parchment Paper) with 74gsm paper – but it feels so good quality I can’t bring myself to write on it yet until I get better with some shortcomings in my technique (I’m still definitely in the practicing newb stage).
I recently came across a thread on the Calligraphy subreddit whilst looking for tips on how to load up your nib with ink in the best way (to avoid dumping too much ink when you come to write), and in amongst people suggesting using brushes, using eye droppers, and dipping up to the eye hole in the nib – a few folk were suggesting sushi fish. And it turns out they work really well!
For anyone unaware, these are the little bottles of soy sauce that comes in the takeaway or food-to-go supermarket ranges of sushi packets. They look like this:
They effectively work the same as an eye dropper. The bottle itself holds a tiny amount. Once you’ve loaded up with a little ink, you squeeze the bottle ever so gently to get a little bulb of ink, then just touch it to the underside of the nib (or under the reservoir if it has one).
Provided your nib is properly prepared (cleaned with a suitable cleaner, or toothpaste, saliva… even a flame if your nib isn’t too delicate), the nib will “grab onto” the bulb of ink and draw it in. You will probably find the nib actually draws more ink away from the bulb from the bottle, and you end up with a slight surplus on the underside of the nib.
Give it a shake or two over your main ink bottle to knock off the excess and you’re good to write straight away!
Quite a few weeks ago, in the middle of the Coronavirus lockdown, I ordered an oblique pen holder to help with copperplate writing. I actually ordered the Speedball holder at the same time, but this particular one I spotted on Amazon so decided to order it as well. The pen I went for was the Hongma Wood Dip Pen. £8.99 from Amazon.
Well, it finally arrived! Given that it was an overseas shipment I can understand it taking so long to be delivered, considering the tough working restrictions some countries have had to work under.
It supports my nib of choice, the Gillott 404, perfectly fine – had to use my microfibre cloth to grip the nib to push it into the flange (to protect the nib from the oil on my skin, and to protect my skin from the fairly sharp edges on the sides of the nib!), but once it got a little bit of give it firmly slotted right into place.
It’s got a satisfying weight in the quartzy-looking bulb section in the middle, which the Speedball lacks, making it quite comfortable to hold and write with for a longer period of time.
Very happy with this purchase!
Copperplate practice from a few weeks ago – Master of Puppets by Metallica
Don’t you just hate smudges! Still, though this one is too good not to post!
So there’s a channel on YouTube that features “bardcore” covers of popular songs – songs re-imagined from times gone by. And there’s a cover of Nirvana’s Smells Like Teen Spirit in classical Latin.
Continue reading “Smells Like Teen Spirit – Classical Latin Lyrics”
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