Topic: Bible Journaling
It really frustrates me that I can only apply ONE topic to blog entries. If I had my way, I would tag this one 'Bible Journaling', 'Lettering' and 'Tutorials' because it is really all three. I had to choose what I might want people to search for in order to find it.
This week I have been the Guest Host on the Creative Bible Journaling Facebook group in their Lettering Lodge. This is the same place I have been getting my Bible lettering inspiration from lately.
The font I am teaching is the new one I designed a few weeks ago. As soon as this is posted, I will go back and delete the original entry as the samples for it were poorly executed and the photography was bad, as well.
So here goes:
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DAY 1 - Good Morning! I'm your Guest Host in the Lettering Lodge this week.
We're going to be working on a new font I named 'Gather Round' because it is ALL about the circles! And the word we will focus on this week is 'Trust'.
This font takes some prep work to make sure the letter shapes are correct and consistent.
First, you will establish your letter height with penciled lines – one for the base and one for the top. Then add a dashed ascender line half a letter space above the top, a dashed descender line half a space below the base and a midline in the center. You will have a total of five lines.
Practice making perfectly round circles in pencil between the base and top lines. For this step, draw lightly and circle loosely, round and round until the shape takes form. Make whole rows of them. This is a crucial step because EVERY LETTER in this alphabet is traced in-part on the outline of that circle.
When you’ve got a good row of 5 circles, go back with pencil and trace the parts of the circle that form the lowercase letters. Add extension lines as needed to complete the form.
NOTE: the uppercase letters are all based on two circles stacked on top of one another.
Trace your formed letters in ink and then erase all your guidelines, circles and penciled letters.
Here is a step-by-step sample sheet:
DAY 2 - Today we are going to learn the letter shapes for both the lowercase and uppercase alphabets in the font we started yesterday. The guide pages attached show the step-by-step with letters that share the same characteristics grouped together (o through q, c and e, r though m, etc)
Note that some letters use TWO circles. These may be side by side or they may be stacked and overlapped.
When you have completed the sheet, erase all the pencil lines FOR THE LAST, FULLY FORMED LETTER ONLY.
This first picture is the instruction sheet for lowercase.
If you want to print practice sheets they are available in PDF form at http://mystudio3d.com/practicesheets.pdf
Now you can go on to the uppercase letters. Note that every letter is based on TWO stacked circles. Again, some letters will be double-wide as well.
The guide page attached shows the step-by-step, grouping the letters that share the same characteristics. Since these are different in the uppercase than in the lowercase the letter order is different here than on the last sheet.
When you have completed the sheet, erase all the pencil lines FOR THE LAST, FULLY FORMED LETTER ONLY.
Again, if you want to print practice sheets they are available in PDF form at http://mystudio3d.com/practicesheets.pdf (all the sheets are combined there so printing one set will give you all the pages you need)
Now you should prepare a new practice sheet and draw all your alphabet in the correct order by referring to your instruction pages for correct letter forms.
Leave the first set of guide circles in place for reference but, when you have completed the sheet, erase all the pencil lines FOR THE LAST, FULLY FORMED SET OF LETTERS ONLY.
There is a sheet for this in the practice pages as well at http://mystudio3d.com/practicesheets.pdf
DAY 3 - Lettering lessons so far have been kind of regimented so now we are going to play!
First, let’s practice making banners to contain words or phrases. There is a great set of banner lessons at https://www.thepigeonletters.com/single-post/2016/08/11/6-Step-by-Step-Banners
Then we’ll practice overlapping your letters slightly. This comes in handy when a l-o-n-g word must fit in a smaller space. There are hints for this in the notes on the page.
Finally, play with Drop Caps. In our case, the letter height of the capitol letter stays the same but the descender line becomes the base for it.
DAY 4 - Next, your assignment is to write a scripture with the word ‘trust’ using the new font and some play-day features. We’re using paper or a journal page for this exercise. We’ll be in the Bible tomorrow.
I worked on scrapbook paper with Jeremiah 17:7 (NIV) – “But blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him.”
(Do you know, this font was a gift of God just a few weeks ago. As I sat listening to the choir one Sunday, some of the forms came to me and I turned to the back of my notebook and just wrote out the whole lowercase alphabet. Then I actually took my sermon notes with it – not as fast as my usual scribbled notes but I got down all the key phrases!)
DAY 5 - The final homework is to work in your Bible on a ‘trust’ scripture using the new font.
The reference I used is Proverbs 3:5 (NIV) – “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.”
From the ‘play day’ lesson, I used the space-saving overlapping letters as well as banners. I also practiced colored pencil blending. I have been using the cross in my illustrations in the Old Testament a lot lately. After all, the whole of scripture is pointing toward Christ so that really makes me want to tie it all together in my ‘word pictures’.
***It was a privilege to prepare lessons for the Lettering Lodge this week. All those who played along did a wonderful job. God bless you all!***
Ddd