Delighted to Teach Lettering
Topic: Bible Journaling
It was my turn to teach a new font in the Lettering Lodge this week. I found one online that was only a lower-case and started the week with that. On Thursday, I realized how much an upper-case was needed so I developed my own and shared it with the group. They got it just in time to use in their Bibles for the Friday assignment, but I'll share it here in the correct place for learning.
Here is the lesson plan:
MONDAY - With a lighthearted font we are going to focus this week on the word ‘delight’.
Use a pencil to practice these letters. First make note of that bubble in the upper right for an important clue to the basic letter structure. You can see my first word attempt is not too great! It’s best if you use the lower (inked) examples as your guide. It also took me several tries to get my letters to stand up straight (a common problem for me).
On my second attempt I made the posts thicker. Also, see the note on that line on how the bottom loops drop below the base line.
On the third example you can see I had a lot of trouble with the letter ‘g’. This is why we work in pencil first!
When you get an example of the word as you like it, trace it in ink. Then erase the pencil. And, finally, color the letters (if you choose).
TUESDAY -For Tuesday’s lesson we are going to tackle the full alphabet. Before beginning, you’ll want to pencil in guidelines all the way down your page. Use the guide at the upper left of the illustration for the spacing of the ascender, x-height, base and descender lines.
Remember, as you draw your font, work in pencil first. Then ink letters. I did not erase my pencil so you could see that I am STILL having problems with that letter ‘g’! What letter is hard for you?
Don't forget to erase your pencil after inking.
I designed an upper-case for this font as well.
WEDNESDAY - Today, you’ll practice letter spacing by writing out some words you associate with the word ‘delight’.
I used four lines for my words and then used one whole line writing that troublesome ‘g’ over and over. I think I finally got the hang of it! Try this with your hard letters: leave the mistakes, move over and do it over, making adjustments. Try to make three good ones in a row. You might end up with a whole page of these practices if you have more than a couple of 'problem child' letters!
I think my favorite letter is the ‘e’ although that ‘a’ kinda makes me happy, too.
Ink your words, erase the pencil and show us your work. (You don’t need to show all your boo-boos like I did, if you’d rather not!)
THURSDAY - Now that we’ve all whipped these letters into shape, we’ll be working on plain paper or in your workbook or journal, and using the new font to write a scripture with ‘delight’ in it.
Whenever I read this scripture, I am always reminded of a pastor telling us that the ‘desires of your heart’ will be in keeping with the will of God if you are truly taking your delight in the Lord. This scripture is not telling us that if we pray we will get everything we want!
After inking and erasing the pencil, have some fun coloring and decorating your piece. I put a little loop in the top of my hearts in keeping with the lettering style.
FRIDAY - Today we take the ‘delight’ font to our Bible.
Choose a scripture with the focus word and use the new lettering to journal in your Bible. I wrote the whole scripture with it, but you could certainly use it for only some of the lettering and mix in other styles for other words. If you do this, keep in mind that a rather plain san-serif font will go best with this very ‘frilly’ one.
I used a finer pen for this lettering than in my practices and it changed the readability of the ‘m’ and ‘n’ letters. After I photographed this, I went back with a thicker pen and traced over the angled lines in those two letters throughout the page.
I wish I’d had an upper-case for the leading ‘I’ and for the ‘G’ in god. On Thursday (long after this page was completed) I went ahead and developed a full upper-case for this font. You’ll have the advantage of having that available when you do your Bible page. (See entry for Tuesday, above)
Note: I used gold gel pen on my page and, though I really like it in person, it has confused my camera a bit.
So that's it for another week of lettering lessons.
Ddd
Posted by studio3d@ccgmail.net
at 10:43 AM PST