"Spidery" hand?

[autophile]

Hi all,

 

I've been working on and off on occult books for movie props. One of the fun things I've done is use scans of Old English texts to create a font, and then a program which replicated the statistics of the texts to create an Old English "grimoire" text which has absolutely no meaning, but looks great

 

Anyway, I've heard tell of an "evil, spidery hand". What do you think such a hand would look like? Samples or pointers would be nice

 

Thanks,

 

--Rob

[WillAdams]

The font ITC Blackadder is based on the confession signature which was tortured out of Guy Fawkes and has such an appearance.

 

William

[london]

...

[BillTheEditor]

H.P. Lovecraft's handwriting, done with a dip pen, is often described as "spidery" and his stories are certainly crrreeeepy enough. You can obtain a CD of various retro fonts intended for use in creating props, including one based on Lovecraft's writing, from the fan site cthulhulives.com (click on this link).

Edited December 7, 2006 by BillTheEditor

[RichardS]

If they tortured me, I wonder if I could write as nicely as London's sample ...

[autophile]

Hmm, Blackadder looks nice. I'm familiar with Cthulhulives.org but I don't really find HPL's hand very creepy, even if I do so find his stories! I tend to think evil, spidery handwriting would be long and thin, and perhaps a bit uncontrolled due to the repeated assaults on the writer's sanity from delving too deeply into Things Man Was Not Meant To Know

 

Any ideas? Writing samples?

 

Thanks!

 

--Rob

[Titivillus]

:ltcapd:

Hmm, Blackadder looks nice.  I'm familiar with Cthulhulives.org but I don't really find HPL's hand very creepy, even if I do so find his stories! I tend to think evil, spidery handwriting would be long and thin, and perhaps a bit uncontrolled due to the repeated assaults on the writer's sanity from delving too deeply into Things Man Was Not Meant To Know

 

Any ideas? Writing samples?

 

Thanks!

 

--Rob

I would imagine a spidery writing would be done with the tip of the pen perpindicular to the paper with the minimum of pressure and extends above and below the line greatly.

 

Let me try something with an EF nib and I will post it.

 

 

not promising anything but I do remember some japanese brush script that was called spidery and I can try to emulate it.

 

K

Edited December 8, 2006 by Tytyvyllus

[Patrick Hand]

Just a thought... but check out a book on handwritting analisys.... there's something about how straight the lines are to tell you if someone is lying and that sort of thing.... Maybe you could combine all of the Bad traits and figure out something that would work.....

[BillTheEditor]

Other writers said to have had "spidery" handwriting include Samuel Beckett and James Joyce. These might serve as good models for what you have in mind. I haven't been able to locate samples on the Web, but then it's your problem, not mine. *

 

In addition, if you can collect samples of handwriting from individuals who have had a stroke, or from individuals with Parkinson's or Alzheimer's, you may also find useful models. I mean no disrespect for the people who have these terrible conditions. However, all three conditions can result in unusual handwriting. Perhaps you could make an appropriate donation to an appropriate research or support organization, in the names of the contributors.

 

* Oh, what the hell. Here's a handwritten page from a notebook by Beckett:

 

http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/exhibitions/online/beckett/career/images/365b.jpg

 

And here's a few words by Mr. Joyce from a letter:

 

http://www.uwm.edu/Library/special/exhibit...es/joy0308a.jpg

 

You know, I really need to get a life ...

Edited December 9, 2006 by BillTheEditor

[Patrick Hand]

You know, I really need to get a life ...

I heard they sell them on E-Bay.....

 

 

Sorry.... back to the topic.......

[BillTheEditor]

You know, I really need to get a life ...

I heard they sell them on E-Bay.....

 

 

Sorry.... back to the topic.......

Yeah, I tried that. Lost to a snipe bid.

 

Back to topic ...

 

Try Fonts.com for the following fonts:

 

Bosin

Funboy

Hemingway's Shotgun *

Madness Family

Sisterhand (light or regular)

 

*not really that creepy, other than the name. I'd go with Funboy or Madness Family

[kissing]

I always thought our fellow member, umenohana's writing samples were spidery-ish with her super-fine flex nibs and her light writing hand

 

Evil? Maybe if she wrote a bit more unevenly and messy, it'll look evil ?

 

For example: If this piece of Spencerian writing was to look more angular and sharp at the corners, would we not have 'evil spidery writing' ?

 

Edited December 9, 2006 by kissing

[umenohana]

I always thought Blackletter looked sort of evil. Maybe if the hairlines(?) were more exaggerated, it could be classified as being "spidery."

 

-Hana

[J. John Harvey]

OOH, the signature of W.J. Harvey has my last name in it!!! I wish I could write as fine...

[BillTheEditor]

I always thought Blackletter looked sort of evil.

I don't suppose you read the text you posted -- not a great example of "evil. Even with exaggerated hairlines. "

[umenohana]

I always thought Blackletter looked sort of evil.

I don't suppose you read the text you posted -- not a great example of "evil. Even with exaggerated hairlines. "

No, I didn't. I just put up the first thing I saw.

 

-Hana

 

P.S. Here, is this evil enough? :ph34r:

Edited December 11, 2006 by umenohana

[lefty928]

First I thought of a very fine-lined, wavery handwriting, then I thought of horror film credit fonts (maybe the kind that looks like dripping blood ) -- anyway, found this Web site and had way too much fun looking at display type:

 

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/typo5/chato-band/regular/

 

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/canadatype/mascara/

 

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/canadatype/heathen/

 

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/itc/stranger/

 

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/btn/dark-half-btn/

 

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/scriptorium/black-cow/

 

http://www.myfonts.com/fonts/brassfonts/paul-d/

[BillTheEditor]

I always thought Blackletter looked sort of evil.

I don't suppose you read the text you posted -- not a great example of "evil. Even with exaggerated hairlines. "

No, I didn't. I just put up the first thing I saw.

 

-Hana

 

P.S. Here, is this evil enough? :ph34r:

My German isn't all that good, but yeah, that drawing of a Mont Blanc focus group would certainly qualify.

 

:ltcapd: :roflmho:

 

(Ow!)

(Ducking rocks and sharp sticks hurled by outraged MBistas, and running away very very fast ...)

Edited December 11, 2006 by BillTheEditor

[kissing]

It just occured to me that it depends on what kind of spider we're imagining when we think of 'spidery writing'

 

Personally, I was imagining daddy long legs (which I occasionally see crawling up my walls )

 

http://www.geocities.com/brisbane_weavers/images/wpe56.jpg

 

Perhaps other people had other spiders in their mind? (Red-back/Black Widow? Tarantula? )