What Does Your Handwriting Look Like

[dms525]

 

Someone's been visiting James Pickering's website I see! I really am a fan of his, and have been trying to put some of his teachings to use myself. Cheers!

 

 

If it is I to whom you are referring, yes. I have visiting JP's site many times, but my italic hand is based on Lloyd Reynolds' not Cataneo's. My Humanist Bookhand is a mishmash of Johnston's Foundational Hand and Poggio Bracciolini's book hand.

 

That said, I do share your admiration for Pickering's site and both his italic and book hand writing.

 

David

[cellmatrix]

 

 

If it is I to whom you are referring, yes. I have visiting JP's site many times, but my italic hand is based on Lloyd Reynolds' not Cataneo's. My Humanist Bookhand is a mishmash of Johnston's Foundational Hand and Poggio Bracciolini's book hand.

 

That said, I do share your admiration for Pickering's site and both his italic and book hand writing.

 

David

Hi David, I do suppose it is a bit odd for me to adopt such a familiar tone to someone whom I have not formally introduced myself to. At any rate, I have read your posts over the last couple years, where you described your classes at Reed College with Lloyd Reynolds (whom I think inspired Steve Jobs in calligraphy too if I am not mistaken) as well as the fact that you are a retired physician in the central valley.

 

I myself studied in Portland over at OHSU during my residency training, and actually did my internship at Valley Med Center in Fresno. I guess throughout this all, being a fellow physician who has practiced in the central valley, a fellow Portland-ite, and my interest in italic writing, in all of these things we have in common, perhaps that prompted by familiar tone. So let me just say its nice to make your long overdue acquiantence here at FPN.

 

At any rate, I noticed from his website that James Pickering is a fan of red and black italic writing, and of bookhand, so in your post I thought I saw some type of connection there.

 

As for my background, I started learning italic with the help of fellow Portlandites Getty and Dubay (not personally but through their books) and more recently was lucky enough to acquire "An italic copybook: the Cataneo Manuscript by Stephen Harvard" which I've been studying off and on since last year (I link a photo of my copy of the book as well as my attempts at italic below - taken from a post I made elsewhere on this forum). This book, along with Pickering's excellent site are now my main tools in learning italic.

 

I do envy your direct learning experience with Lloyd Reynolds and your broad appreciation of italic that you have obviously acquired, but I have resolved that my ambitions in this area are going to have to be more focused, in just learning one area of italic, this Cataneo style of chancery italic.

 

I still have a ways to go even in this more focused area, but I enjoy learning it and also enjoy seeing the examples that you and the other folks here have to show. Cheers! and I look forward to future interactions.

 

 

Edited January 27, 2016 by cellmatrix

[AAAndrew]

[tartuffo]

I don't mind at all.

 

Would you mind being more specific, if you can, about what it is about my handwriting that looks better to you?

 

David

 

Okay, here goes.

 

I think your handwriting can be very pleasing to the eye but as a whole it suffers when you

choose to write without guidelines or perhaps just decide to pay less attention to layout.

 

Here's four examples. The handwriting is all very nice but I think the two examples on the

right look much better and are much easier to read ...

 

http://i.imgur.com/uqWK0eQ.jpg

 

I too am trying to re-learn how to write italic .

 

I can't write a straight line no matter how hard I try, so I use guidelines( usually under the paper )

and always attempt to present things on the page with some sort of balance.

 

I'm attaching the picture below not because I think it's any better but

more because if I'm gonna dare to criticize others maybe I should stick my neck out too !

 

http://i.imgur.com/JqreD8R.jpg

[Inky.Fingers]

[dms525]

Hi David, I do suppose it is a bit odd for me to adopt such a familiar tone to someone whom I have not formally introduced myself to. At any rate, I have read your posts over the last couple years, where you described your classes at Reed College with Lloyd Reynolds (whom I think inspired Steve Jobs in calligraphy too if I am not mistaken) as well as the fact that you are a retired physician in the central valley.

 

I myself studied in Portland over at OHSU during my residency training, and actually did my internship at Valley Med Center in Fresno. I guess throughout this all, being a fellow physician who has practiced in the central valley, a fellow Portland-ite, and my interest in italic writing, in all of these things we have in common, perhaps that prompted by familiar tone. So let me just say its nice to make your long overdue acquiantence here at FPN.

 

At any rate, I noticed from his website that James Pickering is a fan of red and black italic writing, and of bookhand, so in your post I thought I saw some type of connection there.

 

As for my background, I started learning italic with the help of fellow Portlandites Getty and Dubay (not personally but through their books) and more recently was lucky enough to acquire "An italic copybook: the Cataneo Manuscript by Stephen Harvard" which I've been studying off and on since last year (I link a photo of my copy of the book as well as my attempts at italic below - taken from a post I made elsewhere on this forum). This book, along with Pickering's excellent site are now my main tools in learning italic.

 

I do envy your direct learning experience with Lloyd Reynolds and your broad appreciation of italic that you have obviously acquired, but I have resolved that my ambitions in this area are going to have to be more focused, in just learning one area of italic, this Cataneo style of chancery italic.

 

I still have a ways to go even in this more focused area, but I enjoy learning it and also enjoy seeing the examples that you and the other folks here have to show. Cheers! and I look forward to future interactions.

 

 

 

 

 

It's a small world, for sure!

 

To clarify: I did not take Reynolds' calligraphy classes, but italic calligraphy was ubiquitous on campus when I attended Reed College. My handwriting was never very good, and, at the time, I had little confidence that a calligraphy class would be anything but humiliating. Besides, I was majoring in Sociology and also taking pre-med courses. I had room for exactly one truly elective class in 4 years. I took Reynolds' Art History course my senior year. In my freshman year, I did buy Reynolds' workbook and an Osmiroid pen, and I learned italic from the workbook. I stopped using italic handwriting when I started med school; it wasn't fast enough. I resumed studying calligraphy just about 4 years ago.

 

Reynolds' started the calligraphy program at Reed, but he retired in 1975. He got Fr. Robert Palladino to continue the program, and it was Palladino, rather than Reynolds, who inspired Steve Jobs.

 

FYI, Palladino was apparently quite aware of Cataneo, and I have an exemplar of Palladino's interpretation of Cataneo's alphabet. It is copyrighted, but I am trying to get Fr. Palladino's permission to post it and some of his other instructional materials from the 1980's on FPN. (He is currently in his late 70's or early 80's, I think, and is a parish priest in a Portland suburb.)

 

Happy writing!

David

[Cryptos]

This one's handwriting currently resembles the trail of water that falls from one's body and patters on the tiles after climbing out of the tub and blindly groping around the bathroom for several minutes in search of a towel.

[HalloweenHJB]

Another installment in my series of copying out texts in Dutch for fun and amusement. Here, a portion of one of Baron van Munchhausen's adventures...

 

Using a nice Waterman #3 Steel Quartz, with de Atramentis Copper Brown ink:

 

 

Ik vind de inkt een goede match, vinden jullie niet?

[AAAndrew]

Another installment in my series of copying out texts in Dutch for fun and amusement. Here, a portion of one of Baron van Munchhausen's adventures...

 

Using a nice Waterman #3 Steel Quartz, with de Atramentis Copper Brown ink:

 

...

 

Ik vind de inkt een goede match, vinden jullie niet?

 

Scary fun. But that's appropriate for HalloweenHJB, no?

 

Did you notice the holder I was using? Were you in Indianapolis when Merchant's Bank was still around? The guy I bought it from was in Washington state. Crazy.

 

Love your dutch homework.

[AAAndrew]

This one's handwriting currently resembles the trail of water that falls from one's body and patters on the tiles after climbing out of the tub and blindly groping around the bathroom for several minutes in search of a towel.

 

Ah, so Daoist handwriting. Zhuangzi would appreciate it. Li Bo probably wrote a poem about it when he was drunk.

[HalloweenHJB]

 

Scary fun. But that's appropriate for HalloweenHJB, no?

 

Did you notice the holder I was using? Were you in Indianapolis when Merchant's Bank was still around?

 

 

I think there was a Merchant's when I first came to Indy in the early 1990s. That holder is waaaay cool.

[cellmatrix]

 

 

It's a small world, for sure!

 

To clarify: I did not take Reynolds' calligraphy classes, but italic calligraphy was ubiquitous on campus when I attended Reed College. My handwriting was never very good, and, at the time, I had little confidence that a calligraphy class would be anything but humiliating. Besides, I was majoring in Sociology and also taking pre-med courses. I had room for exactly one truly elective class in 4 years. I took Reynolds' Art History course my senior year. In my freshman year, I did buy Reynolds' workbook and an Osmiroid pen, and I learned italic from the workbook. I stopped using italic handwriting when I started med school; it wasn't fast enough. I resumed studying calligraphy just about 4 years ago.

 

Reynolds' started the calligraphy program at Reed, but he retired in 1975. He got Fr. Robert Palladino to continue the program, and it was Palladino, rather than Reynolds, who inspired Steve Jobs.

 

FYI, Palladino was apparently quite aware of Cataneo, and I have an exemplar of Palladino's interpretation of Cataneo's alphabet. It is copyrighted, but I am trying to get Fr. Palladino's permission to post it and some of his other instructional materials from the 1980's on FPN. (He is currently in his late 70's or early 80's, I think, and is a parish priest in a Portland suburb.)

 

Happy writing!

David

 

thanks for the info David. Thats interesting about Palladino inspiring Steve Jobs. If you could get the permission to post his interpretation of Cataneo, that would be awesome!

Edited January 28, 2016 by cellmatrix

[LizB]

Handwriting, looking pretty normal. It changes a bit depending on the pen/nib (and my mood as well). I've tried to get it to lean over a bit more, but it always seems to pop straight again. (OK, this is my first attempt at a post with an image. There must be an easier way?)

 

 

 

[AAAndrew]

Hey, LizB

 

Very nice writing! good consistency (within the parameters of your style), nice spacing, and the nib and ink really lend it a nice flair.

 

And the recipe sounds good too.

[sakayume]

I've been admiring the lovely examples of handwriting in this thread. Here's my usual writing. It's pretty much what I was taught in school, though I've substituted some of the letters.

 

[HalloweenHJB]

That's quite a difference! Amazing. Beautiful and stylish in both samples. Show us more!

[LizB]

Is it common to struggle with inconsistency with particular letters? When I concentrate on my handwriting and try to angle it, I am unhappy with t, s, and b generally. They are not at all consistent.

 

 

[Mercian]

This one's handwriting currently resembles the trail of water that falls from one's body and patters on the tiles after climbing out of the tub and blindly groping around the bathroom for several minutes in search of a towel.

 

My own varies lamentably - between ‘that twelve year old ought to make more effort to make his handwriting legible’ and ‘he will be detained in a Secure Hospital in the interests of his own health and safety, and with a view to the protection of others’

 

I have bought a copy of the Getty-Dubay self-help guide to the creation of legible cursive, but I must admit that I am yet to knuckle-down to actually using it

Edited January 29, 2016 by Mercian

[AAAndrew]

[AAAndrew]

Is it common to struggle with inconsistency with particular letters? When I concentrate on my handwriting and try to angle it, I am unhappy with t, s, and b generally. They are not at all consistent.

 

 

 

 

Ah, but what a pivotal moment you have written out there on that page! Every time I encounter that scene, I try and imagine the shock and surprise at such close physical contact between two young people at that time. It must have made quite an impact, especially considering his "manly beauty" and good address. Alas for Colonel Brandon that it was not he out hunting on that rainy afternoon.

 

Your handwriting is clear, well-spaced, legible and yet with a pleasing individuality to it. Nicely done. I still struggle with spacing and legibility. I am more like Bingley in that the rapidity of my thoughts clouds the legibility of my writing. Or something.