Lining Blank Pages

[AncientScribe]

I recently bought a journal to write in that has unlined pages and wish to add lines myself. Was just wondering if anyone has any tips for doing this. I would prefer fairly thin lines. Also, the pages are too thick to trace anything through.

[CharlieTurtle]

Trace them? Draw heavily over the lines on some lined paper and then lay that paper, pencil-side down, on the journal, and rub hard. You can then go over these very faint lines.

[AncientScribe]

Thanks Charlie, that's a good plan. This notebook has 200+ pages in it and I am hoping to find a way to make some sort of stencil or something else that will make it easy to line full pages without too much time and effort. I will probably end up using your method until I find a better method for a large number of pages.

[wallylynn]

A long time ago, I had a ruler with wheels. draw one line, roll, draw, roll...

[CharlieTurtle]

If you have a craft knife or something similar, you cut lay a lined piece of paper over your cardboard, cut lines, then like... fill in...

 

200 pages will take you a while!

[AncientScribe]

haha yes it will! I might try and make some sort of template with a plastic sheet, in the same manner as your cardboard idea.

[aenjin]

You could look for plastic or metal lettering/letter writing guides (basically rectangular stencils). The spaces are usually big, but you can go down the journal page once to make lines, then move the guide down by a step and go down the page again.

 

This doesn't fit your criteria so I only mention it to be a completionist, Ames lettering guide + a T-square/ruler could be an option. It'd be time consuming and you need practice to use it (there are tutorials and videos online if you do a search). But on the plus side the Ames guide is infinitely adjustable.

[requiescat]

I don't know if your journal lies flat, but could you have a rubber stamp made with lines that you could then stamp down? You'd probably have to hand-ink the stamp unless you have a super-large stamping pad, but it might be worth a shot.

[Gloucesterman]

The template idea sounds good. It's what I do when I do calligraphy on wedding invitation envelopes. It works well and I have to make sure that the lines are parallel to the envelope edges, otherwise they appear crooked which is not a good thing when people are paying you for your work :-)

-S-

[Luma]

If you have a page from a journal with lines or squares that is relatively the same size, you can put it behind the page and write using the the extra page as a reference. This will allow you to write straight but save you the effort of drawing multiple lines on multiple pages

[Gloucesterman]

Luma, that's a simple & great solution. If the lines are difficult to see though the writing page, you can go ovr them with a black felt tip or such to make them more visible.

 

Just think how cool and impressive it would look to have a journal without printed lines in which all/most of your writing was straight across and parallel to the edges. :thumbup: :thumbup:

Edited May 16, 2013 by brgmarketing

[AncientScribe]

Great idea, that would look great in the journal, straight lines without page lines and most important, no countless hours of line drawing!

[TomJKT]

Nanamipen offers a pdf file to print out lines and grids (6, 7, 8mm).

[Elizabeth in NJ]

I use the lined-paper-behind-the-blank-paper sometimes.

 

Instead of using an existing bit of lined paper, I make lined paper in MSWord. That way I can adjust the spacing of the lines to whatever I want and also make the lines thick so they're easy to see through the paper on top.

[N2theBreach]

Hmmmm.... If you drew your behind-the-page-guidelines on a piece of blotter paper, when you are done writing, you could pull it from behind the page, lay it on the front over the newly-written words and close the book. Would keep the fresh ink from marking up the opposite page.