What are your routines and habits for improving your handwriting?

[askwyatt]

1 hour ago, dms525 said:

There are some great ideas posted in this topic.

 

For the past several years, I have switched from the Palmer-style cursive I learned (sort of) in elementary school to italic as my everyday handwriting. But I also practice foundational, carolingian and various gothic styles. All of these use an italic-type nib. For learning a new style, a nib that writes a line at least 2mm wide is most helpful. It makes errors more obvious.

 

In general, it is useful to have an excellent exemplar in the style you are practicing and to start your learning by trying to duplicate it. With most of these styles, figuring out the appropriate pen angle, x-height in nib widths, letter slope and, in some cases, pen manipulation (changing pen angles in the course of writing a letter) is an important step. Then, you practice critically - write each letter and compare it to your model. Determine how you need to change your writing of it, and do so. Write as slowly as you need to. Your goal at this point is to achieve consistent accuracy in letter formation. Speed will come later, once motor memory for letter formation is established. So, the learning strategy is reflective practice. (My mentor called it "critical practice." i like "reflective" better.)

 

Note that letter and word spacing are also very important. So is page layout. If these are ugly, your page will not be beautiful, no matter how perfect each letter is.

 

For each practice session, a "warm up" period is helpful. This can consist of writing the alphabet, writing letter chains, e.g., anbncndnen ... etc) or repeated basic strokes, e.g., arcades of mmmmmmmmmm or lines of o's. Practicing can be made more interesting by copying a text or pages of words using various  beginning letters, e.g., names of animals or flowers, or pangrams (sentences that use every letter in the alphabet), "the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" being the best known one.

 

Hope these thoughts help.

 

Happy writing!

 

David

All very nice and helpful ideas. I am starting to inch toward some of them. I write by hand a lot during the day and sometimes, most times, my handwriting practice turns into tangential journaling rather than practice. 

[Enkida]

Hmm, to try to improve my handwriting, I do a couple of things:
- write letters (anything goes)
- journals (cursive)
- keep word of the day books (block and typewriter print)
- transcribe a Korean webnovel I've been reading (block print)

My best practice for making my handwriting look better in any situation is to write more slowly.  It's always about going more slowly.

Doing standard calligraphy practices (like writing loops, circles, or the word "minimum" over and over again) also helps, but I just don't have the time for that these days, I usually do my writing in scraps of time I can wrangle in between other things happening, not a solid block of meditative sit down and practice style exercises.

 

I recently got a Pilot Parallel pen so I want to try to start learning blackletter calligraphy, at least in some format, so I can do something cool besides illustrate with these flat nibbed pens.

I'm primarily only interested in improving my handwriting because I like the challenge.  I don't see my written texts as works of art.  My handwriting's not good enough for that XD

 

Seeing my inks being used is the most rewarding part of the process for me.  I keep a plethora of pens inked up at all times and consciously try to write in a rainbow progression, with 2 pages per color.  The visual color effect brings me joy no matter how well or badly I wrote whatever I was working on at that time.

[Distaff]

Currently half way through Michael Sull's book.  I like rote drills.   

 

About three years ago, I learned that young people in American public schools were no longer being taught cursive, and I also cast a judgemental eye on my own messy scrawls passing for "script."  I am always filling up notebooks anyway with ...whatever; it would be nice if I could read the later.  

 

Purchased Spencerian Handwriting (the compiled new format book, not the individual originals), and filled in all the worksheets in there.   I like the line spacing in that book - even looking back, my results were pretty good.   Seyes ruled notebooks are smaller spaced and harder for me to get a good fit, esp. with a fountain pen.   Next book purchase will be the pack of the re-printed originals.   

 

Sull's book has been a good primer, but I much prefer the more old-fashioned style.   Many letters in Palmer just strike me as ugly.   Since I am not writing for business or efficiency, I'd rather practice the prettier option. 

[Inkyways]

 

I do this as a ritual  and it includes some warm up plus practice writing. 

Just like you have to walk and master it  and speed walking before you go to run and then racing!!!!

It is teaching the discipline to grow your muscle memories. 

 

 

[JulieParadise]

8 hours ago, Inkyways said:

 

I do this as a ritual  and it includes some warm up plus practice writing. 

Just like you have to walk and master it  and speed walking before you go to run and then racing!!!!

It is teaching the discipline to grow your muscle memories. 

 

 

 

Thank you for sharing your pics and your thoughts!

 

This reminds me of why I love browsing through artist's sketchbooks so much: There is often way more energy, freedom, beauty and happy trying in the preparational études/studies than in the somewhat stiffer and "perfect" work shown. 

[txomsy]

Practice, practice, practice.

 

I just try not to overdo it and try different hands indifferently.

[Inkyways]

There's no harm in overdoing in writing providing you do it right. For this you should follow  a good foundational/ style that you want to develop.  Any" BAD HABITS " in writing should be avoided and by self critiquing is the way to do it. That is another level of studying  your writing and correct all the difficulties and wrong doing at the beginning. ( Which I am trying to learn now a days. )  

 

Then over do it ( As " Bruce Lee" put it .. If you want to get your kick right do it 1000 or more times ) That applies  to the calligraphy too.

I learnt it from the skilled people. Learn one style master it and don't mix your styles at the same time. You can mix it when you think you get tired and bored  of one style. 

Of course  you can do it your way way but being very careful how you go and see how you do is way important. 

Many calligraphy styles has a base of drills of different alphabet ( group letters ) to write  to get a good flow. What that means is even when you are writing in the different styles you follow the  alphabet as group letters and not following alphabetically. This is to form a similar line strokes to get the right memory in to the hand.  So in this case if you mix all the styles at the same time  which out completing  a good development, your memory mussels  will have certain difficulties get progressing. This is a certain knowledge  that I learnt from somewhere .. And it helps me to get going in a correct way to see how I am doing in writing.

 

"Calligraphy is 80% study and 20% writing practice " 

[Carrau]

While I’m not a calligrapher, improvement in my hand has come with practice, and identifying which letters and sequences of letters I have observed to be difficult in regards to uniformity (i.e., double g’s), spacing, or joining.  Once identified, I will collect words containing these sequences and practice writing those words until I am satisfied with the improvement.  Then they become part of my daily practice.  I’ve also found that writing long words with repetitive letters and sequences helps me develop a steady rhythm while writing [words like manumission, mississippi (sic),  renaissance, reconnaissance]. This is much like the suggestion posed by David (dms525 on page 1) for writing arcades of mmmmmmm or uuuuuuuuuuu, etc., helping with uniformity, spacing , and rhythm.

[txomsy]

21 hours ago, Inkyways said:

 So in this case if you mix all the styles at the same time  which out completing  a good development, your memory mussels  will have certain difficulties get progressing.

 

I agree only partially. I think that it depends on what your goal is.

 

If your goal is mastering calligraphy in a given style, practice should concentrate on that style to avoid undesired contamination.

 

If your goal is improving handwriting, I am of the opposite opinion.

 

First, trying various styles helps identify the "underlying reasoning" for letter shapes and commonalities between hands. One might try to do it sequentially by following the historical development of scripts, matching each successively one by one, but it is (in my opinion) better and faster to just try them simultaneously, for then one -consciously or not- cannot avoid comparing them and eventually seeing the underlying basics and common foundations.

 

Second, trying different hands makes it more amenable, one may take longer to master any one specific hand, but will develop the common basic skills to all of them faster and enjoy it more. Muscle memory also works to your advantage: our brain identifies faster common trends when faced with a larger variety of shapes, so learning "to improve your hand" is much, much faster. Mastering a singly defined specific hand, however, may take longer, as you point out.

 

Third, if the goal was improving handwriting, after seeing quite a few training books from all ages, I've come to the conclusion that almost any style may look beautiful (calligraphic) if performed in the "correct" (calligraphic) way, that is to say, consistency and "beauty" is more important than actual letter shape and can be achieved in many forms. So, in the end one may likely come up with something that may not match any given style but may still look good enough, nice or even beautiful.

 

Fourth, by mixing styles one may pick from each the shapes, trends, ducti, etc. that better match one's personality. Again, one may not end with a canonical script, but will end with something that matches one's esthetic taste, is self-satisfying and, by being so, is more encouraging and learnt faster. Yeah, it might end up being a monster mix, but so were all the "b@st@rd" (mixture) hands that have become national hands in many countries.

 

And after all, if it is "improving your own handwriting", typically you do it for yourself. If it does not match your criteria, you can always continue modifying it until it does (say you do it so others can read it better, your first choices may be wrong, but then you can try others until you get what you are satisfied). That's where the practice, practice, practice (and openness to criticism) comes in.

[Inkyways]

 

 

Calligraphy = beautiful wring.   There is no Lebel as a  CALLIGRAPHER OR A PENMAN or a normal  Scribbler,daily user of a pen on this tropic and 

As this main  tropic start this thread of  conversation.. What are your routines and habits for improving your handwriting?  

As the question put it more open for talking advance consistent cursive writing. So I offered  my knowledge in general without of just  talk of " A GLASS IS HALF FULL OR    HALF EMPTY as a mediocre  view. It is very useful if you line up some fundamentals without  just misleading informations  for the beginners.     

 

Bottom line is there are many resources  of free online teaching for every writing to cater for many needs. They are based on many historical  writing masters and not from the WRITING GURUS WHO CALLED THEMSELVES "Calligraphers ".  And also there are many writing manuals  available as books based on many Penman to learn advanced writing as an art. ( CALLIGRAPHY AND LETTERING)

According to your ambition or passion you can choose your point of progression starting at a beginners level. There's no rocket science we all have started from there. 

And also everyones writing knowledge is a personal journey but the progress depends on how you do it and what you want to do next.

My take is if you want be in an advanced  higher level of lettering  and not to stick to a daily note taker , you have to give more and BE ON  A HABIT OF IMPROVING YOU WRITING.

 

*Learn from others by looking at how they do it.

* Modeling of others and coping and imitating their work ( That's exactly what we do following a base of a writing style)

* Read 80% of calligraphy instructions and study and 20% practice. Apply those study instructions  as much as you could to have faster progress.

* And also join a calligraphy  related forum  if that is your next level ,so it benefit more to meet like minded people.

 

 

[dms525]

Thoughts and reflections on recent entries to this topic:

 

1. Handwriting improvement is not the same as achieving an exemplary calligraphic hand. The criteria for good handwriting are legibility and speed. Perfection of letter forms, spacing and use of space on a page are more the realm of calligraphy. Beautiful handwriting - combining the attributes of both - is admirable and worth striving towards.  

2. If you examine the handwritten correspondence of accomplished calligraphers, you will note obvious differences from their calligraphic work. The skills are the same. The priorities are different.

3. When Lloyd Reynolds was starting the Graphic Arts Workshop at Reed College in the 1950's, he invited Arnold Bank, one of the most highly respected teacher of calligraphy at the time and a professor at Carnegie-Mellon University, out to Portland to consult on development of  a calligraphy instruction program. Reynolds came to calligraphy via an interest in paleography, but, influenced by those advocating italic handwriting in England, adopted that style himself. Bank, however, told him that, to consider yourself a real lettering artist, you should master at least 25 different lettering styles. (It should be noted that Bank was training his students to work in book design, advertising, sign painting, commercial art, etc. rather than fine art calligraphy. He wanted his students to be employable as graphic designers.)

4. When learning a new lettering style, it is highly useful to devote a lot of time to understanding the basic strokes, letter forms, pen angles, typical spacing and other characteristics. When practicing, I think it is useful to have different warm-up exercises for each style. One can have motor memory compartmentalized for multiple hands. Warming up for each in a way that activates its peculiar reflexes is necessary, in my experience.

5. Classical calligraphic hands were taught by writing masters in an extremely prescriptive manner. There was a "right way" to form letters, and all others were "wrong." Present day calligraphy is much more inventive and creative, often sacrificing legibility.  The virtues of this are a matter of taste, for which there is no accounting.

6. While classical calligraphy is judged by adherence to prescribed, ideal models, handwriting is famously unique to each individual. (See No. 2, above)

 

Happy writing!

 

David

[dms525]

And, for your enjoyment: 

 

 

David

[txomsy]

Or, for a different point of view (my translation, so, please note that it may be an inaccurate rendering, tough I think it captures the meaning):

 

A good hand does not help science,
It is but an ornament on paper; 
study is my only goal and nothing else,
as, according to knowledge does youth raise above mortals

 

Umm al-Hassan Bint Abû Ya'Far at-Tanyûti
Poetess, daughter of cadi Abû Ya'Far
Al-Andalus
XII-XIII Century.
 

[inkstainedruth]

On 2/14/2022 at 1:13 PM, askwyatt said:

Sometimes I want to use morning pages to practice . . . but that always ends with me going on some wild tangents.

There are times when I wonder whether someone in the future will see my morning pages journal and wonder if different entries are written by different people (or if I had what is now known as Disassociative Identity Disorder...).  That's how different my handwriting can be on any given day....   But as long as it's semi-legible, I don't worry about it so much (especially if people saw the scrawl my husband calls handwriting...).

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[Penguincollector]

I have ADHD, so every day I make a list of everything, no matter how small, that I have to get done. I pick a hand and go with it for that list, and sometimes for the rest of the day. When I have time to practice, I look up pictures of hands and try them. I just found one of the Spencerian workbooks for $2, so I am working on that. I try to keep 3-4 different types of pens inked, sizes and grinds all different, and different colors. I also take notes on different media that I am consuming, footy games, ballet, how to videos, etc. sometimes, the focus is on speed, sometimes accuracy, other times it’s improvised. Sometimes, I write tiny, with a Japanese EF, sometimes it’s a large hand with a BB. 

[amberleadavis]

 

This week, I started a new thread in the Co-Razy View Forum to see if I could encourage others to copy text too.

 

 

[InesF]

On 3/3/2022 at 10:56 AM, Enkida said:

... consciously try to write in a rainbow progression, with 2 pages per color.  The visual color effect brings me joy no matter how well or badly I wrote whatever I was working on at that time.

👍+1

Black ink does the job. Coloured inks are for double joy, immediately and years after.

[InesF]

On 6/21/2022 at 6:52 PM, dms525 said:

And, for your enjoyment: 

👍+1

Great!

Is it an artefact or do I see two colours in your beautiful lettering?

[dms525]

2 hours ago, InesF said:

👍+1

Great!

Is it an artefact or do I see two colours in your beautiful lettering?

 

I wish my lettering were that perfect, but the quotation was lettered by some one else. I just borrowed it. The text seemed relevant to this discussion.

 

The ink does look like more than one color. The ink(s) used is/are undocumented.

 

David

[Torus34]

About three weeks ago, I realized I hadn't written in cursive script for 70 years. I purchased two fountain pens, one fine and one medium-nibbed, and began. I write two pages each day. As I write, I strive toward legibility. That means forming each letter in the same way each time. It also means making sure that the form of each letter is distinct in itself. As I look at the resulting writing, I decide upon changes and then institute them.

 

I can see distinct progress.

 

My goal: give up emails for personal correspondence and replace them with pen and ink letters on nice stationery.

 

Regards, and happy writing to you.