After spending months as Baronial Champion practicing reproductions and delving into more creative projects, I decided it was finally time to try something I had been dreading - calligraphy. Thanks to a "first attempt" A&S competition at Harvest Days 2014, I was able to force myself to sit down and give it a try. My ultimate goal with practicing miniatures and illumination was to be able to produce award scrolls for my Barony and my Kingdom. That meant that I needed to learn some alphabets, and I decided to start with Gothic/Blackletter. I'll let my documentation speak for itself this time, but this was such a fun project! You can scroll through some of my progression pictures in the slideshow below.
Click here for the documentation for my first attempt at calligraphy.
Lessons I learned - I need help with spacing. I need to spend more time with my actual layout to make sure there is enough space around the edges for framing, and I want my letters and lines to be closer and more evenly spaced. Also, calligraphy takes lots of practice. I spent about 4-6 hours over the span of two days just practicing the letter-forms. Then I did the calligraphy for my project. Overall, I was pleased with the design and outcome. I was happy to have a good practice piece that also happened to have special meaning for the recipient.
Click here for the documentation for my first attempt at calligraphy.
Lessons I learned - I need help with spacing. I need to spend more time with my actual layout to make sure there is enough space around the edges for framing, and I want my letters and lines to be closer and more evenly spaced. Also, calligraphy takes lots of practice. I spent about 4-6 hours over the span of two days just practicing the letter-forms. Then I did the calligraphy for my project. Overall, I was pleased with the design and outcome. I was happy to have a good practice piece that also happened to have special meaning for the recipient.