Avvatar's handwriting adventure

[Avvatar]

Hello. My name is Eli and I have decided to improve my penmanship. I will use this space to chronicle my journey.

First, I'd like to say that I've never attempted penmanship improvement. In fact, I was nearly held back in second grade because I didn't learn cursive. I considered it unnecessary. I still do, but would like to improve for the sake of self improvement. My handwriting currently is legible but not cursive. I VERY rarely use cursive.

I spent years in the US Air Force as an aircraft maintainer. As such, I developed a fast but rather sloppy penmanship and a signature that (according to my real estate agent) could not be used on legal documents. [emoji23]

I restored a four rain pen a number of years ago, but never really learned the art of it. I've decided that I'd like to start using a fountain pen. I consider it mandatory to do my best to "earn" a nice pen by improving my handwriting.

This is my record of events. I ask that you give feedback or any helpful tips you might have.

 

[Avvatar]

I bought a Jinhao X450 and a knockoff Lamy Safari. I also bought a vintage pen/pencil combo thing, that that's just for SnG. I haven't received either, so I can't REALLY begin. In the mean time, I'm going to document a few things that might come in handy to anyone else who follows along.

I've been looking at iampeth.com and a few other sites for practice/instruction. Any recommendations or regiments you find helpful?

Paper. I don't want to open this can of worms, but I feel it necessary to raise the question. Is regular old copy paper good enough for practice? I don't need anything terribly fancy for that, do I? I know that certain papers react or handle fountain pens better than others, but for simple practice sheets for the beginner, copy paper is okeedokee, yes?

Ink. I've got some black, but I think I'll be switching to red for practice. Again, this is a non issue for now, but that's the idea. Thoughts?

I'll be working tonight, so I'll post up some pictures of my current handwriting/signature when I get a spare minute.

Anyhow, I hope that having this will encourage me to keep up on the practice and self-improvement. Feel free to offer me any advice you might have for a complete noob. I'm not easily insulted, so give honest and direct feedback, please! I'm looking forward to the adventure!

 

[Jut]

I look forward to following your journey!

Sent from my SM-N975U using Tapatalk

 

[Avvatar]

Day 1:
One thing I'd like to do is keep track of how long this is actually taking me. Not down to the hours, but a general note of how long it's taken me to improve by "x" amount. I'll also keep track of expeses. This could be hazardous, but I'll try to keep it to "necessary" purchases and annotate "frivolous" expenditure. Not that ANY of this is NECESSARY...

SO!

On the way to work I stopped by Walmart and bought two red Pilot G2 0.7 "fine" tipped gel ink pens for intermediate practice. I also purchased a college ruled el-cheapo notepad. I bought the G2 2 pack because, well, I like the G2 and I figured I'd lose one. Shrug. I got red because it seems to be recommended and why not have some dedicated practice stuff. I could have just grabbed a cheap ballpoint u had lying around, but I'm trying to make this an actual HOBBY. So there's my explanation, not that you needed that.

Pens: $3
Paper: $1
Total: $4

I will also throw in the cost of the two fountain pens. I got a deal from ali xpress and spent $2 on BOTH.

Total spent: $6

 

[ajkel64]

Subscribed Eli. Looking forward to sharing your journey with you.

 

[Avvatar]

Right off the bat, I've noticed that the way I'm holding a pen is incorrect. Perhaps not "incorrect", but "not advised". I'm holding my pen like this:


Instead of holding with 1 finger and thumb, resting on middle and ring/pinky trailing (leading?) On the paper, I'm holding with 2, resting on the tip of my ring, and trailing with the side of my pinky. It's served me well so far! Time to break a habit, I suppose. Also, you can see a sample of my current handwring. Both print and cursive. It took me considerably more time to write in cursive as I had to think of how to form the letters correctly.

 

[r0ckrat]

Excellent. It is not "the wrong grip", it just depends on how strict your original teacher was on encouraging the tripod or modified tripod (your) grip.

The G-series are nice gel rollers.

For ideas on furthering your practice, check out "#rockyourhandwriting" - there are daily "challenges" that change each month, some of them are "drills" and some are just things to write about. And an excellent way to become depressed about your own handwriting (some of the samples people post are ridiculously beautiful...)

 

[Whilliam]

Right off the bat, I've noticed that the way I'm holding a pen is incorrect. Perhaps not "incorrect", but "not advised". I'm holding my pen like this:


Instead of holding with 1 finger and thumb, resting on middle and ring/pinky trailing (leading?) On the paper, I'm holding with 2, resting on the tip of my ring, and trailing with the side of my pinky. It's served me well so far! Time to break a habit, I suppose. Also, you can see a sample of my current handwring. Both print and cursive. It took me considerably more time to write in cursive as I had to think of how to form the letters correctly.

Interesting. I have a friend who holds his pen equally "incorrectly." His handwriting is astonishingly graceful and legible.

 

[Avvatar]

Interesting. I have a friend who holds his pen equally "incorrectly." His handwriting is astonishingly graceful and legible.

I'm new, so take what I say with a grain of salt, but:

It would seem to me that (unless you're subscribing STRICTLY to the Spencerian method) this particular "incorrect" grip would NOT affect anything. Instead of leading on two fingers (ring and pinky) you simply lead on the pinky. This might result in less tactile feedback, but that wouldn't change the outcome to any noticable extent.
Again, this is sort of Greek to me, so I could be laughably wrong.

HOWEVER!

In MY case, I also have the habits of dragging the side of my hand on the paper, resting my wrist on the paper, placing the paper improperly, and in general making a mockery of anyone who has ever written gracefully EVER.

I figure that if I'm going to be fixing issues, I might as well fix issues. Start from square one and really train myself properly. I guess it's just a personal decision to attempt to "correct" my grip since I'm already having to retrain my hand placement. Sort of a "might as well" thing.

 

[Whilliam]

I figure that if I'm going to be fixing issues, I might as well fix issues. Start from square one and really train myself properly. I guess it's just a personal decision to attempt to "correct" my grip since I'm already having to retrain my hand placement. Sort of a "might as well" thing.

Wise thinking.

 

[Heckle]

I started off with either a Jinhao x450 or x750, can't remember. I like the larger and heavier pens. As for starting out, just look around the interwebs for a cursive alphabet and print it out as a reference. When I first started to pick this up again, I used a program that was designed for kids (forgot the name right now but I can look around for it). I will also post a few links later in this post.

Paper. If you are just practicing, I would not get hung up too much on paper. I practiced on regular printer paper. I printed off some pages from Lined Paper - https://www.printablepaper.net/category/lined and just started writing. Once you get betetr and are happy with your progress, than you can start getting into different types of "fp friendly" paper, which is a different rabbit hole in itself!

Here are some links to start you off.

https://eps.schoolspecialty.com/EPS/media/ProductImages/Cursive-Instructions.pdf?ext=.pdf

Cursive Writing

Free cursive writing printable activity worksheets.

www.kidzone.ws

Cursive Writing Worksheets | K5 Learning

Free Printable Cursive Writing Worksheets - cursive alphabet, cursive letters, cursive words, cursive sentences. Practice your penmanship with these handwriting worksheets from K5 Learning

www.k5learning.com

Make Beautiful Cursive Handwriting Worksheets

Make beautiful cursive handwriting worksheets in seconds! Type letters - words - student name - sentences or paragraph and watch a cursive writing worksheet appear using traceable dotted letters. Unlike others - our letters connect perfectly!

www.handwritingworksheets.com

Cursive Handwriting Series - KET Education

These 22 videos cover cursive handwriting for lowercase letters, capital letters, numbers, days of the week, and months.

www.ket.org

 

[Heckle]

Found my post from a couple years ago. The first link is one that I printed out and went through.


http://www.k12reader.com/handwriting/cursive_practice_a_z.pdf
http://shared.confessionsofahomeschooler.com/writing/CursiveHandwriting.pdf
http://www.tlsbooks.com/pdf/cursivepractice.pdf
Improve Your Cursive Worksheet Set – The Postman's Knock - https://thepostmansknock.com/catalog/improve-cursive-worksheet-set/

 

[Avvatar]

So i ordered and received the Spencerian books. I have been reading through the theory book, but am hesitant to start the workbooks. I'm not certain where to start.

The Lamy knockoff came in. I can't say that I'm pleased with it. The barrel is quite loose and the nib seems to leak a lot, but for the dollar I paid I can't really complain. The Jinhao 750 still hasn't shown up. Hopefully soon.

In the mean time, I've been "practicing" but not terribly successfully. I might just decide to jump into the workbooks this weekend. I have great hopes for the Spencerian method.

 

[strop]

The best way to do this kind of thing is to just start writing. A journal of some kind is often a good way to go, and gives you an easy way to see how your writing is evolving. Spencerian is lovely, and something I plan to devote some time to when I fully retire, but true Spencerian was devised when dip pens were in use, and takes advantage of a flexible nib, rarely found (if ever) in modern fountain pens. That said, one can easily develop a Spencerian like script and many of us use some kind of personally developed modifications of some of the classic textbook method.

There are a couple of general tips. Your grip needs to be very light. From the picture it seems that it would be very easy to put a death grip on the pen. That quickly causes fatigue and cramping in the fingers and hand. It also seems from the picture that the pen is rather upright. This may inhibit the more free flowing style that it seems you are wanting to achieve. Good script writing is done with the upper arm and shoulder. The forearm, wrist and fingers are only there to transfer the movement to the paper. Some of the books I've seen start out with several different drills (boring for sure) that simply use repetitive ovals, circles, etc to get a relaxed consistent stroke.

Good luck, and welcome to the rabbit hole! Look forward to seeing your progress.