Improving Handwriting - any good books?

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Hi Chaps

As I've got older, my handwriting has gone to pot. It's terrible now! It was never great, but it was a lot better when I was in school. Does anyone have any books on handwriting that they could recommend?

I'd love to improve my handwriting, so a book with exercises in that I could do daily etc would be great...Anyone know of any?
 
This is mainly American cursive and Spencerian, but interesting, and there are some free download links, many of old instructional manuals.

www.zanerian.com

If you "do" Facebook, there are several useful groups there.

I've had a quick look as to what's available in the UK, but much of it seems to be basic cursive handwriting for young schoolchildren, along the Marion Richardson lines.

If you decide to go for italic, cursive, copperplate, or Spencerian scripts, there are various paper practice templates you could use. Most have horizontal rulings at correct spacing for script and capitals, but the one which strikes me as being most useful also has diagonal lines to enable the correct slant of letters. As you will appreciate, there are certain techniques including how the paper is oriented on the desk top to enable the right angle.

I'm assuming that you've thought about a pen or pens, with which to improve, or perhaps you already have one. A fountain pen is, in my view, essential, but that doesn't have to be anything expensive. Although the nibs are usually F(Fine), and perhaps a bit limiting, the Chinese fountain pens on eBay will do as well as many of the dearer ones. Jinhaos and WingSungs are in my pen rack.
 
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Thanks for taking the time to write that comprehensive reply, very useful :) I have ordered a few Jinhao pens already. I had one delivered yesterday and the build quality for the money seems excellent.

I don't really want to spend so much on bottles of ink to use with the converters yet, so I need to get myself some cartridges. Can anyone recommend any? I believe they take international sized cartridges...

A variety of colours would be fantastic but eBay just seems to bring up packets containing only one colour...what a pain!

Thanks again!
 
Thanks for taking the time to write that comprehensive reply, very useful :) I have ordered a few Jinhao pens already. I had one delivered yesterday and the build quality for the money seems excellent.

I don't really want to spend so much on bottles of ink to use with the converters yet, so I need to get myself some cartridges. Can anyone recommend any? I believe they take international sized cartridges...

A variety of colours would be fantastic but eBay just seems to bring up packets containing only one colour...what a pain!

Thanks again!

Did you get a cartridge with the kit? If you did Buy a bottle of ink and an printer ink cartridge syringe off the bay and refill the cartridge. Save you a fortune


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Try Cult Pens for lots of fountain pen ideas. These cartridges give you a range of colours to experiment with.
I think you just might have found another rabbit hole to fall down.

DM08209-ZZZ~Diamine-Ink-Cartridges-Assorted-Pack-of-20_P1.jpg
 
I think you're right about that rabbit hole!! Thanks for the site, i'll check it out :)

I hope I'm not going to be guilty of leading you even further down the rabbit hole,but,on the question of inks, you may find something useful in the Diamine inks website.
Diamine are a UK company who've been making inks for more than 150-odd years. Many places stock their inks, but I usually buy direct from them. You may find some mixed cartridges or small samples.

Most pen shops sell ink samples in small phials (about 5ml). If it's not possible to fill the pen via immersing the nib in the ink, then usually the converter can be filled by immersing it separately, and then wiping it clean externally (a bit inky), or filled with a syringe or dropper in the same way as you would an empty ink cartridge.

The last lot of exotic ink samples I bought (Oster, KZW, some Japanese inks) was from Pure Pens in Wales.

You should be aware that some inks, in some pens, write either"dry" to the point where ink delivery is sparse or non-existent; or "wet", where ink gushes out onto the paper. For most normal writing purposes, the ideal is, as usual, somewhere between. In my experience, Diamine inks usually achieve this.

I don't use them myself, but there are novelty inks with glitter and other additives. They look quite pretty, but the
added solids can cause flow problems, especially with Fine nibs. I'd stick with conventional inks pro tem, if you're tempted.

I for one will be interested to hear how you get on, especially your choice of literature and any paper aids. I have a small grandson who is learning to write, and I'm keen he learns useful analogue things like how to write cursively with a fountain pen. I might well be " picking your brains" on anything I can use to achieve this objective.
 
I've found a difference with the 2 diamine inks I've tried. The onyx black is very dry and hardly writes at all in my faber castell. I've tried 2 small boxes of cartridges and both were the same. The blue black is much freer flowing and much better.
 
That's an incredible amount of info with some absolutely stunning examples. Wow, thanks for opening my eyes Ferrum! I've a feeling I'll be scrutinising some of the techniques and trying to transpose them in my own writing. I already try my darndest to write from the elbow and wrist, not the fingers!
Also +1 Damian for the Faber-Castell. The budget ones have the same nibs as the higher-end ones so they all write incredibly. Unfortunately, I 'sharted' my nib by dropping my pen but replaced it with a Bock (EF) nib which does a great job!
 
Plus umpty for Diamine! great ink.
On the handwriting front can I put in a vote for Italic? It's a great basis for handwriting, nice practice forms, simple rules for forming letters and for joining letters. Best with an Italic nib of course but you can get a Lamy Joy for very little with or without a convertor. Once you have the forms you can write a nice legible hand with any nib, biro or pencil.

italic1-copy.jpg
 
You guys are a bunch of eneblers :)
I read this thread when it was first posted, just out of curiosity..... roll the clock forward a few weeks and you have me buying a Faber-Castell Loom, and a Chinese Nihao something 450, an Oxford pad of some sort and..... a couple of Rhodia Dotpads, ink, converter....

The Faber-Castell arrived on Tuesday the rest should arrive today.

I have not used a fountain pen in years and in all honesty I have never been able to write well with a fountain pen.

My handwriting has been untidy since secondary school I guess, it definitely got worse through university .... I've always admired people with nice handwriting and reading this thread inspired me to do something about my handwriting ;) so I bought a bunch of stuff to write and improve my handwriting :)

The plan it's just enjoy the pens / paper and improve my handwriting. .... I'm not joining any dedicated forum..... I know how easy is to fall in a rabbit hole :)
I just wanted to say thanks ;)
 
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