Basic Letters of Calligraphy

Calligraphy is the art of creating beautiful, elegant writing using a nib or brush pen. It requires patience and precision as well as a lot of practice, but it can be an incredibly rewarding hobby that produces some gorgeous handwriting. To become a master calligrapher, it is essential to understand the basic lettering techniques that form the foundation of the style. In this article, we will cover the basic strokes that make up a letter and how to create them correctly.

Whether you choose to learn modern or copperplate calligraphy, there are some key fundamentals that must be understood before progressing to more advanced skills. The first is that the size of each letter is determined by the width of the upper and lower lines. This means that if you want to create a more formal and professional-looking alphabet, it is important that the upper and lower line widths stay consistent throughout the alphabet.

Another key fundamental of calligraphy is understanding how to draw the thicker parts of each letter. It is crucial that you do not make these thicker sections too large as it can give the impression of messy and unprofessional lettering. Rather, the letters should be thicker at the top and taper off towards the bottom to create a smooth and elegant look. This technique is called “overshading” and can be avoided by practicing each letter over and over again until the downstroke appears to be a uniform width.

As you begin to work with the basic letters, it is also important that you use gridlines as your guide. This will help you to properly position your strokes and achieve the desired thickness for each one. In addition, it will keep your utensil in the proper position and prevent you from lifting it too often. This is a major difference between calligraphy and cursive writing, as the latter tends to be more fluid and lift the pen less frequently.

The first basic letter we will cover is the letter b. To start, you will need to draw an entry stroke and a looped ascender. The entry stroke is a thin upstroke that starts from the baseline and curves slightly as it follows the slant lines to the waistline. The looped ascender is created with an upward stroke that reaches the height of the entry stroke and then reverses back down to the bottom.

Once you have these two basics down, you can move on to creating the other basic letters in the alphabet. For this, we recommend downloading our free calligraphy worksheet that contains both the uppercase and lowercase alphabet to trace and practice with. This worksheet also includes a page of sample words that you can write yourself, so that you can practice your new skills.

With a bit of time and dedication, you will soon be writing beautiful calligraphy! If you have any questions about our Calligraphy basic letters tutorial, please do not hesitate to contact us. We will be happy to answer them!