Ruminations on Lettering....

i recently started a thread with a couple photos of a gun i engraved almost 20 years ago (http://www.engraverscafe.com/showthread.php?21921-Raised-sculpted-steel-inlays). my main intention was to show off the really cool steel inlays, but i was somewhat surprised to see how quickly the conversation focused on the lettering (see closeups below). it would be false modesty for me to claim i didn't think that bit of Old English was anything special- i was actually pretty proud of it, and it was interesting and gratifying to see the attention it received.

i've been thinking about that and thought it was high time we spent more time discussing, learning, teaching, drawing, & ultimately engraving lettering around here. there have been many threads about monograms*, the micro-script challenge, and some other tangential mentions, but threads dedicated to the solid fundamentals of good, basic lettering have been few and far between.

lettering is often the bread & butter of many in our trade (in fact, lately i've been doing quite a bit of it after a few decades of more decorative work and i'm loving it!). in my early years, like most i suppose, i just tried to copy various typestyles whenever necessary, figuring i'd been seeing & reading type for nearly my entire life- i can read, i can draw- how hard can it be to draw my own type, right? turns out there's more to it than that. who knew?

i picked up a few books on typography and started studying things like letter heights (they're NOT all the same!), line weights, spacing, balancing white space, kerning & leading, etc., and how those factors change and need adjusted with different styles & fonts. it's a fascinating artform- an entire world of its own. in retrospect, some of my early efforts should have been in crayon and hung on my parents' refrigerator.

anyway, i'll start by strongly recommending everyone get their hands on a good typography book (sorry, i don't remember the ones i used). any decent library probably has something that will serve the purpose and of course the internet will supply a thousand options.

that'll do for an intro. you have your homework assignment, class dismissed!



*to design good monograms, you MUST first have a sound background in the basic letter forms. if you've ever wondered why a monogram just doesn't seem 'to work', it's probably because you're running afoul of one or more rules of the basics.

Good idea Mitch. I know that I for one could use some time on the basics of good lettering, different styles and the nuance's of each. Unfortunately I will read along but can't participate for health reasons. Haven't used a graver in over a year. Hasn't stopped me from spending money on things though. Got a couple of nice deals in used systems and added some machinery to make engravables for others if I can't engrave. lathes, milling machine and shaper 3 42" belt sanders and TW() 72 inch with surface grinding capabilities added good tig and mig welders. If I can't engrave maybe I can make buckles knives etc..

That sure is some nice lettering in your sampe. I have questions about some now. thanks Fred

As a rank beginner, I have gotten kind of stuck on lettering (both drawing and engraving) and have really stepped away from scrollwork. It is fascinating and somewhat frustrating to not be able to duplicate the beautiful work I see others putting out. Some days I'm really in the groove and doing what I'd call semi-acceptable work (again, for a beginner...) but other days I have to stop because I'm doing so awful I don't want to ingrain whatever bad technique I'm using into memory.... Sam's video on the subject is a gold mine and surprisingly enough, I'm having better results doing bright cut than ribbon. Neither is ready for public consumption but one thing Sam mentioned has really stuck in my mind, that mastering lettering will improve every other facet of your engraving. I can totally see where this would be true.

Mitch, that is an excellent idea and something all engravers need. I started out with a sign painter while in high school and learned a lot about the basic rules of lettering, but not enough. I now know enough (after 50 years) to be very dangerous, but have found my very limited knowledge to be way more than the average person. I would love to see an on-line class or something similar devoted to proper lettering and the rules necessary to understand what constitutes good lettering. Thank you for bringing this to our attention.

Some computer nerd needs to participate as well - to explain "kerning" and why it is important & how to do it - IF you rely on computerized fonts for the basis of your lettering layouts. (some would say doing so is sacrilege? I do both. Hand drawn and commercial fonts, depending on the budget)

That won't be me. I relied on my ex to take care of that for me the past 12 years... haven't figured it out for myself yet.

B.

Pretty much any cheap basic lettering book will teach you what you want to know……………..It’s only a matter of applying it and lots of practice.

Like all subjects is has a lot of sub headings, just like engraving. Typography is a subject all by itself with hundreds of years of refinement since we went from monks illuminating books by hand to printing presses. The most common fonts used for printing to this day are very old. They are timeless.

But the basics of good lettering hasn’t changed. Round letters like OUGSCQ slightly above and below the lines. Italics to be on a uniform angle and stroke thickness to be even and in proportion to the height of the letter.

With computer lettering, kerning (Letter spacing) becomes a problem because it’s a machine made thing………..so alterations often need to be made with free fonts. Paid for fonts are generally a bit better but only a bit for our purposes. Most letter spacing is better done by eyeballing it. Rounded letters closer together and straight letters further apart. The spacing between the letters is as important as the letters themselves otherwise it becomes illegible.

Once you understand the basics then you can start manipulating letters to what you want without losing legibility.

And the one rule that is golden…………….If it doesn’t look right……..then it isn’t.

Now all of this sounds familiar to engravers

Cheers
Andrew

PS. That is beautiful lettering, Mitch........and the sculptured overlays are superb!!! Something that would be nice to see more of. Weldon Lister wrote an article in an FEGA Engraver magazine demonstrating his method for iron/steel overlays

Thanks for chiming in Andrew, was hoping you would add your insight. All you said about keening and the round letters were what my boss at the sign painting company emphasized and was very strict about it, along with color values. Of course, we engravers don't need to worry about color values, our medium is monotone.

I'm just starting to learn old English script with a flat graver. Do you have any suggestions about the geometry of the FLAT graver? Face angle,heel angle,etc.
Thanks much. Mark Hitt

Dr. Joe was in the tips archive. Best ever script lesson the web. He went over every detail of every letter in depth. I think his tutorial had the largest following on the Café' He has written extensively on lettering and you can down load his instruction for free. Fred

Andrew said Like all subjects is has a lot of sub headings, just like engraving. Typography is a subject all by itself with hundreds of years of refinement since we went from monks illuminating books by hand to printing presses. The most common fonts used for printing to this day are very old. They are timeless.

Yes Trajan’s column (AD113) has been a model for centuries. A fascinating place to look for inspiration is to our cousin’s, our fellow engravers, who engrave in stone. The machines have almost completely taken over from the craftsmen letter cutter and the vacuum has been filled by artists creating “dynamic alphabetsâ€￾, attempting to make the letters, and the whole design live and dance in new and fresh ways.
This is a link to some work by Tom Perkins

https://au.pinterest.com/search/pins/?q=tom perkins letter carving&rs=typed&term_meta[]=tom%7Ctyped&term_meta[]=perkins%7Ctyped&term_meta[]=letter%7Ctyped&term_meta[]=carving%7Ctyped

Can you see a prestigious six figure sporting rifle engraved in Mr Perkin’ s style of lettering any time soon?