Instead of starting your letter at the regular baseline, move it up a little below the x-height and then draw your letter to touch the cap line. To do this, draw alternate the height of your letters within a word. Vary the Baseline or Cap Line: This technique is simple but can drastically change the look of your lettering, giving it a playful feel. If you need a good reference for serifs, check out this post with a great example of a simple serif font. Serifs are simply little bars at the ends of your letters. So, adding them can give your lettering a serious or more sophisticated feeling. Continue this with your remaining letters, thickening up the lefthand stroke of the letter.Īdd Serifs: Most people don’t typically write with serifs. Color the space in to give the lefthand stroke of the A some thickness. In the example above, draw a capital A and then along the lefthand side, draw a second parallel line on the inside of the letter. Thicken Up Your Strokes: Want to add a bold factor to your lettering? The easiest way to do this is to add some thickness to some of the strokes in your lettering. Make them narrow or wide to get different effects in your lettering. Then make the remaining letters match up.Ĭhange the Width of Your Letters: Another simple trick is to shrink or expand the width of your letters. With letters like A, E, F, and H move the height of the crossbar either up or down. Print Lettering SuppliesĬhange the X-Height: One of the most simple ways to change up your print lettering style is to adjust the x-height. You don’t need to have any experience with typography or fancy supplies to start adding unique and beautiful headers to your bullet journal. Once you have a basic grasp on the above terms, you can start to make minor adjustments to your lettering that will have a big impact. Be sure to check out her article on Typography Terms for the most in depth, yet beginner friendly explanations. I give a lot of credit to Caroline from Hand Lettering for Beginners for teaching me these basic terms and how they are used. *The above terminology has been summarized and interpreted from a variety of blogs and books. San-Serif just means letters without the little bars. A serif is simply the little bar you see attached to the ends of letters. ![]() Serif and Sans-Serif are two classifications of lettering and typography. These are going to be the curly lines you might see at the beginning or end of a letter. They can be connected to letters or placed as standalone designs. But with tracking, all of the letters are spaced evenly irregardless of size.Įmbellishments and Flourishes are both extra elements in lettering that add character and aesthetic. With kerning, you may offset just one letter, or chance the spacing based on the size of the letter. Kerning and and Tracking both refer to the spacing between letters. However, you may also want to know some of the words below. ![]() ![]() While typography practically has an entire dictionary of terminology, the above are the basics of what you’ll need to get started without overwhelming yourself. Stroke: These are the lines that make up letters. X-Height: This is the distance between your baseline and the top of your lowercase letters or crossbars on capital letters like H and A.Ĭap Line: This is the imaginary line at the top where all of your uppercase letters touch.Īscenders: This is a part of a letter that extends above the x-height.ĭescenders: This is a part of the letter that extends below the baseline.Īscender Line: This is the imaginary line where all of your ascenders extend to.ĭescender Line: This is the imaginary line where all of your descenders extend to. This is the line that keeps your letters and words straight. I encourage you to copy it down into your own notebook or sketchbookīaseline: This is the imaginary line at the bottom that your letters rest on. The image below is your illustrative guide. When you start to dive deeper into lettering and typography, you are going to see the words below pretty frequently. Basic Typography Terms and Definitions Illustrated This article will illustratively cover some of the basic vocabulary associated with typography and lettering, give you some tips and tricks you can use to improve your lettering right now, cover the basic and the best materials, and send you on your way with some of the best books, courses, and learning materials to further your practice. Once you have a basic understanding of a few simple terms paired with a couple tips and tricks and a few a good resources, you’ll be diving into the world of bullet journal lettering with confidence. Please see my Disclosure for more information.Īre you intimidated by lettering? There’s all these strange words like X-height, serif, descenders, cap height, etc.Īnd then trying to get the letters to look similar and be the same height and at the same angle can be frustrating.
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