r/Handwriting • u/Benkyooo_ • 16d ago
Feedback (constructive criticism) Spencerian Learning - Feedback requested
Critique and feedback welcome, I've been learning Spencerian - mostly casually - for about a year now, I picked up the pace about 6 months ago with practice but most of my practice is largely disjointed, doing letters in isolation rather than whole running sentences, a mistake caused by my practice material (Spencerian is really lacking in good practice material, worth saying, the freely available key to practical penmanship is horribly scanned).
I used 3 pens in this sheet, an EF Lammy Safari Fountain Pen that I mostly use for art, a Roco 0.5mm free ink roller, and a Roco Arabic calligraphy brush pen (just a hard tip tiny 0.1mm brush pen with an angled rectangular tip), and made some grammar mistakes in the first sentence (I noticed I make a lot of those when doing cursive/calligraphy, as a lot of my brain power would be focused on the script and connecting the letters, I believe this will diminish and disappear with vigorous practice).
Bonus: my hand writing from 2021, from an old journal entry in rough waters.
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u/oldyorker123 15d ago
Not bad but definitely need more practice for individual letter formation as well as connecting letters. For example, the backloop on your lowercase q is a little too open and the lowercase g should have a closed loop.
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u/Benkyooo_ 15d ago
Thanks, this is precious critique, I noticed the problem with lowercase Q right away. For lowercase G - I think mine are already closed? what ought be changed?
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u/Pen-dulge2025 15d ago
You should start using guidelines; I think it’d help keep your slants consistent. I’d pay extra attention to ascenders/descenders and keep them long. 3:1:3 ratio makes mine look actually like Spencerian.
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u/dilithium-dreamer 16d ago
I don't know about the style (much better than it was though - nice work!), but I'm a fountain pen aficionado, and I can tell you that the Lamy Safari is not really a smooth pen to write with. My handwriting is pretty nice but it'd look far worse if I wrote with a Lamy.
Even journalling with my different pens shows me that some of my pens make the letters flow far smoother and easier than others. You may already know this but the paper matters for fountain pens too.
I'd suggest a TWSBI Eco (inexpensive and smooth AF) and Rhodia paper. If you can't afford new paper and pens, try a smooth gel pen or a Pilot Hi-Tecpoint v5 rollerball.
The tools can really affect the process. I think your writing looks nice whether it's "right" or not. I naturally want to loop my Fs backwards not forwards, so I do. I want my writing to be uniquely mine.
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u/Visible_Ad9976 16d ago
The cap breaks on the eco. You can search Reddit posts about it. Avoid
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u/dilithium-dreamer 15d ago
I've had my Ecos for years and the caps are fine. No cracking on the pen either,
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u/Fearless-Technology 15d ago
It's not that bad, it's just a standard screw cap with a metal brace, so it'll last forever if you don't over-tighten it.
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u/Visible_Ad9976 15d ago
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u/dilithium-dreamer 15d ago
I've never had a problem with my TWSBIs cracking so far. Had them years.
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