In many ways this piece was a trial by fire in my introduction to manuscripts. Fresh back into lettering I was super excited to get such a commission. The request was for two copies under tight turnaround. I was had the highest hopes and motivated to put my best foot forward. At least that’s how it started.
In many ways this piece was a trial by fire in my introduction to manuscripts. Fresh back into lettering I was super excited to get such a commission. The request was for two copies under tight turnaround. I was had the highest hopes and motivated to put my best foot forward. At least that’s how it started.
As with almost every piece, I was super ambitious and began working immediately on the layout first. Leveraging my graphic design background I used InDesign to produce a rough layout. Heading, Illuminated Caps (I’m fascinated with Illuminations so I feel that every piece needs one.), all the line breaks and of course the illustrations. My vision almost alway exceeds my current proficiency with producing. This ultimately equates to me pushing myself to further my desire to execute my vision.
After approval of layout and size I had to choose my materials. On hand were my paints, acrylics, leaf, and inks – everything I needed but the stock. This I had to order what was available and what was in bulk sheets. Knowing I’d likely use for future projects or restarts. Turns out the paper was the only material that was somewhat a miss but it all worked out in the end.
Next was the design of the caps ‘L’ in this case as I crowned the piece with the prayers title, “Waymaker”. After referencing a few sources I ran through a couple of options till I landed on a direction that was mostly akin to the style of Italian whitevine. Thus, the project inevitably took on that direction. Although I wouldn’t classify it as white-vine at all, only inspired by. I produced rough studies for the leading caps to each line before moving onto plotting the lines.
Mechanically I plotted both sheets at the same time. I would plan on executing each sections in one go, so that it was fresh in my fingers. Once lines were plotted, I laid the under-drawing. Old-school lead transfers and cleaned up by dabbing a kneeded erasure. Once the underdrawings were complete, I began penning. Here’s where it kinda went sideways….
LOOK AROUND was the first to be penned. This took about 4 rounds to get correct. So, 4 sheets. I took the best two. Then the title, Wayfinder… no wait, Waymaker! No, finder? No yeah, Waymaker. NOT Wayfinder. WayMAKER.
3 sheets later I was ready to tackle the main copy. At this point I have to stress that no matter how careful or good you think you are, plotting your words can’t be understated. As a beginner – do yourself a favor, always plot your words! If only I’d have taken my own advice. After line 6, there was an error. One I couldn’t fix. So – I began again with the second plotted sheet. Then on line 3 another error. Begin restart #3. And #4. And #5. And #6.
Finally, after many many hours, ink-stained carpet and cramped fingers, I’d successfully penned 2 complete, error free sheets. Finally the fun part. Illumination.
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