Brush Calligraphy Strokes: Compounding Curve

Since you have already covered the underturn and the overturn, this stroke is hopefully pretty easy for you, as it is just a mixture of them both.

It is used when adding an exit or entry stroke to a lot of letters (more on those next) and you will see it’s usefulness in letters like m, y, n, h, v and x.

Starting on the baseline, you draw a thin upstroke towards the waistline. As you get to the top, curve around to the right, and increase pressure on the way down to make a thick downstroke to the baseline. So far, you have made an overturn stroke, but don’t lift your pen yet – we’re not finished. As you get to the baseline, decrease pressure to go back to a think stroke, curve around to the right again and then finish with a thin upstroke towards the waistline.

There you have it – it’s just a combination between the overturn and underturn.

Brush Calligraphy Basic Strokes: The Entry Stroke

The entry and exit strokes are a complicated way of saying “the strokes that join the letters together”. They have actually been mostly covered already. You can create entry and exit strokes with a lot of the strokes you have already learnt: the upstroke, the compound curve, the underturn and the overturn. Firstly I’ll show you how to use these strokes as exit and entry strokes, and then we will have a look at the official exit stroke; the one stroke that hasn’t been covered yet.

The entry strokes are strokes you have already used before; the Upstroke, the Overturn and the Underturn. It’s a way to introduce the letter, and connect it to the previous letter. Have a look at these examples:

As you can see the entry stroke is just using one of the other basic strokes to introduce the letter, or connect it with the previous letter. The type of stroke you use for an entry stroke can differ, depending on your personal style. For example you can either use an overturn, or a simple upstroke (and then the regular downstroke) to introduce a lowercase n or m.

Brush Calligraphy Basic Strokes: The Exit Stroke

The exit stroke is connecting the current letter to the next letter, or to simply finish the word in a beautiful way. There are a few different options here, depending on the letter.

You can use a simple upstroke to finish letters like f and q, an underturn (instead of a downstroke) for letters like a, d, and l, or a compound curve instead of an overturn for letters like n and m.

There is one stroke though, that hasn’t been mentioned previously that is the actual “exit stroke”.

This exit stroke is similar to the underturn, but without as much depth. It’s a really handy stroke to know, because it makes connecting o’s, v’s and w’s really easy. It’s also used to write lowercase r’s really pretty, you just write the exit stroke a little higher with a bit of a tilt, to end on the x-height. Once you have practiced this stroke with the other letters though, writing an r becomes a breeze.

I have just updated the practice worksheet for the exit stroke in the resource library to include the letter “r”. So if you haven’t already, heave over to there to download the updated sheet and start writing pretty exit strokes. If you don’t have the password yet, make sure you sign up using the link below to gain access to all the free worksheets.

Basic Brush Calligraphy Strokes Completed

See you at the next post: Putting the strokes together.