Calligraphy with a Regular Pen (Faux Calligraphy)

What You Need To Know About Faux Calligraphy

The most important part of this style of calligraphy is knowing how to draw the letter. Still sounds like kindergarten, doesn’t it? You would be amazed at how many people I know who draw an “l” from the bottom-up or cross the “t” before even writing the vertical line. The good news is, it’s pretty easy to find out the right “way” a letter is meant to be written. It’s all about the “basic strokes” which shows you how letters are broken down into different strokes of the pen. The next post goes into detail about all the basic strokes, and there is even a resource library which is full of free worksheets that you can download and trace to practice, including a guide on how to write each letter of the lowercase alphabet using the strokes.

Faux Calligraphy Strokes Step One: Draw the Basic Strokes

First, you draw the black parts of these strokes, following the arrows.  TIP: Keep in mind which direction the pen was going, because it’s on the downwards strokes that we want to make thicker. Also, make sure you leave plenty of room to add in the thicker lines.

Faux Calligraphy Strokes Step Two: Fill In The Downstrokes

Secondly, you will want to add in the thicker lines but only on the downstrokes. Practice these with the basic strokes, and it becomes a fantastic foundation for writing calligraphy with a brush pen.

Regular calligraphy means you need to build up your muscle memory by applying consistent pressure on the downstrokes and a consistent light pressure during the upstrokes. It takes a while for this muscle memory to take place, which is why faux calligraphy is so handy as you don’t need the muscle memory to create beautiful words. It’s all done manually.

Writing Words With Faux Calligraphy Step Two: Fill In The Thicker Lines

Now we want to make the downstrokes thicker. Just like you did with the strokes practice earlier, identify which lines are the downstrokes and write a parallel line down the side and joining it with the original line. If the downstroke curves and turns into an upstroke, then the new faux calligraphy line should come to meet the original line gradually. Do this for the entire word.