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Craig Forsyth
April 30th, 2013, 05:28 AM
Hi, I'm planning to learn Spencerian and am wondering if someone might be able to suggest a flex pen. I've been looking at the Noodlers (Nib Creaper, Ahab and Konrad) and am currently thinking I might go for one of those as they are a relatively low-cost option. Good plan or, as a beginner, would I be best to go for something else?

recluse
April 30th, 2013, 11:10 AM
Spencerian consists of two parts - the model itself and flourishing, in particular that of miniscules. For the first part, which is the most important but, let's say it, not the part that attracts people to Spencerian, any writing tool is suitable and, probably, pencil would be even handier. For the second part, however, I'm not sure there are many (any?) fountain pens that will work. The beauty of Spencerian is in curious interplay of hairlines and wide lines and hairlines are tough to get with fountain pens.

The best option, I believe, would be to invest the same amount of money as for a single Noodler's pen but into dip nibs. In any case they, dip nibs will give the result far surpassing any fountain pen.

Craig Forsyth
April 30th, 2013, 02:49 PM
Okay, thanks for the advice, I'll look into that. Any pointers on dip nibs?

I was certainly drawn by the flourishes involved in Spencerian script initially but am now far more interested in the lettering forms. I'm really keen to know how to produce the wide and fine lines using just one pen.

Stefan
April 30th, 2013, 03:42 PM
Craig, as you are in the UK (normally I suggest getting hold of jbb) I would say get hold of Scribblers, J&T Arts, Blots Pens and nibs to name a few and look at their selections.

A good nib to start with is the Zebra G or Nikko G nibs. They are slightly stiff but do flex nice and wont go all chinese gymnast on you.

You will want an oblique holder as well.

Then it is a matter of ink - here you are lookig for an iron gall ink but a good alternative is Walnut ink. That you can get from J&T.

And, like with fountain pens, you need good paper. Mondi IQ Prestige 100gsm is a good paper, £8 for a ream.

Then it is the actual writing :-) and here IAMPETH is full of instruction stuff to look at.

It is great fun but needs patience. There is the issue of cleaning the nibs to get them to work, finding the right angle of the paper for you and a whole bunch of other things I wont worry you with now but I am sure, once you got the basics, you will be back asking more questions!

Enjoy!

Craig Forsyth
May 1st, 2013, 04:15 AM
Thanks so much Stefan, plenty more for me to look at. I'm a bit daunted by the whole oblique holder prospect but I'll put in a little research. I'd already discovered the IAMPETH website, that's what put me onto Spencerian in the first place.

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