10-min Calligraphy Warm-ups
When you are getting ready to practice calligraphy, it can be helpful to warm up your arm and wrist with some simple movements.
These warm-up drills also help you to gain better control of your pen and manage the ink flow.
Remember to adjust your seat so that your dominant arm has a full range of movement, and angle your practice page at around 45 degrees.
Tools needed:
Calligraphy-friendly paper or grid pad
Pen holder (oblique or straight) and nib
Ink
The Box Technique
If you have a Rhodia grid pad or dot pad, you can easily draw boxes for your drills. And, even if you don’t, you can still do some rough ones on blank calligraphy-friendly paper.
The box technique helps to train your hand and your arm muscles to move in controlled lines and oval shapes; a useful way to develop muscle memory for calligraphy descending and ascending lines, curved letter shapes and flourishes.
Step 1: Outline your boxes
Draw multiple boxes on your practice sheet. I did mine in fineliner pen here.
Draw several 2cm-wide boxes to start with, continuing down the page as far as you want to go. You can increase or decrease the size of the boxes for variety.
Step 2: Practice Upstrokes
Starting from the top-left corner of the box, start drawing light hairline strokes upwards, keeping the lines evenly spaced and keeping the pressure light.
Step 3: Practice downstrokes
Starting from the top-left corner of the box, start making evenly-spaced downstrokes by adding slight pressure to the nib.
Your first attempts will probably look shaky or uneven - but that’s the point! Keep practising and you’ll notice the improvement in your technique as you move down the page.
Step 4: Clockwise ovals
Starting from the top-left corner of the box, start drawing ovals - starting with light, hairline upstrokes and curving into thicker downstrokes.
Step 5: Anti-clockwise ovals
Do the same for your anti-clockwise ovals, only start from the bottom-right corner of the box and work your way up to the top-left corner.
The repetition Technique
Another great way to warm up is by writing words that contain letter repetition.
My ‘go-to’ word has always been “minimum”, as you can see here from practice session I did back in November 2015. But, you can choose your own. For example, if I wanted to practice some ascending loops I might choose the word “hillbilly” or for descending loops, “piggy” would work well. :-)
I’m sure you’ll have your own favourite words soon!
The larger the letters, the more range of movement you’ll use, making the drills more effective for developing your upper arm control.
The Alphabet Technique
Another useful warm-up is to write out the letters of the alphabet.
I often do this when I want to get back to practicing after a long break. It helps to remind me of the letterforms while I prepare to go into a full practice session or to get ready to make a card or gift for someone.
The Flourishing Technique
Another fantastic way to develop your upper-arm muscle range is by trying out some flourishes.
Flourishes are used in calligraphy to add drama to your letterforms, but you can practice them on their own first to get used to them.
The foundational shape of most flourishes is an oval, and you can change up the direction of a flourish however you’d like!
Try these simple ones first.
If you aren’t sure where to start with these flourishes, the movement of each of these flourishes is from left to right. But reversing the direction is also a great idea for more variety!
MY Advice
Try to incorporate one or more of these calligraphy drills into your weekly practice sessions or even on a daily basis. It’s good to know that you can doodle these shapes with pencil any time you’re sitting still.
It’s all about improving the flexibility of the hand and wrist and developing the muscle memory that’s needed for calligraphy.
Let me know which one is your favourite!
Louise x
