In part 4 of the video tutorial series, learn about how the final circular calligraphy border image processing was done using open source GIMP software. Keep in mind that this video is designed for GIMP users who have an intermediate skill level.
In part 3 of the tutorial series, this video shows you how to prepare the image for Inkscape. The preparation is actually done in GIMP. Once the preparation is complete we transfer the work over to Inkscape, a freely available amazing software application (open source).
In part 2 of the video tutorial, learn about inking the work, and about the templates that you can download from this post, and how they work with the paper and drafting board you use.
The Project:
For me this was a medium sized calligraphy and graphic arts project. I walk you through the making of the entire project in this 5 part video tutorial series.
If you are using the IE browser and are unable to view this, kindly visit my youtube page to watch the video at: www.youtube.com/user/steveczajka
It seems that we can attribute the choice of interesting fonts we have on our personal computers to Steve Jobs and a single calligraphy course he took. He talked about it in the commencement address he made at Stanford University on June 12, 2005.
“Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn’t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture, and I found it fascinating.
None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it’s likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.”
To read the full address, here’s the link, complete with embedded video:
http://news.stanford.edu/news/2005/june15/jobs-061505.html
Toronto Calligraphy 