Molly Suber Thorpe

Digitizing Calligraphy from Sketch to Vector

Love seeing your edit process. Thanks for sharing! Would love to work together. Looking to collaborate on lettering assignments. I sent an email to your website.

I seriously was going through the projects and THIS CAUGHT MY EYE AND MADE MY HEART STOP. This was before I even saw this was made by my own cousin!!!! That just seals the deal for me. Lurvvvv seeing how thIs evolved &lt;3

Haha! Go figure! These were the early bird stages of trying to figure out how to use a calligraphy pen + nibs. Funny how much my style's changed and evolved since then! When are you gonna teach a class?? ;)

Thanks for sharing your process! I love the various final products your completed!! I think I need to do a little more of what you did in preparing for a piece and practice adding the flourishes in variuos ways in pencil first!

Pencil is always best! It saves so much time to be able to hash out ideas quickly and refine pieces of things you like. Glad showing my process helps! :)

I love this. The 3D one is especially rad! It's very helpful for me to see your process; I'm struggling with where to add flourishes after my initial layouts.

Thanks, Natalie! It took a bit for me to figure out mine. I did a TON of sketches and didn't post all of them on here. For my piece, choosing the slanted version helped me see that I could fill the empty gaps of my rectangular box layout. I mostly used the letters at the ends of my phrase to create those flourishes ("H" in Hold, "t" in Fast, "e" in True).Hope that helps!

These are stunning, Joanna! I am so impressed by where you've taken this project. I especially love the last iteration, with the text overlayed on the photo — the image really complements the meaning of the text, while the flourishes of the lettering contrast it in just the right way. Beautiful!Molly

Thank you, Molly! It means a lot to receive such praise from someone I admire. I really appreciate the amount of effort you put into the class and the time you take to review the work we've put in as well. I hope you offer more classes in the future!

Sketches, sketches and more sketches... <img class="zoomable rounded-image-wrapper" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/a858dac8" alt="Hold Fast - image 1 - student project" srcset="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/a858dac8 600w, http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/a858dac8 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy"><img class="zoomable rounded-image-wrapper" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/38ecf574" alt="Hold Fast - image 2 - student project" srcset="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/38ecf574 600w, http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/38ecf574 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy">Calligraphy time! My loops and curves weren't as smooth as I would've liked so I had a bit of editing to do after scanning it in. <img class="zoomable rounded-image-wrapper" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/5ade977f" alt="Hold Fast - image 3 - student project" srcset="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/5ade977f 600w, http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/5ade977f 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy"> The altered image after rejiggering some of the lines: <img class="zoomable rounded-image-wrapper" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/9d13fa96" alt="Hold Fast - image 4 - student project" srcset="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/9d13fa96 600w, http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/9d13fa96 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy"> Annnd the finalized vector! <img class="zoomable rounded-image-wrapper" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/b36b39ff" alt="Hold Fast - image 5 - student project" srcset="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/b36b39ff 600w, http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/b36b39ff 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy"><img class="zoomable rounded-image-wrapper" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/06ddd6a5" alt="Hold Fast - image 6 - student project" srcset="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/06ddd6a5 600w, http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/06ddd6a5 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy"> A 3D-esque version: <img class="zoomable rounded-image-wrapper" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/0b4c2d4e" alt="Hold Fast - image 7 - student project" srcset="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/0b4c2d4e 600w, http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/0b4c2d4e 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy"> Another version with distressed type over an edited image: <img class="zoomable rounded-image-wrapper" src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/5f538f3c" alt="Hold Fast - image 8 - student project" srcset="http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/5f538f3c 600w, http://s3.amazonaws.com/skillshare/uploads/project/d39d6201c36a9e96a195e5f9e29f6b2c/5f538f3c 1000w" sizes="(max-width: 600px) 600px, 100vw" loading="lazy">

Hold Fast

Company

Work With Us

Teach with Us

Shop

Mobile

English

English