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A lot of calligraphy is about pen angle, which means keeping the nib at a consistent angle to the baseline regardless of the direction you are moving the pen. Learning to control your pen angle can help improve your letters. Learning a few different calligraphic hands can help you improve your style. It is a good idea to draw individual letters in a style first, then work towards words.

I highly recommend The Calligrapher's Bible by David Harris. It's a great little book with all the info the beginner needs, and 100 different calligraphy styles illustrated.

I'm still learning myself so some of these books I'm recommending depend on your skillset and interest I guess. For typedesign and understanding fundamentals: Designing type is a good read, same with Stroke. Free stuff like briem superhandy. As a primer I'd read this before I buy a type design book. For lettering I don't really have books of preference. I generally go googling for info on whatever I may have a doubt in or if I just need inspiration. Like if I were looking at script, I'd look at works by Tony di spigna, tommy thompson, david quay and the like. When I once had a doubt about negative space within letters, I googled and stumbled upon this which helped. so for lettering it's a bit all over the place where I mostly just got info from googling. However if you want a book in lettering for a beginner-intermediate then logo,font & lettering gets you upto speed on a lot of things though he can be a lil old in his methods. Also books by Mortimer Leach and Doyald Young. For calligraphy I think I mostly learnt it from speedball manuals and then just googled but more importantly I did a lot of writing which is why I picked up on it. I think to understand type properly you need to do some calligraphy, once you get a grasp on calligraphy, typedesign makes sense so you go buy type design books, eventually lettering becomes super easy.

First of all you NEED this book, it has it all like seriously all,the tools the strokes the history - the chapter on brush lettering alone is worth the purchase.
(in case the link doesn't work the book is called Modern Calligraphy and Hand Lettering by Lisa Engelbercht)

http://www.amazon.com/Modern-Calligraphy-Hand-Lettering-Mark-Making/dp/1592536441

Then you need to watch this series of videos by Eliza Holliday, she shows the dynamics of the process and keeps it fairly simple and easy to understand - though there are others i found this one to be the most useful.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIxiW_aMiF8

And then you need a fuckton of practice because the Pentel Pocket brush can be a little bitch sometimes but gets the job done - also you might want to get a couple of other brushpens along the way just to make sure you can control all types and be efficent with any tool.


Hope this helps

Get a pen like this one.

And learn real calligraphy. Here's a stroke guide - there are more online.

http://cmcgavren.home.sprynet.com/azAZChancery.html

Not trying to be rude, I think it's awesome that you want to learn. I learned in high school, and it's a somewhat valuable skill if you enjoy typography/lettering.

I like Lettering & Type: Creating Letters and Designing Typefaces and In Progress: See Inside a Lettering Artist's Sketchbook and Process, from Pencil to Vector. But really the biggest help for me was just daily practice, with someone who can give you quality feedback on your work

Micron pens are great! You can get a pack with varying tip sizes from amazon for like $10. Most people tend to swear by them.

The book is Creative Lettering and Beyond, created with three other lettering artists. It comes out in November and shows the process of this piece and others from start to finish. :)

http://www.amazon.com/Creative-Lettering-Beyond-Inspiring-techniques/dp/1600583970/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1408587802&sr=8-1&keywords=creative+lettering+and+beyond

We have a cool guide for choosing a brush pen in our sidebar, so you could always start there. Personally I like to use a pencil and tombow abt brush pens, stabilos, sharpies, copics, eddings and dozens of other pens I randomly find at my local stores. For paper I usually use the cheapest A3 copy paper I can find and only invest in special marker paper when I have some extra money to spend.

If you're into hand lettering, look up the queen, Jessica Hische. Watch all of the YouTube videos where she does interviews, and read her book "In Progress" cover to cover.

https://www.amazon.com/Progress-Lettering-Artists-Sketchbook-Process/dp/145213622X

I just started and personally find this book helpful. For more practice, you can also buy tracing paper and trace lettering as well.

Designing Type should be on your bookshelf for research, metrics, etc. I used it for my first font and its a godsend.

Thanks. I went and found it on Amazon.

Letters of Credit by Walter Tracy is a must-read.

haha, i picked up this book about it... if you leave the pen on the wood for about 15 seconds, you'll start a fire.

This is the book I learned from. Shows you how to draw every single letter—

https://www.amazon.com/Mastering-Copperplate-Calligraphy-Step-Step/dp/0486409511

200 Pcs Kraft Brown Deli Butcher Papers, Eusaor 11.6" x 11.2" Dry Waxed Deli Paper Sheets, Hamberger Sandwich Wraps, Wrapping Tissue, Food Basket Liners, Squares Deli Paper Sheets https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07TGSP55G/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_b-C0Db12RNSZ7

Is this it?

In the picture there's a Micron, not sure if he used Microns exclusively though.