Panic mode

So, like I said, I'm currently working on five projects, in various stages of completion (One is ready to be scribed, one is lacking a detail in the design before I scribe it, two need to have the designs done, and one is just puzzling me. More on that one later).

I actually don't have any of my projects with me (except for one. More on that one later, too). Since I make them as gifts, they have this nasty tendency to go live in other cities. The first one I did (image in the preceding post) is currently in Vienna, Austria; the second one I made is in Aurora, Ontario, and the third is in Laval, Québec.

The one I'm currently working on will make its way to western Hungary, and as much as I'd like for it to be there in mid-March, that just may be a bit over-optimistic.

I do things backwards. By backwards I mean I don't follow the "accepted" order of writing and decoration, as done in medieval illuminated manuscripts. Those works of art were written first, then decorated. And usually not by the same person. I do it backwards--I decorate it, then scribe in whatever it is I want to write--making the writing conform to the limitations imposed by the decoration, whether it be a centrepiece, or a border. On my current project, I've chosen to go with a border only on the left of the board, with small corner decorations in the other two corners.


A note on the design: Most, if not all, of my designs are based on traditional Hungarian folk designs (OK, I lied--I trace them; I'm not good enough to create my own designs). The left border is an element from a tablecloth embroidery from the region of Sióagárd, in West-Central Hungary, and the corner elements are napkin embroidery that go with the tablecloth.

At this point, all I have left is scribing what I want to write. In this case, it's the lyrics to a well-known Hungarian "happy birthday" song.

Here's where panic starts to set in.

I hadn't yet chosen a font, and even though I'm particularly fond of post-Roman and pre-Gothic hands (i.e., uncial, insular, carolingian, etc.), I felt that these hands wouldn't be quite suited to a modern, upbeat song, so I went in search of something more modern, and I settled on a Cancelleresca hand. I then calculated how much space the writing would need for a particular nib size--and to get the whole thing to fit on the board, the x-height (the height of letters like a, e, o, x, etc.) would be 2.5 mm. I found this to be ridiculously small, so I decided to go something that had a little more 'weight' to it--so back to an uncial hand I go, and enlarge the size of the font slightly (x-height: 6mm). The board is now lined for a draft of the scribing, and as I write, I realize that there is simply no way I can get a whole line of the lyric on one of my lines. So I reduce the size of the hand (to 3 mm), and realize that hey, this isn't actually that small.

Result: Not even one line written, a $2 sheet of Bristol vellum which is now scrap paper, and we're back where we started--with Cancelleresca.

Problem is, I don't even know how I could have planned this out more effectively. I probably would have had to attempt writing it in any case.

But at least I know that 2.5 mm is not too small, especially when the ascenders and descenders of the letters are going to be 5 mm each (the 'f' will be close to a whopping 7.5 mm!)

So, yeah, panic for nothing. Welcome to my world.