A whole scroll in ink. No gauche. And tiny fencers! My mind was being blown as it was described to me but I was absolutely thrilled to try something new.

Since the calligraphy with my last scroll went fairly smooth I was confident I could do the calligraphy for this scroll as well. But it was the tiny fencers that worried me; their small human figures (something I never felt confident in creating) and the elaborate shading, all to be done with a crow quill.

The calligraphy took a few tries to get the spacing exactly how I wanted it, and to practice the hand (one I had not done before), and overall I was pleased. On future scrolls I will use a grid system to help me measure the spacing between words and letters (per teacher recommendation!).

To create the tiny fencers, I first located my source and attempted a free-hand drawing. I found that I wanted to make the fencers much much smaller than they needed to be for the scroll. Perhaps this was because I hoped to make them small enough that no one would see my mistakes or insecurities in them. I tried a few times to make them bigger, using tracing paper over each image. I think I went through about 5 images when I realized my images weren’t growing in size at the rate I was hoping.

So, I printed off a LARGE picture of what I wanted to draw ( and when I say large I mean 8.5”x11”) and drew from that. I found that, though I was still drawing smaller that the original image, it ended up being the appropriate size for the scroll I was making!

Everything was first drawn on tracing paper and then transferred to Bristol. The images are actually inverted from the original from the transfer process I used.

I was finally ready to use my crown quill and ink. It was quite fun to trace and shade each humanoid and see them come to life on the paper. I tend to have this fear of finishing art after I have drawn it because I am afraid of completely obliterating what I have worked so hard to create.

Encouragement from friends and lots and LOTS of practice runs gave me the confidence to finish my creation for the Harpers Retreat Rapier Champion.