Real Signwriting with a Real Signwriter. . Professional, time-served Signwriter based in Belfast, UK. . Over 40 years experience in traditional hand lettering, gilding and artistic signwriting. .
They are actually available on Amazon fnow and they are ra lot cheaper than they used to b...but years ago, before I could source/afford one I would use a polished agate stone from one of those new age/crystal shops. Whilst not an ideal solution, the store allowed me to purchase a mix n' match selection of different shaped stones which did the job pretty well as well as teaching me a lot about the burnishing process.
Alternatively, in my more recent video on raised gilding from a few weeks ago, I demonstrate a method of the raised gilding process which uses modern materials and eliminates the need for hard burnishing.
Sorry, my hand obscured that part of the video so I didn't include the footage, but it was just a continuation of the highlighting process (6:40) . It was just freestyled with the gloss medium which gave a raised, burnished contrast to the matte base.
Beautiful job! The lack of blocking out the letters was impressive. All that being said, I hope you went back to the passenger side and finished the Green shadow under the "D"!! I do signs and store fronts in vinyl and would love to do more hand paint lettering. Thanks so much for the video. It was greatly appreciated!
Well spotted...and I certainly did. One thing that was drummed into us as apprentices was that a one minute check round the job before heading home could prevent a potential two hour+ round trip, to add in ONE bit of shading .
While this is respectable sign writing, I would recommend for beginners to spend more time on layout. Better guidelines will help in knowing where your brush lands and not create spacing issues. Drawing two lines per stroke gives better guidance to knowing where the brush will go. Patterns might help.
It's not really important and real turps is not easy to get hold of, but when I can get hold if it, I prefer to use it for various reasons eg. white spirit/mineral spirit/turpentine substitute or whatever you want to call it is very inconsistent in quality and I personally find that paint flows better with real turps and seems to work better with red sable bristles...plus, of course; I love the smell of turpentine in the morning...smells like pine trees.
Excellent workmanship. I would have been inclined to do a pounce pattern though. This way you don't have to do 2 full layouts, plus it's nice to get everything spaced properly and dialed in before working on the vehicle. Why do it twice? Love the 2-tone shadows.
It quite literally took me less than 10 minutes to mark out BOTH sides. How long would it have taken to draw out and make a pounce pattern???...probably well over an hour and I reckon that even a "stolen valor signwriter" with a computer generated template couldn't even come close to that. I also had to take into consideration the geographical location of the vehicle, which involved a three hour round trip as it was, so a preliminary site visit to accurately measure the vehicle would have potentially doubled the travelling time/fuel etc. and effectively taken another working day out of my schedule. all this would have obviously incurred many extra costs which would have been unacceptable to the customer, but besides all that, if I couldn't do a simple job like that without a template, there wouldn't be much hope for me as a signwriter. P.S. The double shade is something that you don't see too often and whilst it doesn't neccessarily suit all applications, when used sparingly it can be an incredibly effective and relatively fast way of making something 'pop' without going down that whole "must use every colour in the spectrum/chisel faced/ bevelled edge/outlined/inlined/blended block shadow/cast shadow with extra drop shadow etc. etc. etc. circus cart route.
Thanks. French chalk works best as a resist, but baby powder can certainly be used in an emergency, although it may not work quite as well. Ordinary white chalk can also be used by crushing a few sticks into powder in an applicator made from a piece of muslin or mutton cloth (stockingette) tied into a pouch.
Absolutely wonderful Patience & control. How on earth do you get that constant fluidity { viscosity } the paint just leaves the tip of the brush in a constant smooth flow...Are the bristles treated with something afore hand to cause the paint to run off them ? or, are there a couple of drops of additive in the paint for it to slide off the bristles...But again just marvellous and amazing for you to demonstrate your skills for us newbies to study...Thankyou.
No Eric, the brushes aren't pre treated with anything...they're made from pure red sable which has a natural taper and a superior spring to it. These brushes (kinda like guitar strings) can take many, many hours of working in before they can even be considered to be useful...but the end justifies the means. You also need to have the viscocity of the paint pretty much perfect and different sized brushes and different colours & makes of paint will each require a totally different approach for usage.
@@JohnBoy-Signwriter Thanyou for courtesy of a reply John, I asked because I know a Guy from USA, who uses a touch of Vitamin E oil on his brushes for pin striping, which is a natural additive for bristle health; and his fine scrollers seemed to last forever. Thanks again.
@@ericashmusic8889 Signwriters have traditionally treated their natural haired lettering brushes with neatsfoot oil, which is derived from boiled cow hooves, but this is for storage purposes ie. it can help maintain the required shape along with preventing paint build-up in the heel. To be honest, it's not something that I have bothered much with in the last 42 years, and If I have ever needed to re shape a brush, I would use hot vaseline...I have also heard of some of the real old timers who would only use Gin.
I just started hand lettering as a hobby. The tip that really made the light bulb go off for me was, every movement is in unison with every muscle, tendon, sinew from the finger to the shoulder.
