Overall, I stayed pretty true to the original lettering. I wanted this design to have a friendly, approachable look, to be round, bubbly and playful. The letterforms were originally more narrow, so I made them wider and put more emphasis on the contrast to bring out the look I wanted to convey. I experimented with whether or not to make it a connected, semi-connected or unconnected typeface, and decided on the connected version as it added more detail and interest. I created an unconnected version as a stylistic set which is also used for contextual alternates. I like for the connectors on the letters to be shorter before a space or punctuation, it just looks cleaner that way. Plus, it makes the design more versatile and provides a more casual option.  

While remodeling and organizing my studio, I realized that I had been collecting (more like hoarding!) a lot of tools and materials for lettering and illustration over the last couple of decades, some of which I had never even used. This led me to an experimental lettering phase using what I had rediscovered to see what I had been missing out on. One item that I had overlooked completely was my set of Speedball B nibs. When my older sister was away at college, she had visited an art supply store that was going out of business. She told me that they were selling all of their Speedball nibs for the bargain price of ten cents a piece. She asked me how many them I wanted, and I said, "All of them!" Two hundred nibs and twenty dollars later, I ended up with quite the collection. I had been using the C nibs for years, but hadn't really touched the others, so I decided to end the cold spell and experiment with these. I fell in love with the round B nibs, they were so perfect for creating a casual, springy, round marker-like look. I had been wanting to create a mono-line typeface, but whenever I attempted it, I quickly became frustrated as the lettering didn't look the way I had envisioned. I had simply been using the wrong tools! Now I had my answer, and I set about filling up a stack of papers with what would be the beginning of my latest typeface, Shelby.

During my years spent as a graphic designer, I was always on the look out for a typeface that would work well for both the handwritten note look that could also double as a splashy headline that wouldn't be too frilly. What I was looking for seemed to fall in between a handwriting font and a script font. Most of the handwriting fonts I found looked a little too authentic, too average looking. Not something that jumps out at you – not sexy, refined and slick enough to be used for headlines. Script fonts were generally too constructed in appearance, taking on a look of formality when I wanted a casual appearance. If I had the time, which I rarely seemed to, I would hand letter what I was looking for. This is where Shelby fits in. The look of polished handwriting with an advertising edge.

Trying to achieve a handwritten look for a typeface is more difficult than it may seem. I spent most of my time working out letter solutions on paper and I had to practice a lot of restraint with any editing done on the computer. Too much editing after the fact can quickly diminish the natural appearance of the letters. When I look at the letters close up on a computer screen, I start seeing flaws that I didn't see during or after the hand lettering phase, and of course, I want to fix them. And, sometimes I also want to modify the letters so they look similar to their family members (ie; b, d, p, q). Both of these practices, while important with most designs, can become the undoing of a natural, handwritten look. The key to a good handwriting font is its quirks and inconsistencies. Trying to strike a balance between just enough consistency to avoid visual chaos while retaining its natural appearance is the challenge.

This design requires more ligatures and contextual alternates than what you might see in your average typeface – necessary to maintain a natural appearance. I paid close attention to my habits when lettering this style according to what letters I would naturally connect or leave unconnected, and if I changed a letter style based on what it was next to. I included some alternate letterforms and some swash letters too for the designer that wishes to do their own experimentation with this typeface.

So here is the final result - I am pretty happy with how it turned out and I hope you like it too!

After I had found the lettering style I liked best, I practiced it until felt natural to me. This takes time and practice and can be quite frustrating. It feels as though you're lettering with the opposite hand! Very awkward. However, it's essential for me to get to where I can work out the style on paper with ease. It allows me to determine how to handle challenges such as letters that collide and to make sure that there is consistency among them. There always are a couple of difficult letters that I will spend hours on trying to get right – the list of culprits typically consist of the letters x, z, s and k.

After I had several sheets of letters, I scanned them in, and then in Photoshop, I set up a simple document approximately 5 inches tall by 50 inches long. I sorted through the pages of letters, selecting, copying and pasting my favorites into the master document. I ended up with 2-4 versions of each letter. I lined them all up on a baseline and made simple adjustments, such as scaling until they were all the same size, rotating and adjusting contrast if needed. The result was a long line up of letter possibilities. Once I saw it laid out all together like that, I had a much better idea of what to keep and what to toss. I whittled it down to one or two versions of each.

raw scans from lettering sheets

Next, using the brush and eraser tool, I made modifications to the letters. If this were done by hand, it would similar to using a technical marker and white correction paint. I use a tablet and stylus to do all of my work. I love tablets – I’ve been using them for almost 15 years. I don’t even think I own a mouse! Tablets allow you to have more control of tools such as the paint brush as they are pressure sensitive and the size and shape of the brush varies with how much pressure you apply.

touch up in Photoshop

After I had everything drawn up just so, I brought the drawing into FontLab (copy/paste from Photoshop). With the pen tool, and using the drawing as a template, I drew my vector outlines around the forms. This step usually surprises people when I explain how I work. They aren’t expecting Photoshop to be part of my process and they sometimes ask why I don’t just use auto-trace. I suppose it’s because I’m very hands on – I like the process of adjusting letters in this way. I feel as though I have a closer connection and intimacy with the forms, and when it comes to drawing outlines, I much prefer to draw the path outright myself. I feel I have more control this way and can make decisions and adjustments as I go.

redrawn in FontLab

In a relatively short period of time, I had the basic character set drawn up and assembled in FontLab. When I set a few sentences, it actually turned out fairly decent looking – which is rarely the case. It’s more common that I shriek in horror when I see the first draw through and have to go back to the table and make major changes, sometimes starting over completely. But this time, I got lucky.

Now, I’d like to add a side note about where the big divide exists between lettering and type design. Lettering is essentially immutable – the word or phrase exists in one combination of letters, and as a lettering artist, you may embellish as you wish, designing the letters around each other, getting the design to work together in one cohesive unit. You have a certain amount of freedom that doesn’t exist with type design. If you were to separate all of those letters out and rearrange them, the design would fall apart. With typeface design, this can be amended somewhat by incorporating swash letters or alternate forms, but even so, it still won’t have the same qualities as an individual, custom piece of lettering. In typeface design, the letters have to be more generic, simplified and consistent (unless you want a completely chaotic looking typeface). Letters need to work together in any combination, and it takes a lot of adjustments to get it there. You have to consider the letters in ever changing groups, not individually. This is also the point where, if a natural, hand-lettered looking typeface is desired, decisions have to be made about allowing some variance to occur within the letters to give them personality without it being overly distracting and causing collisions.

As I continued, the first major challenge I encountered was getting the uppercase letters to work with the lowercase. The uppercase set I had designed at first was a bit much. I took some print outs with me to show my graphic design friends when we met up for dinner and drinks one night. They all emphatically agreed that they were too fancy for the more casual looking lowercase, and as I drove home, I was grateful for the confirmation of my suspicions, but knew that I had to create an entire new uppercase set to pair up with the lowercase letters I currently had. It took time and experimentation to get a new set designed, but once I had it finished, I was glad I had changed it. I kept the original set for use when other swash letters were employed and used it as the default for Samantha Italic, were it was better suited.

The next challenge was what to do about swash letters. I knew I wanted to create a set, but I was concerned about how to style them for an upright design. I was drawing a blank! I sat down and drew several sketches, wracking my brain for ideas as I trudged through it. The struggle resulted in the unexpected – more swashes and alternates that I originally thought was possible. I think if the ideas had come easily to me, there wouldn’t be nearly as many choices as there are now. I had to push myself through this mental block and in doing so, I ended up making Samantha Script into my largest family yet. I wanted there to be something for nearly every design situation. I concentrated on creating a range of styles from simple to complex along with other factors, such as length of the ascenders and descenders. I ended up with over 1100 alternates and swashes. I have to admit, when it got that far, I sat back and wondered if I was losing my mind. What was I thinking? It was a lot to manage, and perhaps I had done too much? Perhaps. But I thought back to when I was a graphic designer, and how I loved having a myriad of choices with the typefaces I owned. I wanted as much as was offered. I may not use them all, but you never know which ones you’ll use. And, the larger the selection, the more you have to choose from and you have a higher probability of finding exactly what works for you.

Next… the story behind creating the catchwords that complement Samantha Script.

After I finished up designing and publishing Liam, I sat down to figure out what my next project was going to be. I had a lot of ideas, but nothing concrete worked out. I'd come up with one concept, spend the day sketching and lettering on it, get excited about it and then wake up the next morning to have changed my mind – again! Nothing was sticking and I wasn’t feeling the love on any of my ideas. And that’s important for me. I have to be able to get behind my concepts with full fledged passion and energy. It was getting frustrating, and quite honestly, a little scary! I like having a plan!

Some examples of lettering practice while trying to come up with an idea. As you can see, I was all over the place!I decided to quit trying so hard to come up with the perfect idea, and figured I might as well loosen up and just get back to basics. Just start lettering. Something will eventually come of it. I have learned this to be true with just about everything in life. Quit thinking so much and just do something – anything! Many times it will have wonderful results further reaching than you could've imagined. I just needed to fill my brain with ideas until the right one spilled out.

So I got out my favorite lettering tool – a pointed nib dip pen. I love these things, but it's really tricky to find just the perfect one, I've been at it for years, going through different nib styles/brands/etc to find the perfect one. I have officially declared my undying love for the Brause Rose nib. It is very flexible and has a large ink reservoir.

Brause Rose Nib

I experimented and played with different lettering styles and I found myself achieving this zen like state with a high contrast upright kind of looping script. It was so simple and methodical, I was in a trance. I knew I was onto something.

I started to explore the idea further, because it was still pretty vague. Sure, I had decided on a high contrast, upright connected script, big deal. That's not a tight enough concept. From there you could have all kinds of looks to it. Is it going to be modern or old fashioned looking, geometric or smooth and flowing? Et cetera or etcetera? I had to define it further.

I like to develop a little story in my mind about my designs and I ask myself a lot of questions about it. What are the thoughts and feelings I want it to evoke? What does it say, what is its voice? How will it be useful to the designer, what purpose does it serve in the vast marketplace of fonts and what is the niche I’m filling with this design? I put together lists of descriptive words and phrases to shape it. Sometimes I like to think of it in other frames of reference, such as, if this typeface were a celebrity, who would it be? If it was a place, where would it be? If it were a song… and so on.

While this is helpful, there’s even more to it than that. The visualization process I’ve outlined goes hand in hand with, well, what your hand does on paper. It’s an organic process – they both drive each other, one idea builds upon the next and this evolution starts to take shape. And, as I worked my way through it, I focused on the overall look and feel and started shaping it by thinking about the visual impact it had and what it was lacking. For example, I might think to myself – I want this to look friendlier. What is it that makes it look so cold and uninviting and how can I make it seem more approachable? Oh, I see. It’s too sharp and angular, not round enough – round is friendly. This phase of my design process is where I make my most dramatic changes. Many times I look back at where I started and I’m surprised to see how I arrived at the current solution. It’s usually quite different than what I started with.

With Samantha, it didn’t stray as much as some of my other designs have, but it certainly had its own shape shifting qualities. I began with a very loopy, open script, thinking that it would be a fun, exuberant style. But it looked overdone and messy. So I started to tighten it up and rein it in. As I did this, I was making decisions about whether I wanted it to be an upright script or slanted. I decided to focus on the upright style and table the slanted version for the time being. I’ve always liked upright scripts, they’re economical with space and usually more legible than other script styles. I wanted it to look modern and polished, with elegance and warmth to it. I wanted the base version of it to be simple and clean, but be able to dress it up and get extravagant with the addition of swashes and flourishes. That way the designer has many more uses for it than if it were just a simple script, or a fully decked out design. I wanted to create a wide range of possibilities so there is something for all parts of the spectrum.

I decided to name it after my niece, Samantha, who is in her senior year of high school. The design was already starting to look like her in a way and reflect her personality. A typical teen, her appearance is important to her. She and I have spent many hours shopping, I act as her assistant, carrying her vast selections of clothing and accessories while she tries things on and carefully selects her new outfits. There are always lots of dresses in the mix, the fancier the better, and although she has no intention of buying any of them, she loves to try them on. For as much time as she spends picking out what she’s going to wear and how to style her hair that day, she usually ends up with a rather casual dress style. But when it comes to dressing up, like for a dance… she pulls out all the stops. This is also similar to how she lives. She is a straight ‘A’ student, well spoken and thoughtful, with the details of her life in order. However, she loves new experiences and is very adventurous and spirited. So this design represents her well. And it helped in the design process being able to put a face and personality to it all.

To be continued…
There’s more to the story than this, but alas, I am too verbose to put it all in one article/blog post. It’s been written and almost ready to go, so come back in a couple of days to read more about the process and details of how I actually went about to develop and bring this font to market!