No Matter How Much You Love It, Work Is Hard

by Ariela

We're generally pretty cheery about our work process here at Geek Calligraphy on this blog. But today I want to pull back the curtain a bit and talk about some of the ways in which it is challenging.

Geek Calligraphy is a side gig for me. I have a day job that I work 35 hours per week (and only 35 hours, thank you, labor union). I create all the Geek Calligraphy art, write my portion of the blog posts, take commissions, and do scribal work around the edges of that. This means that I have financial security while I work on building up this business.

With the recent addition of scribal work to that load, however, I have started to strain the feasibility of this arrangement to the breaking point. There are only so many hours in a day, and aside from shifting more of the blogging burden onto Terri, I haven't really cut back on any of the other work associated with Geek Calligraphy. We still do a product release every month. I have a backlog of commissions that's over six months long. (Sorry people who don't have definitive deadlines! I promise I have not forgotten you!)

I have more work than I can feasibly accomplish while maintaining a full-time job, but not enough that I could quit said full-time job. (Also, my spouse is a grad student. That day job is what keeps a roof over our heads and food on our table.) Someday I would like to ditch the day job and do calligraphy and scribal work full time, but I am not there yet. Reducing my hours at my day job is not currently an option, and finding a new one that would cover our expenses, include benefits, and not require more hours is as likely as finding a unicorn grazing in Central Park (if you see one, it's probably a hoax).

Nobody is forcing me to do this. I could quit anytime, but I don't want to, because I love doing art and I love getting my art out to people who appreciate it. I don't want to stop doing scribal work, or product releases for Geek Calligraphy, because both of those are important groundwork for that elusive someday when I might be able to be a full-time artist. So I work too much, get out too little, and keep saying to myself "someday!"

And right now, I feel like this:

Gif shows Barry Allen on a treadmill.

Tishrei is Coming!

by Ariela

Today is the first day of the Jewish month of Elul, which means only one thing.

Brace yourselves....

Image shows Ned Stark blowing a shofar, with the words "Tishrei is Coming."

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

AAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!

AAAAAAAGGHHHHHHHHH!

Ahem.

For those of you who aren't Jewish, or aren't observant, you may be wondering what all the yelling is about. 

Rosh HaShanah, or Jewish New Year* is on the first of the month of Tishrei. It kicks off an entire month of festivities. Rosh HaShanah runs two full days in the lunar calendar (meaning it starts in the evening and ends two evenings later). It involves going to very, very long prayer services and eating a festive meal each dinner and lunch, usually shared with other people. Think four Thanksgiving meals in two days. So that's the first two days of the month.

On the 10th day of the month is Yom Kippur. That's a day of fasting and atonement. There's no eating or drinking during the day itself, but that means lots of hydrating leading up to it, and we are supposed to eat a large, festive meal before the fast starts.

On the 15th day of the month starts the holiday of Sukkot, or the Feast of Tabernacles. If you have Jewish neighbors and see them putting up an oddly flimsy looking hut-like thing in their yard with a bunch of dead plants on the top of it, that's a sukkah, a booth or a tabernacle. Said booth is not supposed to be built before Yom Kippur, but it must be completely finished by the time Sukkot starts. We spend the next 7 days eating in these booths, starting with two more days of holiday (or one, if you live in Israel or are Reform, about which more below**), during which we spend more time praying and eat another four Thanksgiving-dinners-worth of meals. Yes, in the hut, we eat all that food in the hut. There are lots of bugs, and sometimes raccoons, skunks, and coyotes.

On the 22nd day of the month is Sh'mini Atzeret, the Eighth Day of Assembly. It's another festival day, with more long prayers. Eating in the tabernacle is optional on this day, but there are still two festive meals to be eaten.

On the 23rd day of the month is Simchat Torah (in Israel and on the Reform calendar, this is combined with Sh'mini Atzeret), the Celebration of the Torah. This is when we celebrate completing the annual reading of the Pentateuch and begin the lection cycle anew. It is a relatively new holiday, but there's still lots of praying and eating, though not outside anymore.

All of this is in addition to regular Sabbath observance, which involves more festive meals and praying. Also, those of us who are observant of the Jewish prohibitions against work on the holidays have to take a whole mess of days off from our jobs, but deadlines don't get pushed back.

In sum, in the space of a month we need to prepare and host or be hosted for about 13 Thanksgiving dinners, spend 7 full days in synagogue, still observe the Sabbath, and meet all of our regular work deadlines. Hence the screaming. All of this goes double if you actually work in a synagogue and have to orchestrate this at a professional level as well as for yourself as an individual.

Some Additional Notes

*Rosh HaShanah is usually referred to as "the Jewish New Year," but we actually have four new year celebrations each year. Rosh HaShanah commemorates the creation of the world and is the start of the Jewish calendrical year. The other three are:

• New year for the trees, happens toward the end of winter, also was the start of the tax season in historical Judea;
• Liturgical new year, happens in the spring, on the first of the month of Nisan;
• New year for animal tithes, happens in the summer (today, in fact, first of Elul).

**Why is the holiday calendar different in Israel than for Jews outside of Israel, except for Reform Jews?

Okay, buckle in.

The Jewish calendar is a lunar calendar. In the days of the Temple and the Sanhedrin (the Jewish High Court) in Jerusalem, instead of having a fixed calendar each new month was declared when two witnesses came and swore that they had seen the new moon. Once the new month was declared, the proclamation was spread by means of signal fires, think the Warning Beacons of Gondor. While Jewish holidays listed in the bible have only one day of Festival observance (with the corresponding abstention from work, feasting, sacrifices at the Temple, etc.), the rabbis declared that those living outside the Land of Israel should observe two days of each Festival, in case of any lag or confusion caused by the time it takes to transmit the proclamation of the new month. (The exception is Yom Kippur, since telling people to go without food or drink for 48 hours is impractical and, in many cases, dangerous.)

Before you ask, yes, they had astronomy and almanacs back then, everyone could have worked it out for themselves when the holidays would occur, regardless of location. That wasn't the point. The point was that the new month did not begin until the Sanhedrin declared it so.

Most Jews who live in the modern State of Israel no longer consider themselves obligated to follow the requirement of the additional day of holiday observance. (Whether that is because they are in the historical location of the Land of Israel or they consider the modern State to be a new manifestation of the historical Land is a point of serious debate. Let's not go there now.) Likewise, the Reform Movement has declared that, in light of the calendar now being fixed as opposed to each holiday being individually declared, they see no need to retain the second day observance. The Conservative and Orthodox Movements outside of Israel retain the additional day.

Except Rosh HaShanah is still observed for two days within the State of Israel and by most Reform congregations. Why? I don't know.

Geek Calligraphy Abroad

by Terri

My sister got married just outside of Jerusalem yesterday. I have been in Israel with my family for the last almost month. Working over an eight hour time difference has been... fun. In the way of sticking sharp objects in one's eyes and dental surgery sans anesthesia. On the other hand, I have lots of great pictures. Here is a selection:

Half of Reading Station/תחנת קריה. This is an old bus stop, repurposed into a free library. 
[Image shows a man, woman and stroller in front of a bus shelter filled with bookshelves]

Wine grapes (either cabernet or malbec) at the Tzuba Winery. [Image shows two clusters of blue-purple grapes amid healthy green leaves]

Mosaic map of The Cardo (Roman street in the Old City of Jerusalem.

A solo cat and a cat who owns a person consider each other, rather like the cats in The Aeronaut's Windlass. [Image shows a thin cat with a white belly and calico back staring down a much more well fed grey and black tabby with a red collar]

Monster at the western retaining wall of the Temple Mount (also known as The Kotel). [Image shows a small child in a red t-shirt and rainbow skirt touching the stones of a wall that's over 2000 years old.]

Making friends with a boa constrictor at the Biblical Museum of Natural History. [Image shows me with a large brown snake wrapped around my arms whose head is extending up my neck. The expression on my face is half amused, half terror]

Wide interior shot of the stalactite caves in the Sorek Valley. Visible in the center is the stalagmite feature often referred to as "the ice cream cone with three scoops."

Classic shot of the Kotel and Temple Mount. [Image shows the stone wall of the Temple mount and the gold dome of the Dome of the Rock mosque]

I Love Coloring

by Terri

Animated .gif of me coloring a tulip purple.

Knitting is my primary hobby. So much so that I shipped a large box of yarn to Israel to make sure that I would have enough to knit while on vacation there.

But in addition, I love to color in so-called "adult coloring books." No, they don't have naughty pictures in them (though my favorite book so far has many many naughty words), but they are often more difficult to use than ones designed for children. Typically the images are subdivided into many small shapes, that require more fine motor control than the average five year old possesses. In theory they are designed to be calming and somewhat meditative. Before discovering the F*cking Awesome Coloring Book, my favorite books were generally based on on mehndi designs or other geometric shapes. 

Ariela, on the other hand, finds the whole idea of coloring line art she didn't draw herself twitch inducing. She likens it to wearing someone else's underwear. So the idea of Geek Calligraphy coloring pages never actually occurred to her - she doesn't find it enjoyable, so why should she make them for other people? 

First test version of the Spoon Dragon coloring page. Monster has since absconded with the original.

In my house, there are Monster's markers and Mommy's markers (generally very fine felt tip pens, but I also like brush tips for larger area coverage). I also have a box of colored pencils, and have branched out into gel pens. I have discovered the joy of coloring cabbages and achieving exact radial symmetry in my work. Coloring taps into the part of my brain that is more than happy to choose a radically different yarn than the pattern designer intended, but won't make structural alterations to the pattern itself. In my world, Spoon Dragon is a lovely shade of lilac with blue hair. Fantastic blues and greens show up in every bird, not just peacocks. And I always have something to do while waiting for major web edits to do their thing. In fact, while working on this post, I have been coloring a large raptor type bird wearing sunglasses and holding a piece of pizza in its talons. The bird is in magnificent flourescent shades and the pizza cheese is sparkly. I didn't have to create the bird myself, which is awesome. I just get to choose what it looks like.

So if you like to color, you're in good company. And we'll continue to turn some of Ariela's line art into downloadable pages for you to enjoy.

New Product Line: Printable Coloring Pages

Did you know there was a National Coloring Book Day? It's today! In honor thereof, we are releasing our August products early this month.

Are you the kind of person who finds the idea of coloring cabbages soothing? Do you own a collection of markers and colored pencils that are specific to the grownups in your home? Then you're going to love our new product line of printable coloring pages!

How It Came to Be:

The adult coloring phenomenon completely mystifies Ariela. She likens coloring inside someone else's line art to wearing someone else's underwear. Terri, on the other hand, finds coloring a soothing activity when knitting starts to bother her joints. One day, Terri found a wonderful coloring book from a company called Calligraphuck. The book was called the F*cking Awesome Coloring Book. The lettering and line work struck Ariela as something she might be able to do and wondered if they took submissions. Terri responded that she could easily turn existing artwork into a downloadable coloring page, like Ursula Vernon does. This led to the pilot page that debuted as a WisCon surprise - Fuck You Pay Me as a coloring page. Today we are releasing that page to the general public, as well as launching the Spoon Dragon coloring page.

Because Ariela finds other people's line art so discomfiting, Terri does all the product testing for these items. She is incredibly happy that she gets paid to color. 

Our downloadable coloring pages are $2 each. This gets you a high resolution file that you can print as many times as you like and color to your heart's content.

(We hope this goes without saying, but PLEASE respect our copyright and intellectual property. When you buy the download, that is for your unlimited use, but not for sharing around and not for posting elsewhere online, except as you proudly display your pretty results. If you do post said pretty results, please tag us!)

Eicha

by Ariela

Tonight begins the fast of Tisha B'Av, the ninth day of the month of Av in the Jewish calendar. It is a day of mourning for the destruction of both Temples in Jerusalem, and mourning the sinat chinam, the baseless hatred that brought said destruction about.

On the eve of the Ninth of Av, we read the book of Lamentations, identified in Hebrew as Eicha for its opening word. Before we sign off later today for the duration of the fast, we wanted to share a few images of scrolls and codices of Eicha.

Scroll of Eicha damaged during the Holocaust. Image from the dubious site Scrolls4all.org.

Photo of a scroll open to the third chapter of Eicha. The text is formatted to in diagonals that are supposed to look like walls falling in.
Image from HaSoferet.com

Opening page of Eicha from British Library MS 4709 f. 149r. The penman was Abraham ben Mordecai Farissol. Note the marginalia.
Browse all of BL MS 4709 on their site.

Opening of Eicha in British Library MS 10455. Not sure why the initial isn't filled in, as it is in other books in the same codex. Also note the hand, which is closer to the Birds' Head Haggadah hand.
Browse all of BL MS 10455 on their site.

And now we are off to contemplate the consequences of sinat chinam, baseless hatred, which led to the destruction of the Temple. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Fun With Flowers

by Terri

Stock photo of a bouquet of flowers in a green glass vase. It has pink roses, baby's breath, ferns, pink & white lilies, purple statice flowers, forget me nots, blue daisies and a purple flower not tagged.
Photo via 123rf

When advertisers exhort us to "say it with flowers," they often don't know how deliberately flowers can talk. While everyone knows that roses mean romance, did you know that daisies mean innocence? Or that larkspur means haughtiness? And that's only according to this flower dictionary.*

When we set out to make our Covertly Hostile series of cards, we took inspiration from the Victorian** custom of using flowers to send messages without words. People used to send each other bouquets that could be anything from a poem to a gorgeous insult. According to our favorite dictionary, the stock bouquet pictured means something along the lines of: "You are my true love because of your innocent, elegant, beauty and loyalty." And that's just what I could figure out from the flowers I actually know. 

The knowledge that flowers can carry intricately coded messages is not longer quite as popular as it used to be. This helps us create our Covertly Hostile cards - the average person doesn't dissect the image of a bouquet of flowers the way the Victorians might have. This means that they usually see "generic pretty thing" and leave it at that, and you can feel free to say exactly what you need to.

*There have always been multiple flower dictionaries. Flowers could have incredibly regionally specific meanings, that often contradicted meanings from the next county over.

**While the Victorians took the custom to their usual elaborate conclusions, flowers have carried meanings since at least Shakespeare.

New Greeting Card: Covertly Hostile Thank You Card

Did someone get you a gift that you Do Not Want? Did a relative get you something that you need or want, but comes with burdensome strings attached? Were you on the receiving end of a gesture that comes with Expectations of Reciprocity TM? Then send them this card.

How it Came to Be:

With the release of the Covertly Hostile Mother's Day card, we had multiple requests for a similarly styled Thank You card. Everyone has that one person in their lives that gets them a gift where the obligations imposed by the gift far outweigh any benefits of the gift itself.

The card features three types of flowers. Rhododendrons are poisonous and mean beware, yellow carnations mean "No!"*, and lint flowers. We're pretty sure that lint is a relative of flax, and it means "I feel my obligations." Those are the small blue flowers. As with the Mother's Day card, the recipient doesn't need to know any of this. All they need to see is a pretty bouquet of flowers. In addition, there is no master flower dictionary. This provides plausible deniability. 

Like all of our cards, the Covertly Hostile Thank You is available singly for $4.00 and as a pack of 6 for $20.00.

*That is literally how it appears in our favorite flower dictionary. 

There's a New Way to Support Our Work!

by Ariela

There are lots of ways to support creators you like. Up until recently, the only ways to support us have been to buy our art and to spread the word about our art. Today we are adding a third option: buying us "coffee."

Ko-fi logo

Ko-fi is a free service that allows fans to give money to creators in small amounts, amounts roughly equivalent to buying them a coffee.

Y U No Patreon?

Patreon is probably the best known crowdfunding service for creators, but it has never really been an option for us. Patreon's reward system tends to depend on offering special perks each month for the highest donors, either in the form of early releases or additional content. Our content doesn't tend to be sequential such that getting access to it early would be particularly enticing, and we're already working to our maximum capacity to get each product released each month and complete commissions so creating more content isn't an option for us right now.

That's why Ko-fi is a good model for us. We recognize that there are plenty of reasons why someone may appreciate our work without wanting or being able to buy our art. But we hope that people will be inspired to support us in other ways.

So, will you buy us a coffee?

P.S. Some of you may be finding this a little ironic. After all my loathing of coffee is legendary. I don't have anything witty to say about it other than to shrug and say that I am not actually being paid in coffee, so I can use it to buy tea, or, more likely, matboard for art. Also, Terri does like coffee, and she is half of this outfit.

Calligraphy Tools: Beyond Pens

by Ariela

This is a followup to the post of several weeks ago about different types of calligraphy pens. While pens are, in many ways, the most important tool of the trade, it would be a lot harder to get good results without others.

Ariela's drafting table with t-square hanging off it.

Drafting Table

You won’t get far without a good surface to write on. The sloped surface of a drafting table considerably reduces strain. When working on large surfaces, I increase the angle to bring the top closer to myself. Even when working on smaller pieces, the slant means that the pen meets the paper or parchment at a different angle than it would on a flat surface.

Mine is a Bieffe AF15, but brand matters much less than height and range of angles. As long as one adjusts to heights and angles that are comfortable for you, that's all that matters.

Good lighting is important while working. Many artists, myself included, answer this need by installing a swingarm lamp on one corner of their drafting table, but there are plenty of other solutions available.

T-Square

Making straight, parallel lines is one of the most important preparatory steps for calligraphy. Some drafting tables have a ruling tool built in. Mine doesn’t and I like it that way; there are times when I want to be able to use the entire surface of the table. Instead, I use a t-square together with the flat edge of the table to rule parallel lines. Mine is three feet long.

Ariela rests a triangle on her t-square.

Triangle

When making vertical lines, it isn’t always practical to flip the t-square and use it vertically; for one thing, the t-square is quite a bit longer than the table is tall, and jabbing myself in the gut is not fun. When I need to make a small to medium vertical line, I rest a triangle on top of my t-square.

Lettering Guide

Ariela rests a lettering guide on a t-square.

This little gizmo saves me so much time. Instead of measuring along the side of my writing area and marking each point at which I should draw a parallel line, I sit it on top of my t-square and it does all the spacing for me. (This is another way the slant of the drafting table helps – I can use gravity to keep the bottom of the lettering guide flush with the t-square.) I can change the line height by rotating the disc in the center between 3mm height and 10 mm height. If I want to work bigger than that, I can skip holes in the center or use the ones along the sides.

If you are a calligrapher and you don't have one of these, I highly recommend acquiring one. They are cheapest from Blick Art.

Lead Holder/Lead

Hand holding lead holder.

This is the original mechanical pencil. While you can now get leads of different weights to load into modern mechanical pencils, I prefer this one for a few reasons. You do sharpen this lead, unlike your standard mechanical pencil. This means that you can choose how much you sharpen it; if a super sharp lead tends to cause you to gouge holes in your paper, you can keep it a little bit dull. The lead is thicker than the 5mm or 7mm standard to mechanical pencils now, so I don’t snap it as easily when inserting it into the holes of the lettering guide. I also just like the feel of this pencil body, the weight and the balance. Others might prefer different pencil bodies. I tend to use a 2H lead, which provides a good balance between producing a line that is dark enough to see but doesn’t lay down enough lead to smudge much while working.

Guard Sheet

I put a piece of paper under my hand to prevent the oils from my hand from touching the paper too much as I rest my hand while writing. It can be any scrap piece of paper.

There are more tools still for when I need to do fancy schmancy things, but these are the ones that get used in basically every calligraphy project

Questions?

I love talking about the technical aspects of calligraphy. The best way to get in touch is to tweet @GeekCalligraphy.