How to Do Brush Lettering with Free Practice Worksheets. Download these free worksheets and get practicing!
How to Do Brush Lettering
Brush lettering takes some practice but it’s really fun once you get the hang of it. Using a marker or pen with a brush nib, you use pressure to create a calligraphic style of lettering. On the upstrokes, you use light pressure and on the down strokes, you use heavier pressure. I’ll demonstrate this in a video later in the post.
Practice definitely makes progress, so I designed some free printable practice sheets. I suggest printing these and trying to do them once a day until you are comfortable with using pressure to create the calligraphic lettering style.
Paper Matters
Using the proper paper keeps your brush tips in great condition so look for ultra-smooth paper designed for use with brush pens and markers. My favorites are:
- Rhodia Dot Pad
- Canson Marker Paper
- Copic X-Press It Paper
- Watercolor Paper: Hot Press is smoother than Cold Press so opt for the hot press!
- Copy Paper: HP Premium Choice Laserjet Paper
Holding the Brush Pen
You can really hold your pen however it is comfortable for you, but one thing you need to do is hold it at a roughly 45-degree angle, as demonstrated in the video at the top of this post.
More Brush Lettering / Brush Calligraphy Basics
- Check out my Brush Calligraphy FAQs post here.
- Read all about my favorite Brush Calligraphy Supplies here.
- Download the free practice worksheets here.
- Recommend brush pen for the worksheets: Tombow Dual Tips
Watch a Brush Calligraphy Basics Video here:
This video is a free mini bonus module from my Constellation Lettering Online Class.
The 30 Days of Drills Workbook
This workbook is perfect for busy beginners who want to learn the art of Brush Calligraphy. Commit to doing just one worksheet every day for 30 days and keep track of your progress with the included checklist!
NEW! The 30 Days of ABCs for Small Brush Pens
The second workbook in the 30 Day series is here! Commit to just one worksheet a day, and you’ll see significant improvements over the month.
Want to learn Brush Lettering in a more in-depth way?
- Check out the free hand-lettering worksheets archives here.
- Beginners: Check out my 30 Days of Drills Workbook above!
- Intermediate: Check out my Constellation Lettering Online Class here.
Are you a fellow writing-utensil addict?
Check out all my favorite Pens, Markers and Pencils here.
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Alesandra Gubatan says
November 20, 2015 at 2:17 amso cute i love lettering <3
Juliet says
December 30, 2015 at 4:16 pmThank you so much for this! I am just starting to get into brush lettering and I can’t wait! I got my Tombow Dual Brush Pens from Amazon today and I’m so excited!
Dawn Nicole says
January 1, 2016 at 1:16 pmYay! It’s so fun! You’re going to love those pens!
Isd says
April 27, 2019 at 9:33 amOmg! me too! I was thinking to get thos pens!
Liz says
January 8, 2016 at 9:45 pmThank you so much!! Can’t wait to practice.
angie says
February 6, 2016 at 10:13 amthank you so much!!
Alana says
February 13, 2016 at 9:02 pmHi! I am a lefty myself trying to practice a bit of brush lettering everyday. I use Tombows as well but I have a problem with the tips “fraying” quite fast. Do you have any thoughts on this? Thanks for the videos and the practice sheets, can’t wait to practice on them 🙂
Dawn Nicole says
February 16, 2016 at 8:08 amHi Alana! Check out these tips from fellow brush calligrapher Sharisse: https://www.instagram.com/p/6i3b1KkQYI/ 🙂
Emma says
February 15, 2016 at 8:23 amHi Dawn. These look great, thanks so much! Unfortunately, when I printed the practice sheets from the PDF, they came out as your bog-standard Arial (or something similar). Is there a special setting I need to print them out? I’ve copied by eye this morning but my letter sizes are all over the place even on grid paper. xD
Dawn Nicole says
February 16, 2016 at 8:07 amHi Emma! I’m so sorry I can’t seem to replicate this issue and all my art class students have been printing these just fine. Is your Adobe Acrobat Software up to date? Try saving them to your desktop, opening and printing with up to date Adobe Reader.
Emma says
February 17, 2016 at 3:10 amOh yes, that made a tremendous difference! I just opened it up in Adobe Reader (no saving required, for anyone who might have the same issue). I’m guessing it’s something about Firefox that doesn’t render the images properly.
Thanks Dawn <3
victor says
March 6, 2016 at 5:59 pmu were so cool letting us download this perfect practice sheet!! thanks so much, btw i love this font that im using to comment here, what is it?
Jamie says
March 14, 2016 at 8:30 pmHi Dawn I was wondering if there is another brand besides towbow that you could suggest. Amazon has 1-3 month to ship on towbow and I just cannot see waiting that long. Thanks much
Arancha says
June 5, 2016 at 7:50 amHello!
Fist of all Thank you Very Much for all these amazing brush lettering worksheets because you give us many free oportunities to improve our lettering or just begin as in my case. I’ll buy your brush book with practise worksheets the quick I can. Thank you again for everything. I live in Spain and it’s not easy to find worksheets so thanks to you I can begin learning in my few free time.
Cherish says
June 23, 2016 at 10:28 amI am having difficulty downloading the practice sheets for the brush strokes. Is there a different way to access them? Thank you in advance.
Dawn Nicole says
June 25, 2016 at 7:27 amHi Cherish! I just double checked the link and the download is working properly, so maybe try with another browser? Also make sure to use a laptop or computer, not a mobile device. 🙂
Pam says
July 7, 2016 at 1:58 pmI can’t figure out how to get worksheets to print, when I click on print worksheets here…it won’t bring anything up.
Dawn Nicole says
July 9, 2016 at 1:01 pmHi Pam! It’s working for me. Maybe trying clearing your cache/cookies on your Internet browser and try again. Also try from a computer, not a mobile device. Sometimes ipads/phones are glitchy with the downloads. 🙂
Mackenzie says
August 17, 2016 at 8:30 pmSOOOO happy to find a fellow lefty!!! 🙂
April says
September 4, 2016 at 10:37 amHi There! I’m so excited to start practicing. What type of paper do you recommend for printing the worksheets? Thank you!!
Dawn Nicole says
September 5, 2016 at 11:38 pmHi April! For practice I use smooth laser jet copy paper. 🙂
Adrianna says
September 22, 2016 at 8:12 amHi thanks for the lovely freebies!
I have a quick question. Do these worksheets work well for calligraphy pen?
Dawn Nicole says
September 23, 2016 at 8:50 amHi Adrianna! The worksheets in this post would be better for a calligraphy pen: http://bydawnnicole.com/2015/12/modern-calligraphy-101.html. 🙂
Sonia says
November 2, 2016 at 5:02 amAll our web is amazing, thanks for your effort and sharing for free!!
Kayleigh says
January 15, 2017 at 3:49 pmHi, printed off your sheets! Are yours on A4 Sheets? I ask because the tombow dual brush pen I bought doesn’t seem thick enough.
Dawn Nicole says
January 16, 2017 at 12:58 amBe sure you’re holding the brush pen at a 45-degree angle and don’t be afraid to push down. The Tombow dual tips can definitely get that thick. But focus more on the thin upstrokes and thick downstrokes than matching the worksheet exactly. 🙂
ali says
February 5, 2017 at 7:02 amahhh thank you so much for the free worksheets!! it helps me a lot to practice hand lettering
Nuutaey says
February 9, 2017 at 5:15 amSo beautiful. Thank you very much. Good for beginer.
Caroline says
June 13, 2017 at 5:43 pmI was linked to this page from your “How to do Watercolor Brush Lettering”. First of all, thank you so much for making all of these videos. I am just starting to do watercolor brush lettering and I have the ideas down but it just doesn’t look right no matter how hard I try. Any tips?
Thanks again,
Caroline
Dawn Nicole says
June 15, 2017 at 9:41 amHi Caroline! Check out my Brush Calligraphy FAQs post for a ton of tips: http://bydawnnicole.com/2016/04/10-free-hand-lettering-practice-worksheets.html 🙂
Dawn Nicole says
June 15, 2017 at 9:42 amSorry, I sent the wrong link. This is the correct one: http://bydawnnicole.com/2016/12/brush-calligraphy-and-lettering-faqs.html
Marguerite says
July 25, 2017 at 3:04 amSo wonderful! Thank you!
Hugs
Marguerite
Alonia says
April 24, 2018 at 12:04 pmThank you for these! What kind of board is that you are writing on, would love to get something like that for my desk.
Dawn Nicole says
April 25, 2018 at 5:42 amHi Alonia! It’s a Vantage cutting mat and I got it on Amazon.com. 🙂