At its most basic level, bullet journaling involves writing by hand into some kind of notebook.
But if your ordinary handwriting feels a bit too boring, you can spice things up by using different fonts in your bullet journal.
In this post I’ll explain all about improving your handwriting and give you some inspiration and examples on new fonts you can try out.
How To Make Different Bullet Journal Fonts
Are you inspired when you see an example of cute or well-executed hand lettering in a bullet journal? I know I sure am!
My own handwriting was not so special for many years. It was bit unruly and haphazard, flipping between printing and cursive from letter to letter and word to word.
So three years ago I decided to delve into the world of hand lettering and start examining what it is that makes some people’s handwriting so amazing.
My biggest takeaway is that practice is the key to creating a neater-looking handwriting. It’s all about training your fine-motor coordination. In other words, strengthening the muscles in your hands and learning which type of movement produces which results.
If you’ve learned to play a music instrument, then you probably understand what I’m talking about. Muscle memory. The more you repeat a specific movement and focus on refining it, the better you will become at it.
Easy Bullet Journal Fonts To Try
Here are some pretty simple fonts you can try to copy.
These “hand lettering” fonts are calligraphy made with brush pen markers. I used several different sized brush pens to get different styles of hand lettering.
What are brush pen markers?
These brush pen markers are special pens designed in Japan for writing Japanese kanji. They have an extended, flexible felt-tip that mimics the shape and movement of a calligraphy brush on a much smaller scale. These pens have been and still are used in Japan for writing that needs to look more presentable, such as on cards or envelopes.
Lately, Japanese brush pens have become very popular as a convenient way to do calligraphy in Western languages. Using the brush pen is more portable than using a calligraphy pen, ink, and nibs that need to be cleaned after each use. They’re also quite inexpensive. My favorite brush pen is the Fudenosuke made by Tombow. It comes in a firm and soft version, and I prefer the firm one (“shikkari”).
Faux Calligraphy
Faux calligraphy is a type of hand lettering you can make with any pen, pencil or marker – it doesn’t have to have a brush pen or calligraphy nib.
To make faux calligraphy, you write something normally but with just a little more space between the letters. Once you have written it, you go over it again, making the downstrokes wider. You can use the same pen to add thickness to your downstrokes, or you can use a different color to make a different effect. There are lots of possibilities to get creative with faux calligraphy and to come up with something that’s truly unique.
More Bullet Journal Fonts
Here are some more bullet journal fonts I came up with:
To change up your font, you could try these types of typefaces:
Serif Font
Round Style
A post shared by Gabi R (@gabironco) on May 27, 2019 at 11:38pm PDT
All Caps
This chunky font was pretty simple to make. For most of the letters I just started with a single down stroke, then made it into a block, and then added the rest of the letters. For the rounder letters, like C, G, O, and Q, I made the outer edge of the round first, and then blocked it in. The trickiest letter was S. I started at the top and made a wide curve to the left and down into a narrow curve. Then do the reverse but come up to where you started.
All Lower Case
You can make sheets of font examples like this one by printing out my dot grid printable (it’s free!). I’m going to add these to a little binder so I can have my own mini-pinterest of bujo examples.
Classic-Style Cursive
Hand Lettering
“Faux Calligraphy”
Faux calligraphy is a type of hand lettering where you create a calligraphic effect by adding extra lines, parallel to your strokes. Usually it is the downstrokes that get extra lines added to them. The space created can then be filled in, left blank, have color added, or be filled with a pattern.
I used the Sakura pigma micron 01 pen for all of the black ink in this example. As I mention in the video on how to do faux lettering, this pen is one of my all-time favorites for lettering. Not only does it have a nice consistent flow and very fine tip that’s easy to control, but it is also waterproof, once the ink is completely dry. It works most of the time, although using too much pressure with an eraser or too much abrasion from markers can still cause the ink to smear, as you can see a bit in the image above.
Minimal Cursive
Architect Style Handwriting
Hangeul Inspired
Comic Sans
Skinny Caps
Bounce Lettering
Bullet Journal Fonts Inspiration
Bullet Journal Fonts – TL;DR
Creating artistic fonts in your bullet journal is one of the best ways to express your style. In most cases, you don’t need to invest in any special materials.YOU MAY ALSO LIKETop 10 Bullet Journal Instagram Accounts I Can’t Get Enough Of
One thing you will need to do, though, is practice. Don’t be inclined to think that you’re just “not good enough” at handwriting or hand lettering. That is SO not true!
If you’re unhappy with the way your handwriting looks, the best thing you can do is to practice.
If you loved checking out these bujo font ideas, I know you’ll also love reading my posts on making bullet journal headers and bullet journal doodles to try!
