Map Making

Richard Bell’s Wild West Yorkshire nature diary Wednesday, 2nd July 2008

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I’VE BEEN giving my right arm a bit of a rest for the last week but I’ve lurched back into action with this pen and watercolour artwork for the back cover map for the new revised edition of my Thornes Park booklet.

My last walks booklet was in black and white and I used a Rotring ArtPen for the maps but as I was adding colour to this one I had to go for something waterproof so, for the first time, this has been drawn with an Ackerman Pump Pen; an ingenious design that allows you to use Indian ink and a regular dip pen nib in a fountain pen-type design.

I’ve spent so long designing pages on the computer and I wanted a change from computer-set fonts for the lettering. I struggled with it but when I added the colour it all came together. The wobbly lettering seems to fit perfectly happily with the wobbly drawing. Computer-set typography might have been more readable but it wouldn’t have given the same effect.

Link: Ackerman Pens