Watts All This?: October 2009

Although my final product is somewhat contrived, I originally wanted this exercise to be as organic as possible so I did no research on handwriting analysis prior to creating my font. I had planned on using my own everyday handwriting for this exercise and did not want any prior knowledge of what this or that meant to sully the process or the end result.

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However, as I sat down with my pile of pens and a kindergartner's "learn to write" pad to do this assignment, it occurred to me that I'm not particularly fond of my handwriting. Its really quite illegible. So in some unconscious effort to thwart my own plans, I fancied it up a bit, and used a fine-pointed sharpie. The end result is found below as my finished product font - I call her Isabelle.

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Once my font was scripted, posted, and I was sufficiently satisfied with the result, I downloaded a primer on analysis by graphologist Gary Thomas (found online at http://www.viewzone.com/handwriting.html). Using his guide as a template for analysis, I can now offer you a glimpse into Isabelle's meaning and a bit of her character.

ENERGY

I press hard on the paper when I write, and according to Thomas, this is an indicator of emotional energy - both physical and mental. You can test a writer's pressure by flipping over the paper, closing your eyes and feeling the underside. He claims that writers with heavy pressure are usually highly successful with a great deal of vitality. Their emotional experiences last for a long time.

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SLANT

A right slant (///) to the lettering signals a person who responds strongly to emotional situations. They are caring, warm and outgoing. The heart rules the mind of these people. Some of Isabelle's lines are more vertical, which signifies an honest attempt to temper her emotional impulses.

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EMOTIONAL CONTROL AND RELIABILITY

This trait is measured in the baseline of the sample. A baseline is the imaginary line on which the text rests (this is why Thomas suggests you first write without lines to guide your hand). What I found was that Isabelle trends toward optimism (upward slant), but suffers from bouts of depression and tiredness.

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CONCENTRATION

Large letters signal a writer that is easily distracted and may be prone to daydreaming. Isabelle-esque writers should be given varying tasks at work and assignments that can be completed quickly.

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IMAGINATION AND DESIRES

By dividing Isabelle's letters into three zones we can analyze her imagination and desires. Her upper zone (measured from the middle dotted line to the top line in your kindergarten "learn-to-write" pad), reflects her intellectual thought, psychic abilities and imagination. Her middle zone deals with everyday aspects of life - home, family and paying the bills. Her lower zone reveals her physical and material drives: physical abilities, sex drive, appetite and wealth. The lower zone deals with activities essential to survival - or practical imagination.

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Isabelle doesn't take much time for daydreaming unless it is in the day-to-day realm of life. The quick and pointed upper zone of many of her letters tell us she is focused on her goals and a quick thinker, yet the wispy nature of other letters indicates a bit of whimsy.

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The letters in her mid zone indicate she may worry too much.

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Isabelle has few closed loops in her lower zone which may indicate a willingness to stay open to the possibilities, and fat loops suggest great desires. She is gregarious, social and has a healthy fantasy life. This is awkward so I'll let you decide what it means for yourselves: YG&P all mean specific things. The Y is for sex and money, the G is for gregariousness, socializing and sexual fantasy. The P is for physical drives and means she doesn't mind too much hard work.

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SPACING

Irregularly spaced letters indicates Isabelle is confused, uncertain or mixed up. This makes perfect sense to me because I altered what came naturally to me in order to create the effect pictured in my head. I'm not certain we can trust this part of the analysis. On the same note, average spacing between words means that Isabelle feels comfortable with others while the wide spacing at certain points suggests that she does not.

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INTELLIGENCE AND THOUGHT PROCESSING

Isabelle's letters are pointy at the top with some sharp tops. This suggests she has a quick mind and can retain most ideas.

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SPEED OF THE SCRIPT

Isabelle is a fast writer: spontaneous, impatient, ambitious, aggressive, negligent, accident prone etc... She is also determined. The upward slant of the cross of her T's denotes a high level of determination.

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MOODS

Your mood can greatly affect your handwriting to such a great extent that any one analysis is much better at depicting a person's mood at the time the sample was taken. Effective analysis depends on many samples taken over greater amounts of time.

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ON THAT NOTE: this should be more than enough information to bore most of you to tears. I would like to invite anyone to comment on their thoughts on Isabelle. Please.

*any serifs you might notice in Isabelle, are purely accidental and due to her strong diagonal lines, I believe she is more of a humanist than anything else.