Handwriting Survey: UPPERCASE Addiction?
by Adrian Hanft, (11 comments)
It is considered poor etiquette to type in all caps. Nobody likes to be SHOUTED at. I find it interesting that the same guidelines don’t seem to apply to handwriting. Like many people, I print in all caps and I have never heard the “shouting” observation made when it comes to penmanship.
I was reading the comments on a Flickr post by Shaun Inman where he analyzes his own penmanship and it seemed like many designers share my addiction for uppercase. Is it my imagination or this a trend? Time for another survey…
Design Survey Question 5: In your handwriting, what do you capitalize?
(If you were wondering about survey 4, it looks like Be A Design Group readers aren’t unbeige.)
Comments (11)
Joe Moran said:
Looks like this may be the topic of the week.
However, your handwriting isn’t what I imagined. Ha!
VR/
Posted on August 5, 2007
Tom said:
Adrian, I’ve written in ALL CAPS as long as I can remember. Never really given much thought as to why, its just always seemed natural to me. Is it really a designer “thing”? Very interesting.
The only person who ever had a beef with my handwriting style was a certain sixth grade English teacher, but reading page after page of short stories written in ALL CAPS probably warranted said beef. Of course, he also had a large pet alligator and was fired years later for bringing it into the classroom, but that’s neither here nor there…
Posted on August 7, 2007
Brian said:
as far a handwriting goes i typically print everything in uppercase and occasionally slip into cursive then right back to uppercase print. i think i’m just lazy when it comes to typing, because i never want to capitalize anything. after working on prjects that initiall cap every word i find that anything i type will be done in initial caps.
Posted on August 7, 2007
Allen said:
I had a little different handwriting habit, from about age 12 until I really saw it as a problem in college, I would shift from all caps to lowercase and cursive to print all in the same sentence and sometimes even in the same word. I still catch myself doing it these days, but I have gotten better at controlling it. It’s almost like I have multiple handwriting personalities.
Posted on August 7, 2007
Brian said:
i have also noticed that a lot of comic book artists sign in all caps. Jim Lee Erik Larson Mike Mignola Todd McFarlane Mark Bagley Andy Kubert Joe Kubert
to name a few. Since a few of you have been to comic conventions you probably know a few more.
In contrast we have the wonderful Drew Struzan, who signs simply “drew”
Posted on August 9, 2007
Yael Miller said:
For some reason I write in all-caps, though I don’t know why. Oh, and I’m a girl. I find it’s more a guy thing usually. I’ve been writing this way since I’m 12. I started doing it this way one summer when I was writing letters home from camp. I know that sounds random, but maybe others will share their memory of when they started writing this way and if they can figure out why. I think then I thought it was cool to write in all caps.
Posted on August 12, 2007
TandemAdam said:
I print in caps when I write in my sketch book. but when im not, then I write normally.
I started writing in caps since my graphics (technical drawing) teacher told me to in school. I think its a standard in the technical drawing field
Posted on August 12, 2007
Leatrice Eiseman said:
i switched from handwriting to all caps when I realized that even i was having trouble reading my handwriting, especially when taking notes. I think anything that makes your handwriting more readable simply makes good sense. As an author (and check signer) I excel at my sigature and that’s it!!
Posted on August 13, 2007
Kyle Fletcher said:
Caps is for ballers. There was a distinct commitment on the bus in 6th grade when a good friend and I decided while signing yearbooks that all caps was definitely the way to get all the ladies.
Posted on August 14, 2007
Ryan Colgin said:
My all caps adventure started my freshman year of high school when I took a drafting class. I’ve been printing in all caps ever since (10 or so years now).
The only characters I know in cursive are in my own signature. If I ever have to write something else in cursive (or lowercase), I get pretty stumped.
And, ironically, sometimes when I type, I do like the way all lowercase letters look. I don’t know if my pinky gets lazy, or if I’ve become used to Entourage always fixing it for me?
Sometimes I even print in ‘small caps’.
Posted on August 30, 2007
Sean Fox said:
I too have written in upper case for as long as I can remember, even for my English GCSE’s back in 2003! I would always just use a larger character for the start of sentences or names to clarify that I knew the score with where the upper case character would usually come.
I get compliments on my handwriting all of the time, its rigid structure looks beautiful to me and completely immovable on the page, I can’t see myself ever changing it.
People often ask me why I do it, and because of doing it question my knowledge and respect of typography, but I dont feel I am disrespecting the traditions, merely choosing to use only those characters that fit my need.
Posted on March 19, 2008