How
The
CELTIC KNOT FONT WORKS
My name is Daniel Isdell. I created the Celtic Knot Font. I've been studying
Celtic Knots for several years. I love the simple elegance of the rules
for their construction and the massive complexity that can result from
those rules. This font was over two years in development. I studied every
way that knots could be broken down into their components for maximum
flexibility. I'm quite proud of this font and what it can do. I hope that
you have as much fun with it as I do. I must acknowledge George Bain and
his son Iain Bain for their extensive research and writings on the subject
of Celtic knotwork, and most of all, those ancient Celts, monks, scribes,
and artisans who developed this art form. Check back regularly because
I will be making a lot of changes as this gets started. You can email
your designs to me directly. Your comments are always welcome! Send them
to me at:
How it works:
I
have studied hundreds of Celtic Knots and dozens of tutorials on how to
make them. I have taken these knots and and the techniques to make them
and have distilled them down into a set of standard elements. I took those
elements and converted them into a font.
Why a font?
The
reason is simple. Most people do not have the expensive drawing programs
necessary to create these knots. Ready-made clip-art is fine if you want
a limited number of designs that are already used by hundreds of other
people, but if you want to create knots of your own design you have to
learn to use a drawing program and spend many hours working with it just
to create the most basic designs. I have done the hard part for you. All
you have to do is put the pieces together! Every piece is drawn to an
accuracy of better than 0.00001 inches. That means that each piece will
line up perfectly with the next piece. There are only 3 styles of edges
on all of the pieces. If you can just match one side with the next you
can create thousands of different knots.
Basic knots:
All
of the basic pieces which you need to create a Celtic knot are located
conveniently in one corner of you computer keyboard:
I have arranged the parts so that they are easy to find and easy to remember. See how this block of 9 keys makes a square (well, OK, it 's really a parallelogram, but I'm trying to keep this simple). The corners of this square make the corners of a knot. The sides make the sides of knots and the middle makes....you guessed it, the middle of a knot.
If you type each row of three keys followed by the Enter key, the Celtic Knot Font will make this pattern:
As you can see, it makes a nice square Celtic knot. Let's get a little more fancy. If we type more of the letters that make the top edge, the middle section and the bottom edge we can extend the knot like this:
See how the "a" key makes the left side and the "d" key makes the right side? Watch this:
Using these two keys will make a vertical break in the weave. This is the basis of all Celtic Knotwork. Make a grid and introduce breaks into the grid to create a decorative pattern. Likewise we can use the "w" key and the "x" key to make horizontal breaks. Like this:
These examples were made using just 9 of the pieces available in the Celtic Knot Font. There over 190 different pieces available in the full font!
You can see how you can assemble these
pieces to make thousands of different Celtic Knots.
Be sure to check out our new tutorial:
How
to Draw Celtic Knotwork
A Side-By-Side Comparison of Two Methods
Take a look at the
Gallery to see some more complex examples of
what you can do with this font!
Click here to order!
(With online ordering you could be playing with it in minutes!)
...or call (707) 774-1369 9am to 9pm PST
ClanBadge.com
7610 Elphick Rd.
Sebastopol, CA 954722
(707) 393-1638
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