The Tools I Use (and Love)
Let me start with a quick disclaimer:
None of the brands mentioned in this post are sponsored—these are just tools I’ve personally used, loved, and found helpful over the years. With that being said, some of the links you’ll find here are affiliate links, which means I earn a small percentage if you decide to make a purchase. It doesn’t cost you anything extra, but it does help support me and the time I put into creating helpful content like this for you.
With that out of the way, let’s get into it!!
Start Simple: Pen (or pencil) + Paper
The most basic (and honestly, all you need to get started) setup is just a piece of paper and any pen or pencil you’ve got lying around. The only downside to a blank piece of paper is that you’ll need to draw your own guidelines so your letters don’t end up floating off into weird angles or dancing on different baselines. A ruler or anything with a straight edge does the trick, though, and it’s a pretty quick and painless process.
That’s it. No excuses—start practicing lettering right now!
Want to Make Life Easier?
If you want a shortcut (and who doesn’t?), pick up some dot grid or graph paper. Built-in guidelines = less setup and more practice. They also help you keep not only your horizontal, but also you vertical spacing consistent.
When I first started out, I used Rhodia dot pads and still love them, especially the square ones. The paper is super smooth—perfect for brush pens as it doesn’t tear up the brushes—and holds up really well when you go to ink your lettering. The dots are also not super obvious for when you take photos of your work but you can still easily see them when you’re lettering!
Why you Should have a Pencil and Eraser
You know I love my pencils for sketching out composition ideas. It’s definitely one I suggest you have, especially if you decide to do client work down the road. A pencil allows you to:
Sketch quickly without commitment
Erase freely (without guilt)
Experiment without pressure
Using a pencil lets you practice without that fear of messing up and having your mistakes be permanent (although I personally think mistakes are not the end of the world and even if you make a mistake in pen, there are still ways to fix). Once you're happy with your layout or letters, you can always go over it with pen and erase the sketch lines.
I really don’t have any preferences when it comes to pencils - I’ve used the ones you need to sharpen, mechanical pencils, chonky lead pencils, red/blue color pencils, and they are all great. Mechanical ones are nice because you don’t need to sharpen them, but at the same time, you can’t get them to the very fine point a sharpened pencil can get to. So, try them all and see which one suits you best!
My Favorite Pens for Inking my Lettering
When I want to ink a piece, I usually reach for one of two types of pen: fineliners or brush pens, depending on my mood and what I have on hand. The pros for fineliners is that they tend to come in a variety of nib sizes, so you can whip out a chonky nip if you have large areas to color in or a 0.05 for very fine details. While brush pens allow you to have a variety in line weight as well, it is far more limited and requires a lot more control. But! Brush pens are great for brush calligraphy and coloring in large areas. So, like I said, they’re both great - just depends what you’re going for with your lettering.
Fineliners
Favorite: Sakura Pigma Microns
Why I love them: They're waterproof, come in a ton of nib sizes, and the ink is rich and smooth.
Brush Pens
Tombow Fudenosuke (Hard Tip): Perfect for creating thin and thick lines with just one pen. Helpful when you’re limited in the number of pens you can bring around.
Uni Pin Brush Pen: Dark, waterproof, and the brush is great for coloring in large shapes or bold styles
Pentel Brush Sign Pen: A brushier brush pen—great for full-on brush calligraphy
How about color pens?
When I was first starting out, I didn’t want to worry about colors. I wanted to focus solely on consistency and making my letters look good. So I stuck to black and white—and honestly, I still do that a lot.
I find that having to focus only on black (and white) made me think more about the different lettering styles I wanted to create and use in order to emphasize (or not) important words. If I were using color, I could easily just say this word is going to be red so it sticks out more! But that’s not helpful when I’m trying to learn to create lettering styles. So if you’re just starting out or wanting to better your lettering, consider sticking to black and white for now.
If you do want to add dimension, try a gray for shadows or a white for highlights.
My go-tos:
Uniball Signo White (great for smooth highlight lines)
Posca PC-1MR White (metal nib = more precise and smoother than the plastic ones)
Want to Level Up?
Once you’ve built up confidence with your black-and-white practice, that’s when you can dip into color with paint pens, brush markers, alcohol-based markers, watercolors, you name it.
Or maybe go digital! If you’ve got an iPad + Apple Pencil (or another tablet setup), the possibilities are endless. Just remember—digital lettering and analog lettering feel very different. Same foundation, different tools, and a whole new learning curve. I’ll save that topic for another blog post.
Grab My Full Lettering Tools Guide!
If you want a more in-depth look at the tools I use, including paper recs, specialty pens, digital gear, and more, I’ve put together a printable guide just for you!
Final Thoughts
At the end of the day, the tools are just the assist. The practice is what matters. Have I drilled this into your head yet? So whether you’ve got a dot grid paper and a whole pen arsenal or just a napkin and a pencil—get those letters flowing.
And if you have any favorite pens, notebooks, or lettering gadgets I need to try, let me know! I am always down for an excuse to test new stationery.
Happy lettering (and penjoyment 😉)!