The more your handwritten characters look like the proper fonts, the better. Just because most Japanese people suck at writing kanji doesn't mean you should aim to be as bad.

YOzFont (sample, download page) is the one I've used to make my practice sheets.

BTW, would you like a copy of mine? I'll post a picture when I get home, but basically each line has the character, its number, stroke count, and four boxes in which to practice your writing. Two columns per page, the whole PDF file is about 50pp if I recall correctly. If so, just drop me a line. No point reinventing the wheel!

I would disagree with Tobberoth (or at least, insist on a definition of "the proper fonts"). I would never want my handwriting to look like a Mincho font, for instance. And I don't want my English handwriting to look like Times Roman, either. (Nor, god forbid, Comic Sans <shudder>)

ETA: Moon is another decent handwriting font. There's also Mikachan, but it's a little cutesy for my taste.

E(again)TA: After reading the thread on handwriting books from Amazon.jp, it's a little embarrassing to be recommending one written by a Scandinavian; nevertheless, Learn to Write Chinese Characters has done wonders for my kanji.

Last edited by annabel398 (2008 December 02, 2:49 pm)

Thanks for VOzFont. I prefer to learn from "proper fonts" so to speak, but it's always nice to mix things up.

oo some of those fonts are really cute, ~comic sans

thanks heaps

For doing RtK reviews, my favorite font by far is the Kanji Stroke order font found here http://sites.google.com/site/nihilistorguk/

annabel398 wrote:

YOzFont (sample, download page) is the one I've used to make my practice sheets.

After seeing the link from Annabel, I installed the fonts and the "change kanji font" script.  I've been using the YozFontN04 with my reviews and study for a few weeks, and I think my handwriting has improved.  It's easier to follow sample handwriting than it is to try to guess handwritten forms from regular typescript.  I just write on the backs of receipts and tea bag covers; I haven't made practice sheets.

The script to change the font is at the link below.  It'd probably be more convenient than looking up the characters in the index.
http://forum.koohii.com/viewtopic.php?pid=5351#p5351

Machine_Gun_Cat wrote:

I have to disagree there, If you write "water" as it appears in it's three stroke form on the side of characters like it is in print it will just look idiotic

氵Why?

Machine_Gun_Cat wrote:

bodhisamaya wrote:

Machine_Gun_Cat wrote:

I have to disagree there, If you write "water" as it appears in it's three stroke form on the side of characters like it is in print it will just look idiotic

氵Why?

It just looks unnatural and doesn't follow the flow of how regular strokes work

That's how every Japanese person whose handwriting I've seen writes the stroke. No one makes the "tick-mark" type last stroke unless they are using a brush.

Raichu wrote:

Who writes "a" or "g" like they appear in Times Roman font?

There are typographic and handwritten differences in every character set I've learned (Greek, Latin and Japanese).

I've actually been writing my a's like type font for years, but I don't think it looks unnatural. I think if you were to write every character as displayed in MS Gothic or similar however, your writing would certainly be legible, but it would have no character (no pun intended).

seifip wrote:

10 Beautiful Japanese Fonts

Thanks for pointing this out, and the following isn't any comment on your effort.

When the blog author writes that "Meiryo (Free) is my favorite Japanese font ever." he loses any stylistic credibility he might have, in my eyes. That's one of the ugliest Japanese fonts around, IMO. Really blocky and without any grace at all, it's scalability notwithstanding.

I have to agree with seifip, Meiryo is very nice for a computer font. Reading on wikipedia or news sites, you're going to enjoy how readable it is. I wouldn't want to write like that, but that's not the point.

I'm quite an advocate of aqua_pfont/aqua_font!  It's kinda cute to write!  It depends really, whether you're still at the stage of trying to get the right proportions, or whether you're more at the stage of trying to develop an overall handwriting style... if you are at this latter stage, then aqua_pfont is a viable option to imitate!