How to Do Hand Lettering with Just Dots!
Did you know that you can do super cool hand lettering with just dots?
With a pen, paper, and a little patience, you can create impressive lettering that looks more complicated than it actually is!
If you can draw dots, you can do this fun lettering technique! Step by step instructions below.
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Supplies
All you need for this hand lettering technique is a pencil, pen, and paper.
Try different pens and markers. The smaller the pen tip, the longer it will take to build up enough dots.
The bigger the pen tip, the faster it will go!
Bullet-tip markers like these, or even Crayola markers will work great.
How to hand letter with dots
Time needed: 30 minutes
Here are the steps to doing hand lettering with just dots!
- Sketch out a word with a pencil.
Loosely write a word in whatever style you like.
- Go back over the word and double up all the lines.
Now go back over and double up the lines to make them thicker. This defines what will be the white space of the word later on!
- Using a pen, outline the word with a dotted line.
I like to lightly erase the pencil lines before I do this step.
- Start adding heavily concentrated dots all around the word.
Put thickly concentrated dots all around the outside of the outline that you did in the previous step, being careful not to go inside the “negative” space that you outlined.
- Gradually fade out the amount of dots as you move further from the word.
Continue adding dots all around the word, but make them more sparse as you move outward. Scatter the dots as far out as you want.
- Erase any leftover pencil lines.
Make sure the ink is fully dry before you do this!
And that’s it!
If you’re comfortable with free handing letter outlines, you could even skip the steps in pencil.
I always think the end result looks like confetti around the word!
More dot lettering ideas
Here are a few dot lettering variations you can try for different effects.
Lettering shadow with dots
A fun variation on dot lettering (that also looks even more impressive) is to use dots to add a shadow to the word.
With this technique, you’ll put the heaviest concentration of dots on one side of the letters only.
Here’s how I would do this:
- Sketch out a word in pencil.
- Add a shadow line along one side of the letters (in this case, the right side).
- Add a thick concentration of dots alongside the shadow lines.
- On the opposite sides of each letter (the non-shadow sides), add just a light outline of dots to suggest the shape of the letter.
- Continue adding dots all around, keeping the darkest concentration where the shadow would be.
(For more on how to add a shadow to your lettering, check out this step by step tutorial!)
If that’s a little too complicated for you, you can also easily add a dot shadow to ANY lettering like this:
Start by drawing a shadow line alongside the letter…
…and then add dots along the shadow lines, making them more sparse as you scatter them outwards.
I show you lots more fun lettering shadow ideas in this post!
Different colors
Another easy way to change up the look of your dot lettering is to use different colors.
(Try bullet tip markers like these for a variety of color options!)
A fun thing to try is an ombrรฉ effect.
To do this, find a few color shades that would make a nice gradient from light to dark.
Then, as you add the dots, transition from one color to the other as you move across the word(s), to make a color gradient of light to dark.
This takes a little extra thought and planning but looks amazing!
Doing hand lettering with dots takes some patience, but the end result is so cool that it’s totally worth it.
There are lots of fun ways you could use this technique, so give it a try and have fun!
Check out these other hand lettering and handwriting ideas:
Super Easy Scribbly Lettering Style You Can Do In Minutes
