I’m Ray Ritchie, and I’m into lettering, calligraphy, graphic design, and photography. I’m on my second career(s) now, having spent 32 years working as an engineer and manager in the area of digital communications. I’ve been an avid student of calligraphy for more than 30 years, and have loved both art and photography since I was a kid, so when I retired from my engineering work, I started a small business (Ray Ritchie Design LLC) to pursue my interests in lettering, photography, and graphic design.
This blog’s title, “grraphics,” is derived from my initials, GRR. My first name is “George,” but no one who knows me ever calls me anything other than “Ray.” Well, at least, nothing I’d care to repeat.
All content on this blog is copyright © 2010 – 2015 by Ray Ritchie, unless otherwise noted, and may be used only with permission.
A word about comments: I love comments, and am anxious to have dialog with readers of this blog, but the spammers have made it necessary for me to install a spam filter which traps comments suspected to be from spammers. Among the things that will get your comments identified as potential spam are suspicious links to other sites, or too many links. I normally trust the spam filter software and do not question its judgment unless the comment really appears to be directly related to one of my posts. If you post a comment that does not appear on the blog within a few hours, feel free to drop me a note using the “Contact” page and let me know a little more about who you are, so that I can approve the comment and your future comments will get through.
Comments judged to be inappropriate or malicious will not be tolerated, however, and will be deleted, regardless of their source.
senor ritchie,
first of all let me say that i admire your lettering skills. they are as they in the vernacular “bitchin” and narly to steal a word from the california surfers.
i’m 72 but i’m still kicking – i belong to the san antonio caligraphy guild.
i’ve been a member since 1980. i started out as a sign painter, graduated to silk screener, muddled around as a sho=card man and wound as a graphic artist in a print shop. just a year and half ago i semi-retired from a silk screen, sign shop and commercial print shop. we did all- printing, silk screened from t’s to cups and did signs (not hand lettered but vinyl letters) one of my favorite things in the old days was hand lettering menus – now everything is computer, yuck!
oh well, everything comes to an end – one of the thing that i did in the 60′s was hand lettering grocery store circulars- we used knock between 20 to 30 11 x 17″
pages in a day – i could’n do one page now- but i learned speed ball lettering.
well, i don’t want to bore any more.
thank you for taking time to read my humble missive.
i still do letters – if i could get your physical address i’ll write you a “bitchin” letter.
i remain,
rudolph gonzalez
Thanks for the post, Rudolph. You’ve got an interesting background. One of my earliest lettering jobs was doing brush showcard lettering on posters for the Agricultural Extension Service of NC State University. Back in those days (mid-1960′s), people who did presentations to groups, and even on public television shows, often used such posters as their visual aids, in the way that such things are done today with PowerPoint slides on computer projection screens. So I know where you come from.
My snailmail address can be found on the “Contact” page – physical mail is welcome treat these days!
Discovered your efforts just now and appreciate the clarity of the images and the heart of the blog.
Ray,
I enjoyed your photograph from Mt. Rainier National Park using the Nikon 17-55mm. Here is my photograph of Spirit Island in the Canadian Rockies using the Nikon 16-85mm:
http://www.pbase.com/drjaysel/image/138427846
Personally I have the feeling that the two lenses are pretty much equal in delivering excellent image quality. The nice thing for me is that I don’t have to lug your heavy lens around at the age of 71!
Jay
Dear Ray…great blog! Discovered it when checking out pressure & release on web. Just come back from 5 days tuition with Massimo Polello (brush trajan) and Peter Thornton (playful letterforms) at CLAS Festival in Malvern, England. Now obsessed with pencils…love ‘em! Going back to basics and going to teach them in my next class. Slows you down and makes you understand the forms. 30 years experience, grasshopper mind..love new techniques. Think I got it from my dad…he was a window dresser & wrote signs on the kitchen table to take to work!