Have you ever noticed that twisty curl at the end of a character? That’s called a swash. In this quick tip tutorial, we take a look at what they are and how to use swashes in fonts. 

First, we’ll define swashes in fonts and look at their origin, and then we’ll move on to see how to use swashes in fonts and discover some of the best script fonts with swashes. Let’s get started!

What You’ll Learn in This Swash Font Tutorial

• Definition of swashes in fonts
• The different font swash categories
• Swash font uses and tips
• The best script fonts with swashes

Follow along with us over on our Envato Tuts+ YouTube channel:

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What Are Swashes?

To define swashes in fonts, we need to go back to the 16th century. Swashes first appeared in the first edition of The Prince in Rome in 1532. It features a z-italic ligature that was later extended to a full alphabet. Ludovico degli Arrighi, a scribe, type designer, and printer, extended the swashes into metal type for capital letters.

Swashes were inspired by handwriting and used as decorative elements. They’re also known as flourishes or extended strokes, usually at the beginning or end of a character (initial and terminal swashes). You’ll see these extensions typically on serif or script fonts. 

OpenType technology allows type designers to include more characters into a set. Therefore, more and more fonts are designed with multiple swash characters.

How to Make Swashes in Fonts

Swashes in fonts can range from minimal, like a simple twist, to incredibly dramatic. Swashes are great for making a specific type element the focal point of your design.

• Swash capitals are used at the beginning of a sentence to create a beautiful drop cap. 
• Beginning and ending swashes are caps or lowercase characters with swashes that extend horizontally.
• Stylistic swashes are usually added to ascenders and descenders.  

If you’re wondering how to make swashes in fonts, you can find them as an OpenType feature. Access them through the Glyphs panel on any of the Adobe programs. In Adobe Photoshop, head over to Window > Glyphs. In Adobe Illustrator, go to Window > Type > Glyphs Panel. Or in InDesign, head over to Window > Type & Tables > Glyphs. 

Swash Fonts: Uses and Tips

Swashes are great for making a specific type element the focal point of your design. Use swashes on logos, wedding invitations, and packaging to create a special typographical effect.

Here are a few things to consider when using swashes in fonts:

• Try to stay away from swashes in the middle of words as some might not flow as well as they need to.
• Use swashes sparingly—they’re supposed to make your content special.
• Avoid using all caps and swashes at the same time—it typically becomes illegible.

Assets: Script Fonts With Swashes

Bordemile Luxury Script

Bordemile is a beautiful, elegant script font that’s perfectly suited to wedding invitations and tasteful designs. Some of the characters have up to nine alternates, so there are many options for customizing your design! The swashes for this font are swirly but graceful. 

Metinoline Script

This modern script typeface is inspired by calligraphic brush handwriting. The set includes many alternative characters like font swashes and ligatures. The font also supports many Western languages. 

Marchell

The inspiration for this swash font is copperplate calligraphic writing. The font has a vintage and retro feel, with a touch of elegance. The set includes many alternative characters and has multilingual support. Marchell is perfect for display use to make your text even more special. 

Bigshine Script

If you’re looking for a modern twist on calligraphy, Bigshine is a great option. The font combines copperplate and contemporary style calligraphy. The pack includes 132 alternate characters that let you experiment with the look of your design. Swashes for fonts tend to have a very thin line at the end, but Bigshine features a small circular element that adds texture to your design.

The Clastic

The Clastic font family is a duo of fonts: a swash font and a sans serif. The swash font can also be combined with layer styles to add an inner or drop shadow. Each letter has 5 to 12 alternates, with initial and terminal swashes, so your designs can look as natural as possible.

Now It’s Your Turn!

In this article, we showed you how to use swash fonts and some awesome script fonts with swashes that can help on your next project. Swash fonts aren’t anything new—they’ve been around since the 16th century! Having different swashes for specific characters is helpful to make your text special and different from the norm. 

Looking for awesome swash fonts? Be sure to check out Envato Elements and GraphicRiver—their libraries are updated every day. 

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Trajan is one of the most recognisable and enduring display typefaces. Based on classical Roman letterforms, the original digital version of the font was designed by Carol Twombly for Adobe in 1989. Since then, a range of designers have revisited Trajan, looking to further optimise its legibility and visual impact. 

Discover our selection of the best alternative fonts to the Trajan font family, as well as interesting Trajan facts about the Trajan typeface’s history and design. 

Looking for more fonts similar to Trajan, and other classical Roman fonts? Bring a touch of heritage and historic elegance to your designs with these classical fonts on Envato Elements. 

Trajan Facts

Trajan is a classical serif typeface based on the letterforms of Roman square capitals (capitalis monumentalis). The all-capitals Trajan Pro font (the Romans did not use lowercase letters) takes its name from Trajan’s column, which has an inscription at its base which uses capitalis monumentalis letterforms.

Historically, many type designers and artists have taken an interest in the inscriptions on Trajan’s column, some of whom created their own interpretations of the Trajan font style. Emil Rudolf Weiss created Weiss in 1926, and Frederic Goudy produced Forum Title, Hadriano, and Goudy Trajan, all in tribute to the Roman letterforms. British type designer Eric Gill faithfully copied the Trajan letterforms, using them as a reference point for his own type designs, including Gill Sans and Perpetua.

However, the digital version of Trajan released by Adobe has come to be the most widely used and acclaimed interpretation of the classical type design, with type historian Alastair Johnston noting that the Trajan Pro font outdid ‘anything old Fred Goudy ever produced.’

Trajan was designed as a digital font by Carol Twombly for Adobe, and it was released in 1989 as part of Adobe’s suite of fonts that came preloaded with its software. Over a ten-year period, Twombly designed a range of typefaces for Adobe which were influenced by classical type styles. Some of her other type designs include Myriad, Charlemagne, and Adobe Caslon.

Twombly designed Trajan with display purposes in mind, rather than printed text. The legibility and visual drama of the font made it an instant hit with movie studios and book designers, who used the font liberally across posters and covers during the 1990s and 2000s.

Trajan Pro was the initial OpenType release of the font, which included small caps in the lowercase slots, and in 2012 the font was revisited by Adobe’s Principal Type Designer, Robert Slimbach, who added four additional weights to the Trajan font family, in addition to the existing Trajan Pro Regular and Trajan Pro Bold font, releasing the typeface as Trajan Pro 3.

In 2014, Adobe released a companion font to Trajan, Trajan Sans, which offers a more contemporary and minimalist take on the original typeface designed by Twombly.

Trajan’s classical proportions, legibility, and crispness have ensured its longevity, and it remains one of the most widely used display fonts today. However, a number of type designers have looked to create a more contemporary revision of the old Roman type style. 

Below, discover our selection of the best alternatives to the Trajan font style. These include fonts similar to Trajan Pro with lowercase letterforms, as well as more modern interpretations which incorporate script styling, alternative letters, or ligatures for a unique take on the Trajan typeface’s heritage.

Fonts Similar to Trajan

Looking for fonts similar to Trajan for a design project? The typefaces below pay tribute to the classical heritage that informed the design of the original Trajan Pro font. From classical display fonts to Roman-inspired scripts, these contemporary Trajan alternatives retain the ancient and elegant spirit of Trajan, while offering something fresh and original for your design work. 

1. Karin

Karin is an exotic and beautiful take on classical script styles, with a wide range of alternative letterforms and ligatures, making it a versatile choice for branding and logo design. More flowing and feminine than the Trajan font style, Karin nonetheless retains the legibility and clarity of the Trajan typeface, making it suitable for display, packaging design, and posters.

2. Praetoria

Blending Roman, Greek, and Medieval influences, Praetoria is a dramatic, historic-fantasy font that’s perfectly suited for games, movie posters, and book covers. Available with a range of alternative quirky letterforms, the font is a faithful yet more interesting alternative to Trajan Pro Regular.

3. Merova

Merova is a classical font that blends Roman styling with Belle Epoque proportions. With a tall x-height, the font offers a more condensed alternative to Trajan Pro, and includes five weights for versatile use across editorial, book, and magazine design. 

4. Agatho

If Carol Twombly had designed Trajan in the 1920s, the result would probably not look dissimilar to Agatho. With more pronounced serifs and thicker ascenders and descenders than the Trajan font family, Agatho has a vintage feel that would suit nostalgic marketing, packaging design, or logos. Designed by Andrii Shevchyk, Agatho is available in a single regular weight.

5. The Broads

Described as a modern Roman font, The Broads pays tribute to 1930s interpretations of Roman type styles while retaining crisp, geometric letterforms, resulting in a font that feels luxurious and contemporary. A beautiful and subtle alternative to Trajan, The Broads will lend class and elegance to branding projects, websites, and packaging.

6. Loki

Loki is a brush font built on a minimal sans serif foundation, resulting in a crisp Roman-inspired style that retains a unique character. In tribute to the mischievous Norse god after which it’s named, Loki is a high-contrast typeface with thin, pointy, and heavily bracketed serifs. If you’re hunting for fonts similar to Trajan Pro with lowercase, this won’t be the right fit as it contains only uppercase characters, but it’s this feature that makes it the most honest tribute to the original capitalis monumentalis letterforms.

7. Bw Vivant

Designed by Moritz Kleinsorge and Alberto Romanos, Bw Vivant is a romantic and glamorous sans serif display font with a clean, elegant appearance. Combining 1960s and Art Deco magazine styling with the minimalism of Roman type styles, the resulting typeface is effortlessly stylish. 

8. Porte

Porte is an elegant tribute to the style of stone-carved fonts made popular at the start of the 20th century, which in turn took their cues from the classical carved typefaces on the likes of Trajan’s column. 

The comprehensively kerned typeface (it contains around 2,000 perfectly kerned pairs) also contains a wide range of stylistic alternatives, allowing you to give your designs unique flourishes. 

9. Armadira Display

Most fonts similar to Trajan pay tribute to the lighter weights such as Trajan Pro Regular. Armadira Display’s heavier design draws similarities with the Trajan Pro Bold font, making it feel more impactful and solid. The font is highly legible even at small sizes, making it a good fit for badge and logo design, as well as store signage. 

10. Novante

Novante is described by its designer, Ramz, as a luxury display serif. Inspired by Art Deco interpretations of classical type styles, Novante uses flowing descenders and script-inspired alternates for a romantic and effortlessly stylish result. Suited to contemporary branding, eMagazines, and websites, this offers a relaxed and pretty alternative to the serious personality of Trajan.    

11. Imperiem

Inspired by the architecture and aesthetics of ancient European cultures, Imperiem is an exaggerated interpretation of Trajan’s formal Roman style. The strong vertical lines represent the supportive pillars of Greek and Roman architecture, which contrast with thin hairlines for a balanced result. 

12. Cal Roman Modern

If Trajan or the other fonts similar to Trajan featured here feel too formal for your design project, why not try a brush font alternative? Cal Roman Modern is an informal calligraphic font created with brush rather than pen strokes. Simple Roman proportions are given dynamism and energy with the jaunty brush style, making for a font that feels lively and optimistic. 

13. Giveny

Created by Craft Supply Co., Giveny is a classical and breezy serif font designed for display and brand design. The square shapes of the round letterforms pay tribute to the formality of Roman type styles like Trajan, while the geometric design nods to transitional serifs like Baskerville and Mrs Eaves. 

14. Arrogant

Amongst the most decorative of the Trajan alternatives presented here, Arrogant is suitably vain and flashy, with decorative letters and alternative ligatures. Created by Zeppelin Graphics, Arrogant is indebted to the classical tradition of Trajan, using generous tracking and broad, airy letterforms.  

Still Looking for Fonts Similar to Trajan?

From the true-to-Trajan styling of Praetoria to the informal interpretation of classical typefaces, such as Giveny and Loki, and a range of other Trajan Pro font alternatives in-between, we hope you’ve found a font similar to Trajan that will suit your next design project. 

If not, find more fonts similar to Trajan and other classical Roman fonts over on Envato Elements. Discover our essential selections of the other fantastic fonts and font alternatives to add to your collection below: 

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In the following steps, you will learn how to create a Japanese wave pattern in Adobe Illustrator.

What You’ll Learn in This Japanese Wave Pattern Tutorial

• How to use the Appearance panel
• How to use the Pattern Options panel
• How to create a Japanese blue wave pattern

For more inspiration on how to adjust or improve your final wave pattern, you can find plenty of resources at GraphicRiver.

1. How to Create a New Document and Set Up a Grid

Hit Control-N to create a new document. Select Centimeters from the Units drop-down menu, enter 20 in the width and height boxes, and then click More Settings. Select RGB for the Color Mode, set the Raster Effects to Screen (72 ppi), and then click Create Document.

Enable the Grid (View > Show Grid) and Snap to Grid (View > Snap to Grid). You will need a grid every 1 cm, so simply go to Edit > Preferences > Guides & Grid, and enter 1 in the Gridline every box and 1 in the Subdivisions box. Try not to get discouraged by all that grid—it will make your work easier, and keep in mind that you can easily enable or disable it using the Control-“ keyboard shortcut.

You can learn more about Illustrator’s grid system in this short tutorial from Andrei Stefan: Understanding Adobe Illustrator’s Grid System.

2. How to Create the First Japanese Wave Pattern

Step 1

Pick the Ellipse Tool (M) and focus on your Toolbar. Remove the color from the stroke, and then select the fill and set its color to R=28 G=26 B=68.

Move to your artboard, hold down the Shift key, and simply create a 10 cm shape—the grid and Snap to Grid should make it easier.

Step 2

Make sure that your circle stays selected, and focus on the Appearance panel (Window > Appearance).

Add a second fill for your shape using the Add New Fill button, and select it. Change the color of this new fill to white (R=255 G=255 B=255), and then go to Effect > Path > Offset Path. Set the Offset to -0.5 cm and click OK.

Step 3

Make sure that your circle stays selected and keep focusing on the Appearance panel.

Select the dark blue fill and duplicate it using the Duplicate Selected Item button. Move the new fill on top of the white one, select it, and then go to Effect > Path > Offset Path. Set the Offset to -1 cm and click OK.

Step 4

Make sure that your circle stays selected and keep focusing on the Appearance panel.

Select the white fill and duplicate it. Move the new fill on top of the existing ones and select it. Open the already applied Offset Path effect, lower the Offset to -1.5 cm, and click OK.

Step 5

Make sure that your circle is still selected, and keep focusing on the Appearance panel.

Select one of the dark blue fills and duplicate it. Move the new fill on top of the existing ones, and select it. Open the already applied Offset Path effect, lower the Offset to -2 cm, and click OK.

Step 6

Pick the Rectangle Tool (M), create a 10 x 2 px shape, and place it exactly as shown in the first image.

Select this rectangle along with the circle and click the Minus Front button from the Pathfinder panel (Window > Pathfinder).

Step 7

Focus on the bottom side of your shape and pick the Direct Selection Tool (A).

Select the left anchor point, move it to the left so it snaps to the grid, and then drag it down by 4 cm. Select the right anchor point, move it to the right so it snaps to the grid and then drag it 4 cm down, as shown in the second image.

Switch to the Anchor Point Tool (Shift-C) and click these two anchor points to turn them into corner points, as shown in the third image.

Step 8

Select your entire shape and open the Pattern Options panel (Window > Pattern Options). Open the fly-out menu of this panel and go to Make Pattern.

Name your pattern “JapaneseWavePattern 1” and then focus on the settings of this pattern. Select Brick by Row from the Tile Type drop-down menu and 1/2 from the Brick Offset drop-down menu. Set the Width to 10 cm and the Height to 5 cm, make sure that the Left in Front and Bottom in Front buttons are checked, and then click the Done button to save your pattern inside the Swatches panel (Window > Swatches).

3. How to Add Variations of a Japanese Pattern Wave

Step 1

Let’s quickly create some variations of this pattern. Double-click your pattern in the Swatches panel, and focus on the artboard. Pick the Ellipse Tool (L), create a 2 cm circle, fill it with white, and place it as shown in the following image.

Click the Save a Copy button to add this new version of your pattern to the Swatches panel, and name it “JapaneseWavePattern 2”. Once you’re done, delete that 2 cm circle and click Done to make sure that your original pattern does not change its appearance.

Step 2

Select your second pattern from the Swatches panel and duplicate it. Double-click this new pattern, rename it “JapaneseWavePattern 3”, and then focus on your artboard to change its appearance. All you have to do is inverse the colors. All white shapes should turn blue, and vice versa. Once you’re done, click the Done button.

4. How to Create a Japanese Blue Wave Pattern

Step 1

Pick the Ellipse Tool (L), create a new 10 cm circle, and fill it with R=92 G=158 B=160.

Step 2

Add a second fill for your new circle, set the color to white, and apply a -0.2 cm Offset Path effect.

Add a third fill for this shape, set its color to R=92 G=158 B=160, and apply a -0.8 cm Offset Path effect.

Step 3

Now for the more repetitive part. You need to add another nine alternating fills for your circle. With each white fill, you have to lower the settings of the previously used Offset Path effect by 0.2 cm, and with each teal fill, you have to lower the settings of the previously used Offset Path effect by 0.6 cm.

In the end, things should look like the following image.

Step 4

Make sure that your circle is still selected, open the fly-out menu of the Pattern Options panel, and go to Make Pattern.

Name this new pattern “JapaneseWavePattern 4” and then focus on the settings of this pattern. Don’t mess with the rest of the settings—just lower the Height to 2.5 cm, and then click the Done button to save your pattern inside the Swatches panel (Window > Swatches). This will be your Japanese blue wave pattern.

Congratulations! Your Japanese Wave Pattern Is Complete!

Here is how your Japanese pattern wave should look. I hope you’ve enjoyed this tutorial and can apply these techniques in your future projects. Don’t hesitate to share your final result in the comments section.

Feel free to adjust the final wave pattern and make it your own. You can find some great sources of inspiration at Envato Elements, with interesting solutions to improve your Japanese pattern wave.

Popular Wave Pattern Assets From Envato Elements

Envato Elements is an excellent resource for wave patterns. Here’s a short list with some of the most popular patterns that you can find.

Japanese Wave Pattern Collection (AI, EPS, JPG)

This mesmerizing collection of 12 Japanese themed seamless patterns can be the perfect start for a Japanese-themed design.

Minimalist Seamless Waves Patterns (AI, EPS, JPG, PNG)

This small collection of seamless wave patterns comprises three intricate patterns that can be easily scaled or recolored.

Wave Pattern (JPG, PNG, EPS, SVG)

This hand-drawn collection of seamless wave patterns comes in two color versions and can be used with or without the boats in any type of design.

Abstract Seamless Patterns (EPS, JPG)

This colorful set of abstract seamless wave patterns will help you create stunning effects in a few moments.

Colorful Seamless Waves Patterns (JPG, PNG, AI, EPS, PSD)

For a more basic wave design, you can easily use one of the patterns from this collection of colorful abstract wave seamless patterns.

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