The skeleton
One continuous closed path. Make the outside wider than a circle and the inside as generous as the style allows. O is where consistency gets tested: any wobble in the weight shows up instantly because there is nothing else in the letter to look at.
What happens when you inflate it
O absorbs inflation, but there is a limit. Once the outer weight passes about a third of the letter’s diameter, the shape stops reading as a ring and starts reading as a blob. In fat styles the answer is a short O, wider than it is tall.
What usually goes wrong: Ignoring the O entirely. It looks fine at a glance in almost any condition, which is why people leave it plain — and a plain O in a designed piece is the most visible lazy letter in the alphabet.
Letters O sits next to
O is the great connector of graffiti. Because it has no terminals and no flat edges, it can be overlapped, filled, or turned into a face, a target, or a piece of punctuation without breaking. Next to C and G it needs a weight difference, or the three round letters fuse into one shape.
One thing to try
In bubble styles, rotate the O a few degrees. Nobody can name the change, but it stops the letter reading as a perfect circle, and a perfect circle is the one shape that never looks hand-drawn.
How to draw the letter O in four steps
- Sketch the skeleton. One continuous closed path. Make the outside wider than a circle and the inside as generous as the style allows. O is where consistency gets tested: any wobble in the weight shows up instantly because there is nothing else in the letter to look at.
- Inflate the strokes. O absorbs inflation, but there is a limit. Once the outer weight passes about a third of the letter’s diameter, the shape stops reading as a ring and starts reading as a blob. In fat styles the answer is a short O, wider than it is tall.
- Check the neighbors. O is the great connector of graffiti. Because it has no terminals and no flat edges, it can be overlapped, filled, or turned into a face, a target, or a piece of punctuation without breaking. Next to C and G it needs a weight difference, or the three round letters fuse into one shape.
- Add your own twist. In bubble styles, rotate the O a few degrees. Nobody can name the change, but it stops the letter reading as a perfect circle, and a perfect circle is the one shape that never looks hand-drawn.
Questions about the letter O
Should a graffiti O be a perfect circle?
No. A true circle reads as mechanical. Make it slightly wider than tall, or tilt it a couple of degrees, and it will look drawn instead of generated.
How do I stop my O from looking boring?
Change one thing about it — its weight, its tilt, or what it contains. In throw-ups the O is often where writers put a small icon or an eye, which is exactly because it has room.