What Seagull just said….

Thanks Deb,

I don’t have to finish typing my reply and looking for the address of your site lol.

You guys! ROFLMAO

Looks like I have a lot of reading to do tomorrow.

Looks like I have a lot of reading to do tomorrow.

It’s not boring I can tell you that. Even though I worked on the handwriting I still get goosebumps looking back over it. I tend to work on something and then forget it so even when I look back over my own work I tend to view it from the third person not from the POV of remembering working on it. It allows me to be critical but as I said this guy’s stuff still gives me shivers.

From the thread’s humble beginnings it spread out to look at the contents of his letters and what he said. At the very least I think we ‘stumbled’ on some interesting theories of the origins of Zodiacs choice of words.

There are so many POI’s and they all have something that makes them so but Manalli is and has been, for me at least, peculiar because he just won’t go away. It happened for me looking at the handwriting. I’d think that I had found something that would make him a big no-no then after looking back through every character in his writings I would be scuppered and he would provide an answer to my doubts.

To fill you in on my own experience. I am a designer and I have been fortunate enough to have had a career that spanned the days of manual artwork and font and character recognition from catalogues right through to the advent of computers being used in design and beyond. I have spent many years working in detail in shape and form and character and font crafting. So, when I think something is interesting regarding any handwriting I don’t think it lightly. I am however not a handwriting expert and as such I still have to explore whatever it is that catches my attention.

I say this not to make my opinions or findings more appear to have more weight to them but rather to illustrate the depth of attention that is brought to any subject we explore.

It will be most refreshing to see what yourself and our other new members think of this thread and it’s contents. It can be tricky to remain objective when you are working on something but sometimes something comes along that just has something to it and this was one of those occasions. On the surface it was pretty much the same as anything else. Might be interesting, might not be, whatever. Once we started to dig a little though it exploded. Was this because we wanted to find things? I don’t know. As with a lot of our work it has speculation and what if’s but at every turn we found something to slot into Zodiac lore.

I started this Zodiac journey from the POV of my own life experiences and skill sets. I believe that Zodiac was creatively minded. He may or may not have followed that path career wise but I see evidence of this leaning in his communications. It’s a footprint I can’t ignore because I am trained to see it. Even this slightly obscure aspect of who Zodiac could have been was covered in Fred’s writings. His junk shop renovating of tables and even his noticing of the designs of stamps.

As I write this I am mindful that we didn’t show all of Fred’s letters. We couldn’t because of possible legal restrictions. To maybe help with the context of this thread a reader would benefit from seeing those. In that respect I would want to check with Deb first if it’s ok to furnish those to anyone interested in reading them. I think we have done this in the past but under the strict conditions that they are for private use and must NEVER be sent on to anyone else. If you want to see them I will facilitate providing them privately but as I said I will wait to hear Deb’s decision on such an action. If the answer is no then it’s no but I can assure that we were very transparent in our presenting and perhaps all you would miss out on is more reading and a little context.

Now we have the stuttering thing…..Fred just won’t go away and stop ticking boxes.

Trav that is fine. They can not be published which is the big deal. Even then I could write and get permission to publish if it were necessary.

Trav that is fine. They can not be published which is the big deal. Even then I could write and get permission to publish if it were necessary.

Thank you Deb.

So, if anyone wants to see the letters in their entirety just PM me with that request and an email to send them to. They are however NEVER to leave your computer, is that clear? You don’t forward them or print them or whatever without permission. You look, you read, that’s all. Simples.

It took me a few hours but I got through page one, exhausted from it A lot to take in at once. Lots of interesting stuff. Looking forward to reading the rest.

Looks like I have a lot of reading to do tomorrow.

I think you’ll find the time well spent.

I can’t wait for Trav’s analysis of the new material.

Me either……yay! lol.

Ugh I already typed this but closed the window too soon so here goes again.

I am re-reading the thread as well, still on page one lol.

I had Fincher’s Zodiac on in the background. Yes I’m that sad. Something caught my attention though that I hadn’t picked up on before. If, whilst reading this thread, you will have seen a few posts I made regarding the k’s and particularly the possible ‘transitional’ nature of them.

At one part in the movie when Graysmith is liaising with Morrill, Morrill is explaining to Graysmith the nature of how we form our handwriting with the locking in of our characters early in life. Even though our handwriting itself may change over the years the underlying approach to form and construction still remain. Then he says something that I found quite curious. He said "not so with Zodiac", "In his early letters he used a 2 stroke k but in his later ones a 3 stroke k". Is that true? I’ve had a quick look and I’m not sure that’s the case but it seems an odd thing to include if there wasn’t some basis to it. I have seen some of Zodiac’s k’s that might be 2 strokes but I would have to go back and specifically check with that in mind.

If this turns out to have some basis in fact then it would be very very interesting. You see I’m not sure anymore how much of what we see as Zodiac’s writing is actually his writing. I think a lot of it might be close but then the later letters kinda put a spanner in the works. It’s almost like they were created to say "fooled you, my other letters weren’t my real handwriting either". They do however contain similar underlying traits. Now, if that is the case then there is going to be a ‘transitional’ footprint in some characters, especially if they are changed more often. That’s what intrigues me about Manalli’s writing. It seems to provide those gaps or links in such a transitional exercise. Even within Manalli’s own writing you can see that happen on just one page. I have never encountered that in any other POI’s writing. Yes there may be variation and different styles on some characters but to have that and an incredibly similar underlying footprint is, well, scary. I only wish I could think of a way to show this but a lot of it doesn’t easily translate to comps.

I look back over some of my work and I think, WTF was I thinking. You will most likely think that too lol. Then there comes along another little gem and I have to say that I still find them compelling as I re-read.

If the next batch of letters starts with "Dear Dan, it may or may not surprise you to hear that I have been practicing mirror writing…" I won’t be surprised, lol.

A little off topic. Trav if you accidently close a tab you can get it back by hitting CTRL shift T, all at the same time, and voila you’ve got it all back! Tahoe sent me a neat video with some short cuts I didn’t know about.

Back to the topic. The new material does not involve Dan. Morf found new stuff at a different university. It will be interesting to see if Manalli sucks up to this different person like he did with Dan. I can’t wait!!!

I only wish I could think of a way to show this but a lot of it doesn’t easily translate to comps.

Sorry, quoting myself and I hate that when others do it. I wanted to expand on this a little. In the thread you will see a few overlay posts as I call them. I had ‘overlayed’ one of Manalli’s letters onto, I think for example, the citizen letter. Some members complained they were hard to look at or see what I was trying to illustrate.

Understandable, when I look at them now I think how the hell would that mean anything to anyone lol. The point of those though was not to show similarities in characters. It was to show where the pen strokes lined up when overlayed. Even at that it’s tricky to see but you can at least see the similarities in line spacing but that was just a byproduct of what I was trying to show.

As I said it’s hard sometimes to translate some things to comps. The ‘effect’ of things lining up is much more apparent to me as I work on the thing on screen as I can see one letter snap into place over the bottom one and as such I can see how many points match up. A before and after thing. So in that respect even the negative space around whole letters one page were giving me similarities. I should really find a better way to show this.

A little off topic. Trav if you accidently close a tab you can get it back by hitting CTRL shift T, all at the same time, and voila you’ve got it all back! Tahoe sent me a neat video with some short cuts I didn’t know about.

Back to the topic. The new material does not involve Dan. Morf found new stuff at a different university. It will be interesting to see if Manalli sucks up to this different person like he did with Dan. I can’t wait!!!

Right …..good to know….stable, horse, bolted. Lol Thanks Deb and T. Good to know.

Yes I wondered if the new stuff would be to Dan or even family or someone else.

Me either……yay! lol.

Ugh I already typed this but closed the window too soon so here goes again.

I am re-reading the thread as well, still on page one lol.

I had Fincher’s Zodiac on in the background. Yes I’m that sad. Something caught my attention though that I hadn’t picked up on before. If, whilst reading this thread, you will have seen a few posts I made regarding the k’s and particularly the possible ‘transitional’ nature of them.

At one part in the movie when Graysmith is liaising with Morrill, Morrill is explaining to Graysmith the nature of how we form our handwriting with the locking in of our characters early in life. Even though our handwriting itself may change over the years the underlying approach to form and construction still remain. Then he says something that I found quite curious. He said "not so with Zodiac", "In his early letters he used a 2 stroke k but in his later ones a 3 stroke k". Is that true? I’ve had a quick look and I’m not sure that’s the case but it seems an odd thing to include if there wasn’t some basis to it. I have seen some of Zodiac’s k’s that might be 2 strokes but I would have to go back and specifically check with that in mind.

If this turns out to have some basis in fact then it would be very very interesting. You see I’m not sure anymore how much of what we see as Zodiac’s writing is actually his writing. I think a lot of it might be close but then the later letters kinda put a spanner in the works. It’s almost like they were created to say "fooled you, my other letters weren’t my real handwriting either". They do however contain similar underlying traits. Now, if that is the case then there is going to be a ‘transitional’ footprint in some characters, especially if they are changed more often. That’s what intrigues me about Manalli’s writing. It seems to provide those gaps or links in such a transitional exercise. Even within Manalli’s own writing you can see that happen on just one page. I have never encountered that in any other POI’s writing. Yes there may be variation and different styles on some characters but to have that and an incredibly similar underlying footprint is, well, scary. I only wish I could think of a way to show this but a lot of it doesn’t easily translate to comps.

I look back over some of my work and I think, WTF was I thinking. You will most likely think that too lol. Then there comes along another little gem and I have to say that I still find them compelling as I re-read.

If the next batch of letters starts with "Dear Dan, it may or may not surprise you to hear that I have been practicing mirror writing…" I won’t be surprised, lol.

Trav, Zodiac most definitely uses 2 distinct kinds of K’s. The 3 stroke K, and that funny bubbly/rounder one. We also caught Manalli sneaking two different types of K into his writing….thats odd! You either use a 2 stroke or 3 stroke,so we were at a loss to explain why Manalli used 2 different K’s