An updated, cleaner version of this:

..which was drawn freehand as draft, and added colours via PhotoShop. William Hunter Hamrick.

Ambigramistas, start your engines..

It has started. For ambigram enthusiasts still wanting your regular ambigram fix, a new worldwide online challenge is here to whet your appetite all over again. Thanks to Imriaylde, we now have the Flickr Ambigram Challenge (FAC). Do visit here for more details. One more thing: you need to sign up on Flickr first.

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All the best! And more importantly, enjoy yourselves!

Two design proposals for Trinity. Not chosen.

Pretty straightforward formula. And the font-choice was rather obvious, too.

Was doodling around when an old theme presented itself. The Malay version of Angels&Demons: Malaikat (Angel) & Shaitan (Demon/Devil). 'Shaitan' is a less common spelling of 'Syaitan'.

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Tomas' Spanish version, Angeles y Demonios:

A stylised ambigram of Angels&Demons (by Andrei D. Robu, his website: here). He did mention that his is a version of John Langdon's.
And of course, the 'original piece' itself:

The Arabic name for Archangel Gabriel: Jibrail.

A Chinese character love story

Once, there was Joy. She was filled with Happiness.

(Actual character, Joy):

She met her soulmate and they fell in blissful love. They got married.

(Actual character, Double Happiness):
(And more examples):

Their life turned around since that day:
Years passed. And they had then a Happy Family they could call their own:

Logo proposal for Anomaly.

Also known as Nadrah, Maria Hertogh was the central figure in Singapore's 1950 riots. More info: here. She passed away today.

Two logo proposals (rough drafts) for Ameriblue.

A concept ambigram, I suppose. The letters in 'MERCY' spell out 'WRATH' when rotated individually on their own respective pivotal axis. M->W; E->R; R->a; c->t and y->h. A more effective way to present this would be by placing the letters on individual gears, and see them rotate upon turning of a handle. Similar to Tom Banwell's brilliant ambigramautomaton.

Been a while since we do a country ambigram. Tried to incorporate the flag, too, but missing an emblem.

As educators - and parents - the word could take on very different connotations in the different contexts. The pivotal 'nf' could also be a convenient allusion to our names.

Straightforward solution. Wak Yem (Old Uncle Yem).

A similar sentiment to PunkNotDead, I guess, but for another music genre.

Natalie Portman. The pivotal 'P' doesn't work quite as well as our Alberto Portacio ambigram below:

Quite straight-forward formula. An 'afrocity' pun came to mind when I see this again.

concept 69

A slightly conceptual representation for a 'sixty-nine' ambigram. In numerical symbols, a '69' is a vastly recognizable ambigram. Here, we use the word 'sixty' juxtaposed with the hidden Roman numerical 'IX' (9) to conceptually read 'sixty-nine'.

A design for Metal Horde (Singapore) a (quite new) Facebook page for updates on the Singapore's Metal Scene: here.

Metal Band logos

Request for a Metal Band logo, 'ophelia'. The first proposal:

Same formula, different font-style:

... and after some refinements:
We'll update the link to their webpage upon receiving that piece of information.

Metal Band Logos

Requests for a Metal Band logo. Ambigram, of course.
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The first 'Projeria' proposal:

... and the second (accepted):

We'll update a link to their webpage as soon as we receive that piece of information.

A simple sharing. The request was for a Kelvin-Parvin ambigram. A freehand sketch was done.

The image was later imported to PowerPoint and meticulously replicated using (of all things) basic shapes. After which we exported it to Photoshop for details. The final output:

That could be ambigramized!

Sometimes, a mere glance of a word or phrase could make us go, "That could be ambigramized!"

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Some words/phrases are just too cooperative to not be turned (pardon the pun) into an ambigram. Two posts back, we had shared our own (excited) discovery of The.president, The.Mutant and The.Militant.

The past week had seen other ambigram artists doing 'cooperative letter combinations':

WM Jas: '... a very ambigram-friendly phrase'.

Jutt: 'The letters cooperated nicely for this ambigram'

Robert Maitland: "... 90% of this fell into place very easily... "

Welcome WM Jas!

We've been trawling the internet for new artists, and was pleasantly surprised to have stumbled upon WM Jas' website: here. WM Jas - William James Tyconievich, based in Taiwan - must be one of those artists who excels in experimenting in his art. In such a short span, he had come up with very good concepts of diversed ambigrams and wordplays.

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One fun example is shown below, a pictoral ambigram where a decapitated head rotates into a jug of wine. Even the clever splatters / splashes of red fluid help in the understanding of the graphics.

Then, we also saw this, a very original take of a 'William' ambigram. Which works by playing with the negative spaces, too.
And if that wasn't enough to thrill us, he had designed a cross-language ambigram, too:

We're not done yet. He had this very observant wordplay in store for us (and listed other possible words-combination, too!):
Not satisfied with the 'simpler' one-lined ambigram, he pulled off a stunning 8-words ambigram 'Well, Adam, you have a new world here'!
Expect more surprises from the artist himself: here.

A design drafted during the US elections. The letter combinations fell into their respective places very cooperatively.

One 'secret' of doing a successful ambigram is the word choice. A word whose letter combinations need minimal manipulations works best. That's the same reason why 'naturally occuring ambigrams' are by far the most legible and most readable of ambigrams.

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From the design above, we'd noticed that the first three letters 'T-h-e' and last three letters 'e-n-t' easily rotate into each other. Having a 'safe' formula in mind, we could then simply choose other words or phrases which start with 't-h-e' and end with 'e(or a)-n-t'.

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We chose 'TheMutant'. No surprise, the result proved very easy readability:

Next word is simply an extension, 'TheMilitant':

In fact, we had something similar done years back:

Done using PowerPoint. Strategic Planning.

W.Bush. A visual pun, if you will.

Another take on 'The Grateful Dead' ambigram. The name screams for an awesome solution. So far, we couldn't just about nail it. Below is our earlier (20th June 2007) version:

Homero (Larrain) rotating into 'one way'. His 'ambigrama' blogpage link under AmbigramMates in sidebar.

R.I.P.

Going back to ambigram basics: antonyms. Hope it reads well enough.

Introducing a new member in our Ambigram Family, Daan Juttmann from the Netherlands. Though quite new in ambigram designing, Daan has shown considerable maturity in handling the letterforms and presentation. You may want to refer to his 'Leonardo Da Vinci' and 'Vitruvian Man' pieces in the recent NAC. Or, you could simply visit his blog: here.

Reading 'I am well'. A further placement of an 'S' could also make for a similar-idea 'I am swell'. Looking at this again, and with some minor adjustments, this could be a strong basis for a Tom Banwell ambigram as well (below was our Tom Banwell ambigram - dated 24 April 2007).

A straight-forward design, playing on the common evil-live / live-evil wordplay. A central 'A' lend not only a symmetrical pivot, but also a more impactful phrase. Done on MS Paint.

We've been watching the Spelling Bee tournament. Good stuff. We have not heard most of the words before ourselves; our hats off to all participants. Below is our take on the National Spelling Bee logo (already a superb piece of design!). We just made a reflection version. Minimal changes, really.

The original superb design:

nagfa ambigram challenge (NAC) December 2008

Hi and salam to all!

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At last, the compilation for NAC December 2008. Our Guest Challenger was Alessandro Pocaterra from Italy and the theme was Leonardo Da Vinci.

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Before we showcase the submitted entries, we present Alessandro's own solution (below). It is a reflection ambigram reading 'Da Vinci', which at the same time, depicts a stylised rendition of the the famous 'The Last Supper'. Jesus in the centre with two of his apostles to his left and right.

Da Vinci by Alessandro Pocaterra
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Now,we present the Top 3 entries, as chosen by the Guest Challenger:

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#NO. 1:

Da Vinci by Homero

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#NO. 2:

Leonardo Da Vinci by Daniel Dostal

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#NO. 3:

Leonardo by NastyBasty

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And the rest of the entries, in no particular order:

Leonardo by Krzystof Sliwa
Virgin of the rocks by Adi
Rinascimento (Renaissance) by Homero

Mona Lisa by Rico Frans

Leonardo Da Vinci by Robert Maitland

The Universal Man by Diego Colombo

Leonardo Da Vinci by Dave Williams

Da Vinci by Daniel Dostal

vitruvian man by daan juttmann

Da Vinci rotating into Painter by Blake Walker

Leonardo Da Vinci by Daan Juttmann

monalisa-gioconda by txescu
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We would like to extend our heart-felt thank you to Guest Challenger Alessandro Pocaterra for his time and patience. And of course to all contributors who had made this NAC another successful one.

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Though this would be the last official NAC, do visit us again for more information on other similar Ambigram contests / challenges being held in the internet realm.

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We take our humble leave from NAC. Thank you all.

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Salam and take care,

nagfa: Naguib & Fadilah (& baby Nayla)

Updates

Hi and salam to all,
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Before we reveal all the entries for the December 2008 NAC (Guest Challenger: Alessandro Pocaterra) - within the next 24 hours - we would like to give an update on a few matters.

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1) There has been a sudden surge of interest in ambigrams and ambigram designing, not surprisingly, after the screening of Dan Brown's Angels & Demons on the big screens. With it, we have noticed many new webpages and blogs dedicated to this art.

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So, if you do have your own blog dedicated to ambigrams, or you know of someone who does, do email us at: nagfa_ambigram@hotmail.com so that we could include your ambigram gallery in our AmbigramMates link.

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On the same note, if you have changed your website and your link doesn't work on our blog, please do let us know. Thank you.

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2) We have come to a point in our lives when we couldn't put aside as much time as we would have liked to in maintaining this blog. It had been some 5 years since we started doodling our first ambigrams - and 3 years since we've started this blog - and it would be sad to see lesser ambigram challenges where ambigram enthusiasts could participate and share their artistry among like-minded artists from around the globe.

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It is, therefore, with a heavy-heart and sadness, we would like to inform that we would like to step back from organizing the nagfa ambigram challenge (NAC). Having said these, we hope that there could yet be a similar challenge-invitational which could be a focal for the worldwide ambigram community.

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We have seen some successful ambigram contest/challenges among smaller groups - the Flickr ambigram groups, the Latin Ambigramas, etc. - so we know we have still an abundance of worthy successors.

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So, if you do intend to have any forms of ambigram challenges/invitational, we would be honoured to help spread the word. Please email us at: nagfa_ambigram@hotmail.com and we'll put a link to your ambigram contests.

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From time to time, when we have erred in our hosting / blogging / commenting on this blog, we would like to apologize again. We'll be around, maybe even posting an ambigram or two once in a while, so do come by a-visiting.

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Thank you,

Salam and take care,

nagfa: naguib & fadilah (& baby nayla)

Angels & Demons Gala Premiere (Singapore) by Nayla Najwa

Hello! I want to tell you a story. A happy story because Ayah and Ibu were smiling a lot. And kissed me a lot, too.

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One day, Ayah received a plain envelope: He showed it to Ibu and me, and said 'Invitation to the Gala Premier'. Ibu smiled. I smiled too, because I love playing with papers. Tearing them. Ayah arranged the things in the envelope and took a photograph. (Ayah deliberately hid my envelope behind the other glossy papers.)On Saturday, Ayah and Ibu dressed nicely and Ibu put on lipsticks. I like seeing Ibu with lipsticks. I want to put on lipsticks too when I grow up. Pretty just like Ibu. Ayah put on his funny spectacles (matches his funny beard, heehee). I don't want to wear funny spectacles when I grow up.

At the Gala place, Ibu said every guest received a contest form with nagfa's (Ayah and Ibu)ambigrams:

The person who could read the four ambigrams could win a Sony Ericsson handphone. I want to win a handphone for Ayah but I cannot read, yet. But I can tear papers, though.
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Ibu said there were also bigger ambigrams to help the guests see better. The four persons in the picture will also rotate the big cards. Maybe to confuse the guests even more:

After the contest, and chatting with the guests while having light refreshments, Ayah and Ibu watched the 'Angels & Demons' movie. Ayah said the movie was good. But after Ibu gave me my envelope, I was engrossed with it. I only saw Ayah's funny beard move but I did not pay attention to him anymore.
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Report done by cute Nayla Najwa:

'Ayah' is Malay for Father / Daddy.
'Ibu' is Malay for Mother / Mommy.
.. and I love both!

Another opportunity presented itself. The published article on Today (please refer a quite recent post) was only part of Sony Picture's (Singapore) publicity for the Angels & Demons movie. They had roadshows at various malls, one particularly grand one at the new Iluma mall (Iluma: rather apt, don't you agree, since the 'villain' of the film is the 'Illuminati') and a round-the-island race a la Robert Langdon's own around Rome.

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For us Nagfa, we were entrusted to design four ambigrams relating to the story plotline. These four ambigrams would be later used as part of a contest during the Gala Premiere for the film itself. We proposed more than four.

Vittoria Vetra, the main (only?) female character in the film. This was not included in the final four, as understandably, the contest would be held prior to the screening and non-readers of the book (perhaps, readers, too, frankly) wouldn't be able to know the name.
(The conflict of) Science & Religion. We opted for a more inclusive '&' rather than 'or'. Included in final four.

Two versions of 'vatican'. Top version included in final four.

Two versions of 'Race Against Time'. Top version included in final four.

Two versions of 'Antimatter'. Top version included in final four.

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In our next post, we'll show how the ambigrams were used during the Singapore Gala Premiere of Angels & Demons.

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salam,

nagfa: Naguib & Fadilah (..and baby Nayla)

Many would point to Dan Brown's Angels & Demons as the main reason ambigram came into the public's eyes. The recent release of the film version made ambigrams even more mainstream. In the coming few posts. we'll be touching on the film.

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Meanwhile. we have stumbled upon ths intricately beautiful Spanish version of Angels & Demons - 'Angeles y Demonios' - by our friend, Tomas.

You may want to go to his blog for a more stunning, rotating version (here).

After the story about nagfa was published, we received many emails. Some to congratulate us, many requesting for personalised ambigrams and one - from Ryan Hong and his wife, Tan Pei Ling - sharing their own ambigram. Below is the ambigram 'Peiling & Ryan' designed by Pei Ling:

Thank you for sharing, Ryan and Pei Ling! And as a sign of our appreciation, our own take, an ambigram reading 'Ryan&-Peiling':

Done using MS PowerPoint.