This will get you started and up to speed on runecrafting.
Rune essence can be acquired from the rune essence mining site, you can teleport there from the wizards house in Varrock, behind the Varrock East bank, you go there on the quest.
Speed and stamina potions will speed up this skill, use the best ones you have for most efficiency.
Teleports will also speed up training.
For a list of all runes and requirements check out the Runecrafting page.
Levels 1 - 5 Air Runes[]
With a full inventory of essence head west of Varrock to the Air altar, right click and wait a moment to craft the runes.
There is a bank in Varrock west.
1 rune gives 5 xp, 175 xp per inv.
It will take 88 rune essence (3 trips) to reach level 5 from level 1 using this method.
Levels 5 - 9 Water Runes[]
South west of Lumbridge and south east of Draynor, in the swamps is the Water altar.
There is a bank on top of Lumbridge castle.
1 rune gives 11 xp, 385 xp per inv.
It will take 57 rune essence (2 trips) to reach level 9 from level 1 using this method.
Levels 9 - 14 Earth Runes[]
East and north of Varrock, south of the Sawmill is the Earth Altar.
There is a bank in Varrock East.
1 rune gives 14 xp each, 490 xp per inv.
It will take 83 rune essence (3 trips) to reach level 14 from level 9 using this method.
Levels 14 - 28 Fire Runes[]
North of Al Kharid, south of the mines, is the Fire altar.
There is a bank in Al Kharid.
1 rune gives 18 xp each, 630 xp per inv.
It will take 432 rune essence (12 trips) to reach level 28 from level 14 using this method.
Levels 28 - 53 Chaos Runes[]
North of Edgeville is the chaos altar. WARNING, this altar is in the wilderness where you can be killed by other players.
There is a bank in Edgeville.
1 rune gives 33 xp each, 1,155 xp per inv.
It will take 2,568 rune essence (70 trips) to reach level 53 from level 28 using this method.
Levels 53 - 65 Law runes[]
Currently, the best discovered method is to take a chartership from Catherby to Entrana, runecraft the runes and take chartership back to Catherby.
1 rune gives 56 xp each, 1,960 per inv.
It will take 3,119 rune essence (85 trips) to reach level 65 from level 53 using this method.
Levels 65 - 99 Death runes[]
North of Edgeville is the death altar, to get there reliably teleport to Edgevill and go north to the wilderness wall, go west to where the wall ends and go straight north into the wilderness. WARNING, this altar is in the wilderness where you can be killed by other players.
There is a bank in Edgeville.
1 rune gives 65 xp each, 2,275 xp per inv.
It will take 78,486 rune essence (2,122 trips) to reach level 99 from level 65 using this method.
Levels 53 - 99 Law Runes[]
A safer and faster method is just doing law runes to 99, especially when combined with speed potions and the Falador teleport.
It will take 90,014 rune essence (2,433 trips) to reach level 99 from level 53 using this method.
Number of trips was calculated assuming 37 essence crafted per trip, with no xp multipliers.
Multiple Runes[]
A chart to the runes per essence is available here.