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Post by penguy on Jul 6, 2022 16:28:11 GMT
Curious about peoples preferences regarding inks and papers.
What is your favorite brand of ink and why? What is your ink color preference? What inks are wet writing and dry writing?
What is your favorite brand of writing paper? Do you select for it's texture, design, or fountain pen friendliness, or price?
Where do you usually purchase your ink and paper, brick and mortar store or order on the internet or other source?
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Post by davidv on Jul 7, 2022 13:05:51 GMT
I've been gravitating to the Herbin standard colours lately. I like them because they are vintage pen friendly, and most aren't too saturated and are easier to clean out of pens. Another factor is that they're available at 2 stores locally, so I'll buy them in person. I like having inks of a variety of colours, but I don't care about shading, sheen, or shimmer properties. For colours, I like blues and browns, and dark green most. Specific favourite inks are Herbin's Lie de The and Vert Empire. I find most of the Herbin inks moderate in terms of wetness, but there is some variation depending on the colour. The bottle shape is the major downside to Herbin; it is very difficult to fill out of them once the ink is a bit low. But, I've decided to just accept that.
For a while now, I've been using paper called SugarSheet. I like it because it's fairly fountain pen friendly and priced similar to regular printer paper; I can be a bit cheap when it comes to paper. Bleedthrough can eventually occur if the ink is way too heavily applied, but it's what I like for general letter writing. I prefer paper that isn't too smooth (Rhodia is slipperier than I like), and not too thin. I also like ink to be absorbed somewhat by the paper, rather than entirely sitting on top - what I especially don't like are papers where the ink remains extremely smudge prone, which I often find on Tomoe River. If I want something more premium, I have a Strathmore writing pad, that I enjoy. I will use Rhodia sometimes just to mix things up. Southworth makes a paper that I really like too, but I haven't found it around here for a price that I like.
At work, I use some coil bound notebooks from Dollarama that have actually very nice lined paper that works with fountain pens. Those were very satisfying finds. I also like Leuchturm notebooks. But most of my pen use is for letters or miscellaneous gibberish that I write on loose sheets, so the notebooks don't get that much use outside of note taking at work.
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Post by filpot on Jul 7, 2022 14:08:21 GMT
The bottle shape is the major downside to Herbin; it is very difficult to fill out of them once the ink is a bit low. But, I've decided to just accept that. If, like me, you can't bear to leave the last drops of ink in the bottom of a bottle, this is where a nice syringe comes in handy......
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Post by davidv on Jul 8, 2022 0:14:01 GMT
filpot, yes, I should get one of those sometime. I have a plastic pipette that works well, but might not be small enough to say fill up a cartridge with the ink.
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Post by allanorn on Jul 8, 2022 4:32:14 GMT
Favorite ink brand is generally Pilot. Their blue and blue-black are workhorses for this lefty underwriter who needs quick-drying ink. Their Iroshizuku line is also fantastic for a higher quality experience. I haven't bought ink in a while but I'll usually buy bottles from JetPens, Goulet, or perhaps where I buy a pen or have a large order worthy of adding a bottle.
For paper I usually go with Mead Writing Tablet from Amazon for most letters. It's a nice size (6x9 inches), takes fountain pen ink from narrow nibs fairly well, and it is usually consistent. Ideally I'd find a source of decent A5 paper that's inexpensive, but that's unlikely to happen in the states.
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Post by tramplingrose on Jul 8, 2022 13:49:36 GMT
I don't necessarily have a favorite ink brand. I buy ink by color, which means I have varying shades of green, blue, and teal that make up most of my collection.
As far as writing paper goes, my favorite is Franklin-Christoph's lined looseleaf. Even wet inks dry fairly quickly (unlike Tomoe River paper) and you can see decent shading with bold/broader nibs (which are my preference). And I don't think it's unreasonably priced.
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Post by Bob on Jul 8, 2022 15:17:40 GMT
Curious about peoples preferences regarding inks and papers. What is your favorite brand of ink and why? What is your ink color preference? What inks are wet writing and dry writing? What is your favorite brand of writing paper? Do you select for it's texture, design, or fountain pen friendliness, or price? Where do you usually purchase your ink and paper, brick and mortar store or order on the internet or other source? Favorite brand is Noodler's - many colors, BSB is the most brilliant blue of all, and the added benefit of Nathan's unique humor expressed on the labels. A close second is J. Herbin, which offers cartridges as well as bottles so I can write with Éclat de Saphir in Paris. The bottle design makes it difficult to fill with what's left at the bottom of the bottle, but I simply pour what little is left into a new bottle. Many of J. Herbin's inks are wet writing, par example : Éclat de Saphir, Rouge Bourgongne, and Rouge Caroubier. Montblanc Lucky Orange is also wet writing. MB no longer sells it, but I have a good supply having bought a number of bottles while it was still widely available. Favorite paper brand: Crown Mill. A friend gave me a box of their laid stationery and it's friendly to my Pelikan Medium cursive italic nib and the 146's OBB nib. The note cards and envelopes are a less expensive alternative. Another favorite: Pineider Par Avion, which I selected for its design / blue color that complements BSB ink and the Inverted Jenny airmail stamps that I use for international mail. Yeah, the Inverted Jenny is more than International Forever stamps, but it's classier and the extra money helps the Post Office. As there are no brick and mortar pens stores in the Cleveland area, I buy ink and paper online from Goulet Pens, Jet Pens, and Laywines' in Toronto. Jet Pens carries Exacompta fountain pen-friendly index cards that I use to make flash cards for my French classes. As Brian Goulet so eloquently and succinctly says, "Write On."
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Post by purplemaze on Jul 10, 2022 5:16:08 GMT
My favorite ink brand is Sailor for their beautiful colors. I like Iroshizuku, Diamine, and J.Herbin as well, all of these are usually well behaved. I like all colors, but gravitate towards teal, brown, and pink.
My favorite paper is Tomoeriver as it showcases ink colors really well. I see the sheen of the inks that I don’t on other papers, and shading also looks great, too. I often use loose A4 papers for long letters. For short to medium letters I like using Life L writing paper. I also use various Yamamoto papers, and Midori MD papers. All of these are not cheap but I buy them for fountain pen friendliness. I want to enjoy the writing experience so it’s like little luxury:)
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Post by stompie on Jul 11, 2022 12:26:59 GMT
No particular way of choosing inks or papers. I do tend to go for stuff that I see samples of or recommendations from other folk - eg FPN have that chap who does bleach work with inks and his sample pictures are spectacular. Papers, much the same or if someone writes to me with a fancy paper I might get some. I used to enjoy that paper from Staples but they stopped making it some years ago, it was lovely, especially with dip pens and it could take the swells of letters easily!
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Post by radellaf on Jul 14, 2022 13:10:10 GMT
I don't necessarily have a favorite ink brand. I buy ink by color, which means I have varying shades of green, blue, and teal that make up most of my collection. As far as writing paper goes, my favorite is Franklin-Christoph's lined looseleaf. Even wet inks dry fairly quickly (unlike Tomoe River paper) and you can see decent shading with bold/broader nibs (which are my preference). And I don't think it's unreasonably priced. Didn't even know they had that. Was on the fence about the pink smoke panther from their "virtual pen show" so grabbed 100 sheets of it to go with the pen. Tempted by ink but, seriously, NO MORE INK. I have a 6 pack of new Birmingham colors and just got two exclusive Endless Pens ones (the red old book smell and green tea or something like that) No favorite brand here. Lots of Noodler's, Robert Oster, Colorverse, and OMG Diamine. To a newbie I'd unqualified-ly say Diamine. Worry about "ink properties" later.
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Post by stompie on Jul 15, 2022 11:31:22 GMT
I too enjoy Diamine but, I recently got the Diamine Platinum Jubilee ink - wow, how dry an ink! Even in my hand ground broad nibs I can not get it to flow properly - any ideas on loosening up a shimmer ink from Diamine would be appreciated!
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Post by distractedmom on Jul 21, 2022 20:36:43 GMT
radellaf, your "seriously no more inks" made me laugh! I LOVE inks, especially shading and sheening inks. My favorite colors change with my mood, though I do have a lot of blues. And oranges. I'm still searching for the perfect red now that Sheaffer Red is discontinued. Instagram is a wormhole for previewing inks. I have a lot of Birmingham inks, but I find that some of them bleed through more than other brands. That being said, my current favorite ink is Birmingham's Supercell. I tend to order from Anderson and Atlas Stationers. They both have brick and mortar stores in Chicago, which I have visited several times. It's so nice to visit with the proprietors and I like to support them even when I can't get to the city. As for paper, I love Tomoe River because it shows off ink so beautifully but sometimes it's not practical. I like the Black n Red notebooks from Office Max. I really like the stationery designs of LaPapierre, though my love for a juicy nib doesn't always play well with their paper. I think that katiel has done some testing of their papers. I like Clairefontaine too.
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thepostingnib
Finger Paints
Posts: 1
Looking for Penpals?: Yes. Global penpals welcome
Country I live in is: USA
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Post by thepostingnib on Jul 22, 2022 5:24:21 GMT
My favorite brands are Pilot and Sailor. I also like Platinum carbon ink for waterproof black. I find myself buying a lot of yellow ink and green ink. I'm very picky about greens though, I probably only have 4 or 5 green inks in my hands that I really liked and bought. I consider most Sailor inks to be very wet. The drier ink would be from Kyo no Oto, I use the Kyo no Oto when I want my thicker pens to produce finer lines. Paper wise, Tomoe River are my #1 goto papers. I also love Cosmo Air Light and B7 Tranext. I got both Cosmo and B7 from Etsy shop, they send it from Japan. Both paper will drastically change your writing experience!!! They are must try! It almost felt like writing on a soft pad with a very good amount of feedback.
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Post by radellaf on Jul 24, 2022 0:52:10 GMT
I'm still searching for the perfect red now that Sheaffer Red is discontinued. I have about 2 bottles of that left, which is probably a lifetime supply, but it will test my no more ink intentions when the new Sheaffer ink lineup is available. Maybe the red in that will be close enough. Pelikan is certainly no sub. Waterman is OK, so is pilot (in the big bottle). The best substitute is most likely one of the Diamine reds, I just don't know which. R.O. and Noodlers make good reds but, rightly or wrongly, I think Diamine is more universally well behaved as a mixer. Oh, R&K has Morinda, that's a good red from an innocuous ink lineup. Fernambuk is a interesting heavily pink/magenta mixer, especially with Helianthus for good oranges. My Birmingham Indescretion, along with part of my recent pencil indiscretions, USB power bank oversupply, one of too many radios and too many batteries; and, on the far right, an in progress reply to a December letter from katiel. Which I will not write and mail at the same time I'm writing a reply to you, this time.
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Post by radellaf on Jul 28, 2022 14:41:38 GMT
"seriously, no more inks" was held to for an impressive amount of time, I think. I'm a sucker for new inks in lines I already have a bunch of, so after the Birmingham buy, I unfortunately heard about the Sheaffer ink change. Pen Chalet only had three of those in stock; OK, I'll get those. And a nice Rotring pencil. And then... somehow, I stumbled on their having full bottles of the three new Iroshizuku inks. So that'll be here today. THEN, probably FB's fault, I found I'd missed the R&K Deep Pine ink of the year. Seitz Global is sadly out of business, but iPenStore had reasonable $4 shipping so I got it from there for $20 total. Looked for other stuff, since I love to buy $50 of stuff I don't need to avoid paying $7 shipping, but their selection is a bit sparse. Someone will get my order for most of the other Sheaffer ink, unless it gets horrible reviews. Maybe Vanness, maybe Chalet. I hit 25 "ink points" so, yay. My birthday 15% expired: boo!
No new pens. Just pencils. Well, no new _fountain_ pens. I did my annual mid-year seeking of Pilot G2 with a 2022 mfg date and found a pack. So happy.
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