Semi off-topic but I've recently started using a brush pen for writing kanji, it's a Kaimei hair brush pen and although the stock ink is a little weak it's been wonderful to write with.
Fountain Pens - Page 3
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Badfatpanda
United States9719 Posts
Semi off-topic but I've recently started using a brush pen for writing kanji, it's a Kaimei hair brush pen and although the stock ink is a little weak it's been wonderful to write with. | ||
Prog455
Denmark970 Posts
On April 23 2013 18:22 Firebolt145 wrote: So if I wanted to buy a fountain pen from Amazon.co.uk, budget up to...£20 or so. What would your recommendations be? I don't really know what other criteria I should have. Probably a 'fine' nib? Hmm. Lamy Sarafi is probably your best option. In terms of nibs it is a matter of taste. German nibs tend to be a little wider than Japanese, but i'd say that a medium nib would be a fine nib for an all-round pen. Also fine nibs can be a little scratchier even though i doubt that would be a problem with a Lamy Sarafi nib. | ||
BluePanther
United States2776 Posts
On April 23 2013 19:58 Szgk wrote: Interesting that you mention the G2. It is my pen of choice. Is it popular? I came by it by chance. I wouldn't buy a 12-pack of those pens though: you can get refills for around 1/2 - 2/3 the price of the pen. I have a fountain pen as well - it was a graduation gift from my parents. I use it extremely rarely though. I won't use any other pen. | ||
Detri
United Kingdom683 Posts
![]() similar to what I roll with, except mine has a gold coloured clip. Also have the matching fountain pen, but I rarely use it. Good pens make writing a joy, and fuck getting calluses on your middle finger. | ||
Saumure
France404 Posts
But I have to say, nothing is better then the 10€ parker fountain pen. Speed, feeling and durability is simply awesome :p | ||
radscorpion9
Canada2252 Posts
On April 23 2013 19:57 wptlzkwjd wrote: Oh god I love videos like those! Check this one out: This one is particularly good, because it has David Byrne in it ![]() | ||
Butterednuts
United States859 Posts
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fabiano
Brazil4644 Posts
Drawing with them feels so good ![]() Btw, how to you call these in english? They are just the nib, that you sink in ink to make it write/draw. I've one of those too, and I actually like it better than the fountain pens ![]() | ||
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salle
Sweden5554 Posts
On April 23 2013 23:05 fabiano wrote: I've 2 fountain pens I used to use to draw mangá. Haven't used them in 2 years though, but this thread re-sparkled the fire! Drawing with them feels so good ![]() Btw, how to you call these in english? + Show Spoiler + They are just the nib, that you sink in ink to make it write/draw. I've one of those too, and I actually like it better than the fountain pens ![]() You call those a dip or a nib pen, in English. | ||
docvoc
United States5491 Posts
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Aocowns
Norway6070 Posts
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JieXian
Malaysia4677 Posts
My pen of choice for most of my life: + Show Spoiler + ![]() In my defense, even G2s are expensive over here, it's the cost of a nice meal: + Show Spoiler + ![]() Bah my handwriting is had never grown past 5 years old anyway. In a way you could say that my handwriting's retarded hahaha On April 23 2013 16:50 Wombat_NI wrote: This makes my interests seem non-esoteric, but really loved the OP and what might that be? | ||
Marimokkori
United States306 Posts
On April 23 2013 19:58 Szgk wrote: Interesting that you mention the G2. It is my pen of choice. Is it popular? I came by it by chance. I wouldn't buy a 12-pack of those pens though: you can get refills for around 1/2 - 2/3 the price of the pen. I have a fountain pen as well - it was a graduation gift from my parents. I use it extremely rarely though. The G2 is the probably the smoothest gel pen you can get for that price. Pilot claims it's the #1 selling pen in the USA. I use them for work, I'm a waiter, so I need a handful of cheap pens I don't care about in case people take them. The only complaint about them I really have is that the clips are frail and always break on me after a while. If you have problems with your bodies also, I'd take a look at the G2 Limited: http://www.pilotpen.us/ProductGroup/32-G2Limited.aspx Same pen but with a metal body and clip that won't break so easily. I'm also a fan of the Zebra Sarasa clip, because the clip mechanism is awesome for someone like me who has to constantly place pens into a shirt pocket or apron. The Zebra airfit is probably my favorite gel pen for this reason. I use one as my main writing tool when I'm working. Even if you only buy G2 refills, it's still more expensive per mL than a bottle of ink. Here's an article about someone switching from Pilot's G2 pens to fountain pens with Noodler's ink. http://mikeshea.net/Noodlers_Ink_the_Pilot_G2.html + Show Spoiler [Embedded Article] + Yesterday great joy arrived at my apartment door in the manifestation of two 3 ounce bottles of Noodler's black fountain pen ink. Now I love fountain pens but I also love knowing that my written word could conceivably last for a thousand years and I don't trust normal fountain pen ink. For about the past year, I have used Pilot G2 rollerball ink. G2 is archival quality, acid free, water resistant, costs a dollar at just about any grocery store, drug store, or stationary store, and fits inside of my favorite Waterman Expert rollerball pen as well as Rotring, Sheaffer, and other fancy pens. For the last year I used this ink exclusively, but something was missing. Here's the problem: Fountain pens are cool. Stephen King, Neil Gaiman, and Neil Stephenson all wrote novels with a fountain pen. The technology of a fountain pen hasn't changed much since Lewis Waterman invented the capillary feed system in his fountain pen in 1884. World leaders used a Waterman fountain pen to sign the treaty of Versallis, one of the most damaging documents ever written (many blame the treaty of Versallis for the rise of Nazi Germany). Fountain pens are classy. They feel traditional and cultured. They write smoothly without a single moving part. But there is a problem, a hypocracy. Fountain pen ink is almost always water-based ink and while much of it is acid free and safe for use on high quality paper for permanent work, it is far from waterproof. I tested this by writing with Waterman-brand fountain pen ink on one side of a sheet of paper and Pilot G2-based rollerball ink on the other. I boiled the page for five minutes and removed it. The G2 ink was fine. The Waterman ink was completely gone. Fountain pens, however, require water-based ink or they gum up and quit working right. When I tried to put an acrylic acid-free waterproof ink into my Waterman Phileas fountain pen, it gummed up in a couple of days. Only washing it out and replacing it with water-based ink made it write well again. All seemed lost. Fountain pen ink didn't meet the criteria for Mike Shea's permanent inking solution. The criteria includes the following: Easy to acquire Inexpensive Acid free Black Water resistant Fade resistant in light exposure But then, after much digging on the web and some suggestions from people over at Moleskinerie and other sources, I heard of a new ink, a magical ink: Noodler's fountain pen ink. This ink, though water-based, becomes waterproof when it chemically bonds to the cellulose on paper. A variety of tests in the harshest of circumstances shows that Noodler's fountain pen ink on paper can survive water soaking, acetone, naphtha, bleach, ammonia, blue magic, industrial cleaners and chemical lifters. A quick query out to Usenet gave me back the ink's pH acidity level of 7.1. pHs of 7 and above are considered acid free. So I ordered up two bottles from Fountain Pen Hospital at $12 for a 3 ounce bottle and last night it arrived. What did I find? I loaded my three fountain pens full of the Noodler's ink including my Waterman Phileas fine tip, my Waterman Expert 2 fine tip, and my Lamy Safari medium tip. I wrote out a page of text using each of the three pens for one or two paragraphs. I cut it up, took one of the paragraphs, and soaked it in water for about 20 minutes. Its just fine. The ink is as strong as it was when I put it in. I found something else as well. My Expert 2 fountain pen, my personal favorite pen, had a bit of a broad line when writing with Waterman ink. When I switched to Noodler's I found that the line the pen wrote was much narrower yet flowed as smooth as I could ask for. I wrote a couple pages of a story in my favorite Moleskine pocket plain notebook without any bleed through and the tip width is perfect. I couldn't ask for a better pen. So I now have an ink both worthy of daily writing and traditional enough to let me enjoy writing strange tales of the macabre in my new leather-bound journal or my pocket Moleskines. While the Pilot G2 is a fine pen for daily writing and especially air travel, where fountain pens have a tendency of exploding with greatly humorous results, I will write daily with my Waterman Expert 2 fountain pen with Noodler's ink. It is traditional, fun, archival, and water resistant. I'd also like to point out that fountain pens don't really explode on planes (As Mike suggests). They only leak if they are not stored properly, and all it takes is some understanding of the pressure changes during a flight. Higher altitude = Lower atmospheric pressure. Air potentially trapped in a pen is still at the pressure of ground level - so it tries to escape the pen, pushing ink out in the process. But there are a number of ways around this. Store the pen nib up so any air in the pen is near the tip and can more freely escape. I believe there is a pen that allows you to empty the feed and channels without emptying the ink reservoir, though I can't remember the name. Brian Goulet on flying with pens: | ||
Kukaracha
France1954 Posts
Question : my writing is TERRIBLE. I learned how to write by myself as I missed the schoolyear when you learn how to do it and still went to the next class. Does any of this help ? Having a nice pen, taking calligraphy classes...? | ||
ZenithM
France15952 Posts
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Psychonian
United States2322 Posts
Im sorry but this thread makes no sense to me. What little sense it makes seems interesting though. | ||
Marimokkori
United States306 Posts
On April 24 2013 02:26 Kukaracha wrote: Always, you've caught my attention. Question : my writing is TERRIBLE. I learned how to write by myself as I missed the schoolyear when you learn how to do it and still went to the next class. Does any of this help ? Having a nice pen, taking calligraphy classes...? Nice handwriting is a skill that comes with practice. Learning calligraphy might help, but if you are looking to just improve your everyday normal handwriting, then that's what you need to practice. My English handwriting looks decent because I've been writing it for a very long time. My Japanese, on the other hand, looks kind of childish regardless of what pen I use because I don't have nearly as much practice with it. Check out things like The Palmer Method | ||
Djzapz
Canada10681 Posts
![]() Edit: I sincerely believe that my handwriting is unrecoverable, even if I trained ![]() | ||
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Firebolt145
Lalalaland34465 Posts
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BearStorm
United States795 Posts
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