Category Archives: Review

Review: Semikolon Journal A6

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This journal or pocket notebook feature 64 leaves or 128 pages of blank cream-colored paper. It measures 105x148mm or 4.1×5.8 inches. In other words, pretty standard pocket-sized. The corners are sharp. The whole notebook is held together with 2 regular steel colored staples. The notebooks are available in several different colors and are shrink wrapped.

Mine is burgundy or brick red colored. It’s a nice vibrant color. The paper has a pleasing texture. The cover stock is the same weight as the interior pages, which doesn’t bode well for it doing well in a pocket. This is a book that will require a cover of some sort.

The paper inside is cream colored and has a laid texture, which is lovely. The paper responds very well to fountain pens, inks of all kinds, and all the pencils I tested. It’s really quite lovely. I look forward to sketching on its pages.

At Almost $5 for the little pocket-sized notebook, I’m not sure it is a great value. IF I had a cover that fits it, I may feel differently. But as it is, I just don’t feel like I’ll get enough bang for my buck on this notebook. Continue reading →

Review: MD Paper Products Pencil B Grade

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The Midori pencils have been around for awhile, and I snagged one in a swap but bought my first package of them while in Cambridge. You can find them online easily but also at Black INk in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

These pencils feature a cream colored matte finish over fabulously scented cedar. The imprint is in black and crisp. They are eraser less and the ends are not finished. Each end is ever so slightly domed. The domed ends are a lovely little detail, something I’ve come to expect from Midori products.

They sharpen well in every sharpener I’ve used, from Classroom Friendly to Masterpiece to Pollux. The cedar shaves off smoothly and the lead sharpens to a perfect point. The B grade core is darker and softer than many B grades. Compared to European pencils, like Staedtler I”d rate is a 3 or 4 B while in Japanese pencils I’d say it is closer to a Mitsubishi 2B. The core is silky smooth and reminds me of Mitsubishi pencils. It glides over the paper and lays down a nice dark line as I write. Sketching this pencil produces decent darks and lights, it won’t produce the darkest of darks, but it does a good enough job for general sketching.

These aren’t the cheapest of pencils. I picked up a 6-pack for almost $11, still cheaper than Blackwing Volumes and around the same price as the regular Blackwings, with a vastly different look. Continue reading →

Review: Ohto Sharp Pencil 0.5 Mechanical

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The Ohto Sharp Pencil (OSP form here) is wood cased with lovely cedar and designed to look like a standard number 2 pencil. The design mostly works, with a few little details that could work better.

First, let me tell you about the good parts of the OSP. The wood casing is the size of a regular number two pencil. It is lightly varnished with a clear satin finish. The imprint is black, crisp and looks fabulous. The “ferrule” is silver aluminum but is also available in brass, but more about that later. Seated in the ferrule is a cup, with a standard pink eraser.

At the working end, the pencil features a small brass cone and guide. If your pencil gets jammed up with broken leads you are SOL, the tip cannot be unscrewed to be cleared. I tried and the tip did not budge no matter how much I attempted to remove it. The interior mechanism appears to be made with a combination of metal and plastic. For less than $5 this is to be expected. Ohto makes a higher end version with a brass colored ferrule and no eraser. The interior appeared to be the same as the cheaper version, the big difference is the lack of eraser and brass coloration.

I find that the mechanism to work well. Leads deploy at roughly 0.5mm per click and the click while soft is satisfying. The supplied lead is smooth and appears to be a hard HB. I swapped mine out with some NanoDia in 2B which works wonderfully in this pencil.

The OSP 0.5 mechanical suffers from the same issues as the Ohto Sharp Pencil 2.0 mm, in that the eraser cup floats around in the ferrule and clicks as you write. The 2.0 mm version has a very small amount of room and required a quick wrap of sticky tape to solve the metal on metal click. The OSP has a larger amount of room and required a wrap with washi tape to solve the issue.

This points out a regular issue I have with many Ohto products- their half-assing their design and production. Ohto puts out lovely, really nice designs that fall flat in production values. This design is lovely, but the rattling of the eraser cup in the ferrule is beyond annoying. Solving this issue is as simple as a wrap of tape around the cup, but Ohto could solve the issue by inserting a plastic sleeve into the ferrule. I get that they are attempting to get their products into a certain price point (affordable/cheap) but I’d gladly pay an extra buck for this pencil without the issue. Let’s face it several other companies have made wood-cased mechanical pencils at much higher price points.

Overall, if you love wood-cased pencils and mechanicals this is a nice mashup, especially for $5. Does it perform as well as my Rotring 600? No, but I’m not going to use it for anything but notes and writing, not draughting fancy plans. Continue reading →

Review: Tofty Via Shapeways Refill Adapter

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I’ve been wanting a gel pen refill for my Squire since I got the thing. Don’t get me wrong I love the Schmidt P8126 refill that comes with them, but I love gel ink, particularly on the paper at work. As I’ve detailed before, my DayJob has the finest cheapest crappy printer paper, and everything bleeds on it. Gel pens seem to perform the best. Well, that and ballpoint.

After a chat with Ana of The Well-Appointed Desk, I tested out a bunch of the gel refills I had around on my desk. Only to continue the conversation (as pen nerds do) and find that Baron Fig had narrowed up the nose of the Squire and it will only accept a few refills, namely those with a tip roughly the same diameter of the P8126. This leaves you with using standard Parker type refills, and Parker does make a lovely gel refill that I destroy in under a week.

But in my discussion with Ana, she suggested Tofty and his adapters. I headed over to Shapeways and Tofty’s page and ordered a few adapters. I also ordered some Schmidt D1 ballpoint refills. D1 refills are a steal on the ‘Zon, I snagged a 10-pack for cheap. Are they the best? No. As far as ballpoints go, they aren’t bad. They write smoothly and don’t blob.

Anyway. The D1 refill slide into the adapter- BE CAREFUL the adapters should be snug and hold onto that refill like, well you make up your own metaphor/simile here, my mind isn’t going to good places. It takes a bit of effort to get the refill into the adapter but once it is in there, it STAYS in there. I found it helpful to get the refill started into the adapter, install it into my pen and then press the tip of the refill straight down into a pad of paper, which fully seats the refill every time. To remove the refill, take it out of the pen, hold the adapter in on hand and grip the D1 refill with a pair of plier and yank.

Like most of the Shapeways stuff, I’ve picked up… The plastic looks cheap, feel fragile, and gets filthy in moments. It doesn’t matter so much with these adapters because they live inside the pen and so long as it’s not a transparent pen, they are hidden. Thus far I’ve been using one inside a Squire for a few months and I’ve been happy with the change. It does its job well.

At $5.50 the price is… A little high in my mind. BUT over time and with 10 D1 refills over P8126 you’ll save a few bucks. Continue reading →

Review: Tofty via Shapeways Pen Clip

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This clip has been mentioned on RSVP multiple times yet I’ve failed to post a review. My thoughts on this clip are mixed.

I picked up the white processed versatile plastic. It’s got a rough finish I rather like but it looks filthy very quickly. For another $4.50 you can get a smoother premium plastic. White goes with everything, and given how many color variations Baron Fig has, black and white are the best choices (to me.)  The 9mm clip worked for me, but 8.5mm might also work with a snugger fit.

The part of the clip that wraps around your pen is delicate, BE CAREFUL when you slide the pen into it, or you might crush or crack it and it won’t work. Sigh. I’ve ordered 2 of these because the first clip I ordered was 10mm and too big and of course I crushed that one. Once you get the right size for your pen, the clip slides on and fits nicely at a good point on the BF Squire pen body. It doesn’t look great, but it is perfectly functional.

Scratch that. The Tofty clip is a wart on a beautiful pen body. It’s ugly AF and I hate it except for the fact that it means I can now use my Squires at work. My work environment means I’m up and moving around and I need to be able to grab my pen (clipped to the buttons of my shirt) quickly for notes. I can’t leave it on my desk in the Stone like I do when I’m at home. For work use, my pens MUST have a clip, and Tofty’s are ugly but functional and they won’t scratch the anodized finish like other slide on metal clips will. I won’t even look at the Peerless pencil clip as an option, that things scratch my fingers if I look at it wrong.

Anyway, if you can look past the aesthetics of the Tofty clips it is the only option for BF Squire that slides on securely. At $4.50 it’s not super cheap but it is affordable. Continue reading →

Review: Brandless Softcover Notebook 3-pack

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I reviewed the Brandless gel pens over here. My wife likes to add on a new stationery item with every order as a surprise to me. 🙂

Like all the other Brandless items a 3-pack is $3. Each notebook contain 30 sheets or 60 pages. There are multiple signatures in each notebook and they are stitched together and then glued to the cover. The cover is soft and pretty floppy, it is impossible to write in hand with these notebooks. That said they are about composition notebook size and fit into any cover that fits comp books. The corners are square and not rounded.

The matte cover features ridges of texture and a white area to write into, no Brandless info on the front cover. Discreetly on the back is the brandless logo.

The paper inside is college ruled in dark gray. The ruling is dark enough that it doesn’t blend into the background but stands out. The paper is thin, very thin. It does not work well with fountain pens. Some of my inks feathered, but not all. Most all had show through and many had bleed through. Even some of my gel pens bleed through the page. The paper responded best with ballpoint and pencil. Pencil was really nice on this paper.

These aren’t great notebooks but they aren’t bad if you stick to pencil and are just looking for something to jot down a few study notes or thoughts on book reviews. They don’t feel special or particularly nice, but they are okay. It’s not a bad way to get your Brandless order up for free shipping. Continue reading →

Review: Baron Fig X Codecademy Computerworld LE Vanguard

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I’ve reviewed a few BF vanguard sets in the past. This set sports the same great paper and soft but sturdy card cover with stitched spines. The big difference in this set is that they arrive in a box, instead of belly banded and shrink wrapped. If you are seeking a lovely presentation for a gift, this is a good one. The interior paper is printed with a nicely sized ruling with numbered lines. The numbers are pale enough that if you wish, you can write over them and it won’t interfere with reading your writing later.

What is truly enjoyable about this set are the covers. Each cover sports a different theme and intricate artwork that I can’t help but stare at as I think. The covers are colorful but use muted shades of all the colors used. Teal, yellow, and magenta call back to the late 80s and early 90s while the interior numbered lines are a full-on thrown back to dot matrix printer paper I used in elementary school.

The back cover of each book is one solid color with an icon in the center and the title of the set in the bottom center. It is a simple reprieve from the business of the front. The inside covers sport a pale shade of that back cover with info about the cover in white text. Overall, the covers are lovely.

This is the first Vanguard set I’ve received with a sheet of stickers. I think it is a great addition to the set. BF has pulled out little icons from the covers and made stickers. They are a lot of fun.

Overall this set is a lot of fun. It looks great and has amazing paper inside.

Continue reading →

Review: Baron Fig LE Apprentice The Atomic Edition

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Baron Fig hasn’t put out an Apprentice in years. This is a great new edition that I love. My RSVP cohost, Lenore might hate the planetary atomic model but I love the look.

The pale baby blue textured cover feels great in my hand. The tactile feel of all the BF covers really draws me in, this is no exception. I find myself picking the notebook up without thinking about it. The spine is stitched, which I’ve blathered on about my favorite of all the pocket notebook bindings.  It’s sturdy and mine are all straight and well done.

Inside the covers live 48 pages of cream-colored dot grid paper. As usual, the grid is pale gray and fades behind any writing. The paper is great with pencil, ballpoint, gel, and rollerball, but I found that my fountain pens tended to have a great deal of show through and even a bit of bleed. It doesn’t feather so I use my EF and F nibbed pens on it and ignore the show through.

My big problem with the BF Apprentice isn’t the bleed or show through with fountain pens, it is the size. It is about ½ inch (1cm) too short and roughly ¼ inch (5mm) narrower than most other pocket notebooks. The size feels precious and small. The size feels great in hand but it doesn’t fit any over my covers and slides down deep into my Nock FodderstackXL. Of course, this means that if I want to slap this into a cover I’m stuck using the BF Guardian.  

Overall, this is a worthy addition to the scores of pocket notebooks on the market, but I think BF missed out by not making this the standard pocket notebooks size. The stitched binding could have made this a serious contender but instead, it falls a little short and narrow. Continue reading →

Review: Baron Fig Mysterium Squire

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I’ve previously reviewed the BF Squire pen, so it’ll be no surprise for me to say that I like this pen. Let me tell you more about the Mysterium. A friend of the blog, Harry Marks wrote a lovely short scifi story for the pen, you can head to the previous link to read it, everyone should, it’s lovely.

First off, it is a lovely shade of burnt orange. Orange may not be my favorite color but this shade is less brilliant and more toasty and warm than safety cone. It looks great with all of my stationery items. It goes well with the Stone.

Secondly, it’s got a d20 engraved in place of the Squire sword. Don’t know what a d20 is? It is a 20 sided die, and it is integral to playing certain roleplaying games. To get geeky on you, BF rolled a 20 on this pen.

Finally, it is filled with the Schmidt P8126 with black ink. Of the rollerball refills available, this is one of the best. It is smooth and free flowing and deep black. It works perfectly on all BF paper, plus anything else available.

The twisty mechanism is smooth and satisfying. The big problem that I have with the Squire is that if I toss it into a pocket the twist mechanism deployed in my pocket and the free flow of the refill destroys my pants. As a result, I have a Tofty clip on mine, it works but is ugly as hell. Continue reading →

Review: Jinhao 992 Fountain Pen

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I picked up 5 Jinhao 992 fountain pens for about $2 each on eBay. I purchased the clear model but they are also available in a variety of colors like grey, orange, and blue. Mine arrived with a converter and a fine nib. Each was sleeved in a clear plastic envelope. They were gathered in one big zipper bag and Shipped in a snug bubble mailer.

Mine has silver trim and clip. The clip works really well and can be clipped to a shirt if needed. The converter holds a tiny amount of ink but makes these great for sampling ink and testing out colors. For this purpose they are amazing. They write well and hold enough ink for a day. At $2 a pop, you can buy one for every color of ink available. The size is on the small side. They are perfectly sized for my small hands and feel balanced even when posted, which is something I don’t often feel.

I have only ever found them in a fine nib but I understand that you can find them with a medium as well. I purchased mine to fiddle around with nib grinding and smoothing. They don’t need much to write a wet buttery smooth line on even cheap paper. A swipe across the shine side of a nail stick is all it takes. I tried to grind mine down to a fine architect grind but I’m not even close. I think I need to start with a medium to make that happen. That said mine write well.

Another experiment that I wanted to try was turning them into an eye dropper. The body of the pen holds a whopping 3 ml of ink! Massive ink tank possibility here! Sadly only one of my 6 were sealed from the factory. To turn them into an eyedropper you’ll need to invest in some E6000 or other clear epoxy and practice dribbling it into the end of the pen. Mine all look like hell after I dribbled E6000 into the barrel. I now have 6 sealed pens I can eyedropper.

Continue reading →