Category Archives: Review

3 Replies

I stumbled upon Fountain Pen Revolution while searching for a place to find a couple of inexpensive fountain pens made in India. The FPR is a site dedicated to the sale of such pens. At the time I found his site I also found that he was running a special I took him up on his offer and scored a fountain pen for $2.50. The special is no longer running but his prices are pretty reasonable. There are pens on his site for $6 plus $3 shipping. Not bad especially when you consider the review I'm going to give on this $2.50 pen.

The pen I was sent was a gray Serwex Special 101. It reminds me of the Noodler's Nikita Nib Creeper pen. Ever since I got my first Noodler's pen I sniff my new pens, I know weird, but not. The Serwex has a slightly different odor like engine grease and garage, or what plastic toys smelled like in the early 80's,* somewhat pleasant. Unlike the Noodler's which I likened to dog crap and diesel fuel. Along the side of the clear barrel is a gold foil imprint of the company name and product name. The cap has 2 cap bands which are silver. The clip is also silver and seems to be pressed steel. The jewel, which holds the clip to the cap is black. The gray cap itself is slightly mottled with a few streaks of darker gray here and there. The barrel is tapered and has what I call a cigar shape, though small.

Not the sexiest pen I've ever seen but looks serviceable and good knock around pen.

Taking off the cap I'm greeted by a fine gold nib with a design and the words "iridium nib" pressed into it. There is no breather hole in the nib. The nib reminds me of the Noodler's Nib Creeper nibs.** I unscrewed the section from the barrel and found a few mould edges at the end, I scraped these off with an exacto, for fear they'd come loose with use. After rinsing the barrel and nib off I loaded it up with ink. For a smaller pen it holds an impressive 3+ml of ink. I loaded 2.5ml in it with a TON of room to spare.

I loaded mine up, eye dropper style, with my sample of Iroshizuku Fuyu-syogun. Yes, I put the most expensive ink I own into a $2.50 pen. Why? I'm addicted to gray inks right now and I had a nearly full sample of this ink and wanted to use it. Plus, for the first time ever I had an ink that matched the color of the pen. Gray ink in a gray pen.

I then proceeded to write out 2 full pages in my Exacompta journal. At first it was slightly scratchy, the feel of writing with this pen matched the feel of writing with a Noodler's Nib Creeper.The nib writes with a true fine and is rock hard, no bounce, no flex; it is friction fit into the section. It writes relatively wet and started up with a quick shake downward. I did notice that when I had some ink on the nib it seemed to blob there. After I cleaned the ink off it no longer creeped to that one spot.

At the end of the 2nd page of writing I noticed that the nib was much smoother than when I started. The flow of ink was perfect for me, slightly on the wet side (6/10) and the nib itself was smoother, and gliding over the paper. Given I was using a premium ink this was to be expected and I wonder what will happen when I put a less premium ink in it. All in all this is most likely to end up as my new gray ink sketching pen and will have a permanent spot in my drawing stable.

Given my love of cheap pens I'm going to have to say I like this pen, a lot. Yes it's cheap and will never perform as well as a $50 TWSBI 540 and it has one nib size available- fine and it's construction is okay. The real thing to think of here is how it performs, and in my opinion if you are looking for something like a Noodler's Nib Creeper or an inexpensive pen this is a good pen.

As an aside this pen is one you can COMPLETELY disassemble, meaning you can get at the innards to clean it… I have in the past abused fountain pens with India ink. This is a pen you could do that with as you can get at the feed and inside the section to scrub them with a toothbrush. Hmmm. Ideas.

The Serwex Special 101 is not in stock at FPR. They have a pen called the Serwex 77TR that looks identical to this pen EXCEPT that the clip and bands appear to be all "gold" plated. At $6 plus $3 shipping it's not a bad deal, especially if the pens write as well as this one does. You can check out the FPR on FaceBook as well. The way you order from FPR is to figure out what pens you want, make note of the name and color you want and send Kevin an email. He'll send you a total price. Then you paypal. Shipping is from India so it will take some time (3 weeks) to get to you, but the wait is worth it.

Continue reading →

Papers I’ve Been Using

6 Replies

I've been testing out a variety of papers for my automatic drawings. I'm not being very scientific about this, just trying things out with my style of working. I have done a large amount of them in a Canson Universal Sketchbook. It's a great sketchbook, the paper is sturdy and accepts light washes with ease. The paper cockles when I use more watercolor. With ink it's perfect.

So I taped down some pieces of Canson XL Bristol. I like this for ink too, in fact of all the papers the ink really pops off this page. It's bright white and after watercolors dry the paper is smooth and flat. It's really great but I didn't like how watercolors behaved on it's surface. It was absorbent and dried very fast.

Next up I tried another Canson paper, Montval, not or rough watercolor paper. It's one of my favorites with watercolor. I love the nooks and crannies of it's rough surface, it makes watercolors blend in amazing ways. Ink also looks great on it, but the pen tends to skip across it's surface. It's a little harder to draw on than the other papers. When it dries, it's perfectly flat.

I think what I'll end up using is a cold pressed watercolor paper. The hard part with this whole thing is that I never know what I'm in the mood for, I let these images grow organicly and the end result is that I never know if I'm going to cross hatch the hell out of an image or flood the page with watercolor, so I need something that can handle both.

Review: Exacompta Plain Journal

1 Reply

I was given the Exacompta plain (unruled) journal to review by Karen and Stephanie of Exaclaire,the US distributor for Clairfontaine and a variety of other French stationary products. I like to put journals through a few paces before I do a review and since it took me a full year to get through my last journal, it’s been awhile.

The paper is off white, a very nice cream color that I really like a lot. The paper is laid textured on one side and much smoother on the other side. For some this would be a detraction, personally I like it very much and feel it opens the journal up for a variety of media I wouldn’t normally consider. Dry media does much better than expected- things like charcoal and soft pencil really like that laid texture. Though it is textured fountain pens love it’s surface.

Wet media also does admirably on this paper. I was pleasantly surprised when I soaked the paper down with water and color that it held up. It didn’t just hold up, it out performed the luxury of the Rhodia Webnotebook. When it dried the wrinkles (cockles) relaxed. While the paper is not perfectly smooth it’s less cockled than I’d have expected. I was able to lay down a nice wash of watercolor on BOTH sides of the page and have not one drop show through or soak through to the reverse side. That is pretty amazing.

Even my wettest writing pens don’t soak through. Occasionally you can see dark colors through the pages, but that is the case with most any journal. I’ve painted pages with ink and it doesn’t soak through to the reverse side, which again, is pretty amazing. I haven’t been interested in doing any collage in this but I’m sure it would take to it well.

In summary:
100 Laid Textured Ivory pages 100gsm
5.5×8.5 inches
Ribbon Marker
Soft Covers with a fabric spine, meant to go inside a leather cover, many companies make them
Price $15.50 at gouletpens.com

It handles wet media like a champ and is wonderful for a fountain pen. Pencil does amazing textural things on the textured side but doesn’t smudge as much as would be expected on the smooth side.

It’s not cheap but it’s a better value than the moleskine sketchbook, it’s got more papges that behave better and respond better. I’d rate this 2 happy thumbs up and would recomend it to anyone looking to get a nice journal that they can write in, sketch ink, test watercolors in, and abuse.

Continue reading →

Art Experiments: In Search of a Gray Ink

3 Replies

I've been workingon the automatic drawings, and one of the directions I've wanted to take them is to use a very fine pen with a nice gray ink as the first layer of the drawing. I considered using pencil but really don't want to be able to erase the lines. Part of the automatic process is that the lines stay from start to finish. I wanted to use the gray ink with my extra fine RapidoCraft pen to get a fine hairline that fades into the background when a darker color is put of the top.

I searched the network's archives to see if I could find a gray ink that fulfilled my needs. I found a few reviews, but gray inks don't seem to be too popular. I then went to Gouletpens.com and checked out their swab shop tool to see the colors of the grays they had in stock. Still nothing definitive. Instead I ordered 5 samples of gray colors. Each was from a different brand and most I'd seen mentioned at some point on the network.

The 5 colors I ordered were:

    Omas New Gray
    Private Reserve Gray Flannel
    Diamine Grey
    Noodler's Lexinton Grey
    Iroshizuku Fuyu-syogun

And my 4 needs are:

    That it survive being wet and not bleed too profusely. A distinct line must remain.
    It not foul pale watercolors like yellow.
    It not foul shades of blue, turning them muddy or green
    It recede to the background when black is put over the top in a drawing.

I performed a test on each of these criteria with each ink on 3 types of paper:

    Clairefontaine Graf It
    Canson Universal Sketch 65lb
    Exacompta Plain Journal

The results were the same across all papers, though with the Graf It there was additional lifting across the inks when lifting was noted.

Diamine Grey was too dark to be a grey I would use for my drawings and it lifted the worst of all the inks.

Private Reserve Gray Flannel was also too dark for my use. I can't say that I actually like this color either. It has a green cast to it that I do not enjoy. It was also the second worst for fouling the pale watercolors. It was also barely discernible from black.

Noodler's Grey was the only ink that did not lift at all. Thus colors floated over it's surface and were not fouled nor muddied. However, it is very dark when in a pen running wet. It might be a contender if it were in a dry pen. I will be loading this into my freshly cleaned RapidoCraft XF to see if it will work. I'm not convinced. It does hands down win on every other test.

Iroshizuku Fuyu-syogun was a good shade that is easily discernible from an overlay of black. It did lift, though not badly. It slightly muddied the pale colors, though not too badly. I really like the color. It does not fit the bill because it is too blue. It's also REALLY expensive.

The perfect shade of gray is the Omas New Gray. It perfectly matches the pale silvery line of pencil. It's clearly gray without a green tinge or looking like I added a bunch of water to my black ink. It's just a cool clear gray. It's pale on the page and black ink pops on top of it. It does however lift. It muddies the pale yellow but mixes well with the pale blue. Even when it does lift it leaves behind a discernible line.

I have one last test. It will require me to leave the inks on the page over night to see if time will allow them to bond with the paper more. Given how I work the more immediate test is the better indicator of how the ink will respond to me and my methods of working but the additional information will be useful. Click any of the images to see these tests in hi-res glory.

The above images is the Canson Universal Sketch paper.

This is the Clairefontaine Graft It pad.

This is the Exactompta plain journal.(review on this to come.)

Continue reading →

Review: The Artist’s Way (BOOK)

8 Replies

I am seemingly one of the few artists (journalers) who is not in love with Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve read it, I’ve got it on my bookshelf, complete with the bookmark exactly where I left off. Sometimes I feel like I’m the only one who isn’t telling everyone else what a great book this is, recommending it every time someone I know hits a block.

It’s not that I don’t get it or that I don’t think it’s a wonderful book, it simply didn’t resonate with me. Sometimes I feel guilty that I’m just not that into TAW. Someone once told me that to follow TAW was a commitment, and I have to agree. There are groups online to help you get into TAW as well as a workbook, and at some community colleges you can take a course in TAW.

Reading TAW or taking a course in TAW can be a transfomative experience for some people, at the end of the line, the real message behind TAW (and all it’s look alikes) is that you need to spend time making and thinking about art.

If you think this might be a good book, pick it up. Maybe I'll revisit it, or not.

Review: Golden Coarse Pumice Gel

2 Replies

Golden Coarse Pumice Gel

I purchased a 6 pack of Golden Mediums about a year ago and other than using the gloss gels I haven’t used them. The list price for 8 ounces is $13.49 and it comes in a tub. In the tub it is gray in color and looks much like cement.

I used an old discount card to spread it on my binder’s board. It lays down a very thick and heavy layer. I found it pretty difficult to lay it down thin. As I was laying it down on the board I had moments where I didn’t think it would stick. It’s a very dry gritty material. It does stick. It helps to work slowly. Because it is so gritty I would recommend using an old brush or a metal palette knife to spread it.

When dry it still retains that cement like look which could make a very cool texture in a journal. It retains its flexibility so it could be used on a journal page with no issue. It can be used as a base much like gesso but keep in mind it’s very gritty and its surface is much like 60 grit sandpaper. It’s very rough. When coloring my pages it wore holes in the rags I was using to apply glaze and color.

(On the left is the Golden and the Right Liquitex.)

This is a very intense texture gel that can definitely make a statement when used on canvas or page. It took a full ounce to cover an 8.5×11 inch page completely. The deep crevasses and graininess of it is very neat. With color added it’s even more interesting.

A quick comparison of the Golden Coarse and the Liquitex shows that the golden is muchmore coarse, the liquitex is more like 100 grit sandpaper where the golden is like 60 grit. The difference is noticable and visible.

Review: Liquitex Basics Coarse Texture Gel

2 Replies

The last time I was in AC Moore I noticed that Liquitex had released the Basics line of mediums again. This time in 200ml squeeze tubes. I’ve gone on record by saying that the Liquitex Basic Gel Medium is my favorite, and I can’t wait to take my 50% off coupon in and get another tube. This time around the tubes, all of them retail for $7.99, where the old versions retailed for $5.99. Higher gas prices= higher paint prices.

All of these mediums come in tubes. Which I like. I can squeeze a very tiny amount of paint out onto my palette and not waste a drop. They have modeling paste, gloss gel medium, iridescent medium,coarse texture gel and one other I can't remember. I've purchased gloss gel, coarse texture gel and the modeling paste.

I’ve been obsessed with texture lately so I picked up a tube of coarse texture gel. (Next week I’ll review the Golden version.) Out of the tube it had a heavy body and held its shape well. I used an old credit card to scrape it around on my board. It was wet enough that it stuck down easily and I felt like once it was down it was staying down. The grittiness of it was about like 100 grit sandpaper. It looks like fine beach sand embedded on the page. It held every shape I introduced to the page with my old credit card. I’d shy away from putting this on with a good brush, I did mention that it looks like sandpaper right? This will wear the tips down on just about any brush, especially a good natural hair brush. Stick to your gesso brush or an older synthetic while using any coarse sand filled texture gel.

Clean up was easy, warm soap and water took the still damp gel off my hands with ease.

It’s been about 8 hours since I scraped a relatively heavy layer of the stuff onto my binder’s board and it’s still not completely dry. Granted we (the North East) are sitting in the midst of a incredibly high humidity cloud right now, but it has taken an incredibly long time for this to dry. It was dry to the touch with some hair drier action and I was able to gesso over the top of the gel in about an hour. If I wanted to sand or carve into the gel I’ll need to wait for it to be completely dry. Gessoing over the top of the gel is not necessary it’s ready to go as a base as is, but I wanted to add another layer of texture to the board. Like most gels this one should dry flexible, but I’ve not tested that yet.

This is a fun additive and I can see it having many applications both for an art journal but also for paintings on canvas and board. It’s got a coarse but not overly coarse texture, like fine beach sand. If you want additional texture you could add more sand. If you are looking for something that looks like cement right out of the tube you might want to look at Golden’s Coarse Pumice Gel, which I’ll be reviewing next week.

FYI: I purchased this product for review and was not compensated by any of the companies mentioned in this review.

Comfortable Shoes Studio

Musings about art and writing supplies.

Category Archives: Review

Review: FlexiSketch Sketchbook

Review: Loew Cornell Simply Art Fine Tip Marker 4 Pack

Review: Jinhao 602 Fountain Pen

Review: Fountain Pen Revolution Pen

Papers I’ve Been Using

Review: Exacompta Plain Journal

Art Experiments: In Search of a Gray Ink

Review: The Artist’s Way (BOOK)

Review: Golden Coarse Pumice Gel

Review: Liquitex Basics Coarse Texture Gel