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Top 5 Ink Drawing Pens

From Helen South,
Your Guide to Drawing / Sketching.
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Your choice of ink-drawing pen will depend upon your style of drawing and personal taste. Marker pens with lightfast ink are available in various diameter nibs, as well as brush-style tips. If you use a fountain pen or drafting pen, choose ink made for those pens, as they clog with indian ink. Some artists even use the common Bic biro, though you need to scan these drawings for a permanent record, as the ink is not permanent. My favorite is the old-fashioned split-nib dip pen and Indian ink.

1. Speedball Standard Point Dip Pen and Nibs

Cheap plastic pen holders are available in most art stores and stationers. Nibs come in various sizes, types and strengths: a fairly firm steel split nib is good for all-round drawing. Wide calligraphy nibs are not really suitable - choose one designed for drawing. A copperplate writing nib is soft and gives a wider range of lineweight. Try a variety from your art store to see what you like - they are quite inexpensive.

2. Zig Memory System Millennium Markers

I use basic Uniball pens for writing, so I've ended up using them for a lot of sketches too, especially in my journal. They're great. However, they aren't archival, so its worth paying a tiny bit extra for archival pigment ink, especially if you've paid the dollars for the archival paper. Zig claim to be lightfast, waterproof, fadeproof and non-bleeding. I also like their 'Memory System Writer' which has broader bullet tip on the other end.

3. Bamboo Reed Pens

These give a rather broad line and don't hold a great deal of ink. The most interesting point was the gradual depletion of ink allowing time for some interesting dryer marks, rather like a dry felt pen. Worth trying when you need something different.

4. Faber-Castell Pitt Artist's Pens

These finepoint-marker style pens from Faber-Castell come in a range of nib sizes as well as brush tips (try them to see which suits your style of working) with lightfast, ph-neutral india ink. Great for travel, they come in black, shades of gray, sepia and a big range of colors, and are available in handy sets or individually . The manufacturers would like to claim that they replace the dip pen (they don't) but are certainly a convenient, affordable addition to your kit.

5. Rotring Rapidograph Technical Pens

Technical pens used to be notoriously difficult to maintain, but Rotring have developed a sophisticated construction that gives a consistent, clog-free ink flow. These are favorites of many artists for reliability and their smooth, clean line, though some will find the line too 'clinical' and the cartridges can get a bit expensive if you use a lot of ink.
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