week 11 recap

pen 87: inc optimus fine point pen

today i'm going with the inc optimus fine point pen. these pens are available at the dollar store in packs of two, and in black or blue ink. the tips are felt, which kind of surprised me, having used them before looking at their specs, i would have thought that the nib would be a permeable plastic tip of some sort, i guess what i'm saying is that the tip is firm and a bit of a surprise, in that, what this particular event has reaffirmed that you don't always have to spend a lot of money on pens, these dollar store pens really hold their own.

to start with, this pen reminds me of the le pen i reviewed back in post 26, the pilot razor back in  post 42, and almost but not quite the sharpie ultra fine point back in post. really though the winner out of any comparison would be to the sharpie pen stylo  in post 34.
the ink is dark, full saturation is usually achieved with one pass of the pen, this does mean that it has a very limited range value between black or white, this pen is probably best used for things like crosshatching or whatever for shading. the pen has consistent flow, is clean - it dries super fast, inks over pencil lines and fairly good glide. this pen would be great for blind contour or contour drawing, detail work over washes, watercolors, acrylics, or just plain sketching or inking the ink has no noticeable bleed or smell and that is a plus that these pens have over the sharpie. another plus is that it looks nice, i think it would be hard to pick it out as the cheap pen when set next to a variety of other pen brands, its pretty snazzy.

i think that i should mention now that after buying a two pack at the dollar store, i went back the next day and purchased several more  packs of these pens, i like them that much, and at $.50 a pen i will probably go back and buy a few more, these pens are that good.

the last thing i'm going to mention here is that the sharpie pen stylo retails between $3-$10 depending on where you buy one, so that's p


otentially 6-20 pens that work just as well for the same amount, i think that alone should make you stop for a moment and think about that. these pens are really one of the best deals that i have found at the dollar tree.

websites:
peachtree playthings

dollar tree

what they say:

Fine strokes in deep black and blue ink are perfect for everything from taking notes to signing checks! Each pen features felt tips and bleed-free ink. Great item for offices, schools, churches, bookstores, and resale. Case includes 36 – 2-ct. packs of inc.® Optimus felt tip pens with caps assorted between packs of black pens with black in, and packs of blue pens with blue ink.

pen 86: inc r-2 rollerball

i suppose that i should start off today with a note of questionable interest and that little tidbit was that i finally found the official website for inc brand pens. unfortunately the peachtree playthings website is colorful but woefully bereft of any actual information when it comes to their stationary line, all that was available is a gallery of pictures that show these products in their packaging and it's model name.today's pen, the inc r2 rollerball, is one of those pens that i feel confident comparing to a pen produced by a more mainstream pen company, in this case it is the bic z4+ roller. this pen does a few things well, at fifty cents you might really want to take a look at it. first it lays down a lot of ink, and fast. this pen is good for things like inking over pencil lines, filling large areas of black and to a lesser degree writing. i say to a lesser degree because this pen is a little messy, while the ink does dry fast it will bleed through the paper, especially when making multiple passes over the same area which you might have to do as the pen does have a tendency to have inconsistent ink flow, its skips and stutters. the glide is fair to poor but if you like a pen that interacts with the paper this is not necessarily a bad thing, really it depends on your preference. the price, again, is $.50 versus the $2 price tag of the z4+ and with the way they use ink, it might be in your best interest to save yourself $1.50 a pen... just saying is all.

websites: 
www.dollartree.com
www.peachtreeplaythings.com

what they say:

Controlled ink flow system helps you write smoothly and rubber grip by the pen tip provides maximum control! Great item for offices, schools, and resale. Case includes 48 – 2-ct. packs of Inc® R-2™ 0.7mm rollerball cap pens with black ink.

Long lasting ink supply Controlled ink flow system helps you write smooth and skip-free Soft comfort grip provides maximum control and helps prevent writing fatigue

pen 85: inc clipclick

yet another gem from the dollar store, these pens, the inc clipclick comes in a package of eight pens making them a whopping twelve-and-a-half cents a pen. i wasn't able to find an official web page for this pen so i decided to post the retailer instead.

the pen that this reminds me of the most is the pentel-bk420 - pen #30 - in that it suffers the same basic design flaw with the retraction device. anyone with large hands run into the problem that the clip is triggered while writing and drawing and this makes for an extremely  annoying constant pain in the neck. at first i thought that this would be a universal problem but after having several friends try this pen out, it seems that the women especially do not seem to have this problem. ultimately i solved this flaw in the same way i did for the bk420, i simply snapped the clip off of the pen.

aside from the clip the clipclick is a solid pen, it flows well, but has a good bite, it doesn't skip or stutter, i does not have the problem of ink buildup on the tip of the pen and the ink dries fairly quickly and has a good range of value between of gray to black depending on pressure, and building up with techniques like hatching, crosshatching, or just building up layers of in over multiple passes. - it is a very clean pen. the clipclick does sport a rubberized comfort grip that makes drawing with this pen slightly more comfortable.
all said and done this pen is inexpensive, solid construction, and qualities involving things like overall performance aspects of the click clip, i would say there are better pens out there, no doubt, but these pens are dirt cheap and perform as well as many of their analogues made by other companies. and is these happen to walk away from your desk, you're really only out a few pennies.

i would say that, if you have the chance to try them out go for it, it's a dollar.

(edit: since the whole point of this project was to illustrate what these pens can do with out doing photoshop magic. that said, if you would like to see what this became you can see it here)

website:
dollar tree

what they say:
Rubberized textured comfort grip design keeps the pen from slipping from or tiring your hand. Smooth, bold ink flow allows the pen to move with ease and consistency. Great item for offices, schools, and resale. Case includes 36 – 8-ct. packs of Inc.® Clipclick™ black ball-point (1.0mm) pens.

the pen that this reminds me of the most is the pentel-bk420 - pen #30 - in that it suffers the same basic design flaw with the retraction device. anyone with large hands run into the problem that the clip is triggered while writing and drawing and this makes for an extremely  annoying constant pain in the neck. at first i thought that this would be a universal problem but after having several friends try this pen out, it seems that the women especially do not seem to have this problem. ultimately i solved this flaw in the same way i did for the bk420, i simply snapped the clip off of the pen.

aside from the clip the clipclick is a solid pen, it flows well, but has a good bite, it doesn't skip or stutter, i does not have the problem of ink buildup on the tip of the pen and the ink dries fairly quickly and has a good range of value between of gray to black depending on pressure, and building up with techniques like hatching, crosshatching, or just building up layers of in over multiple passes. - it is a very clean pen. the clipclick does sport a rubberized comfort grip that makes drawing with this pen slightly more comfortable.
all said and done this pen is inexpensive, solid construction, and qualities involving things like overall performance aspects of the click clip, i would say there are better pens out there, no doubt, but these pens are dirt cheap and perform as well as many of their analogues made by other companies. and is these happen to walk away from your desk, you're really only out a few pennies.

i would say that, if you have the chance to try them out go for it, it's a dollar.


website:
dollar tree

what they say:
Rubberized textured comfort grip design keeps the pen from slipping from or tiring your hand. Smooth, bold ink flow allows the pen to move with ease and consistency. Great item for offices, schools, and resale. Case includes 36 – 8-ct. packs of Inc.® Clipclick™ black ball-point (1.0mm) pens.

pen 84: promarx mega bold gel

okay, so today is one of those days that i kind of wished i had waited a few days to launch another event, in this case it just dovetailed so well with last weeks event that i just went for it. the reason i regret this is that today's pen, the promarx mega bold gel is not the pen that i've been wanting to use all day and i had to make a real effort to stop sketching with the one i'm currently obsessing over and get down to sticking with a plan and following through like an adult - an adult that hoards pens albeit, but whatever, pobody's nerfect.

the mega bold sounds intimidating, the only other pen that i feel intimidated by its name is the signo 207 impact, a pen that i have not gotten around to reviewing yet.

soooo... what can i say about the mega bold?

before finding this gem at the dollar store i had no idea that promarx existed, i looked a little bit for a company website but all i found were amazon sales (which are like eight times more expensive than at the dollar store) and a very pathetic facebook page with five likes, no real information and it includes the company founding in 2004 and that they got their facebook page in 2012... i don't think that i need to say anymore about that, in fact, on the dollar store website they don't even have a listing on this pen - which is odd considering i bought these pens there.

okay, enough with the history lessons.

the mega bold has a 1 mm. tip, the terms: bold, fine, extra fine and micro are not standard for all pen companies and accurate measurement of the pens tend to be in relation to other pens that the company makes, so be aware of that.

the ink, being a gel pen is easily smudged as it dries slowly, the glide is good and it has hardly any bite, a lighter touch seems to work better, but it takes several passes to get really dark, sadly that doesn't really translate to having a good range of value between black and white, i have noticed that when drawing over ink you need to be patient and make a few passes and building up that full saturation is going to take some time - like waiting for the first coat to dry. the pen's flow seems to be hit or miss, sometimes it put a lot of ink on the paper very quickly, which you might expect from a pen called mega bold, but sometimes it needs warming up or quits mid stroke, it also can be messy in that blobs of the ink can build up when its actually working. the pen does have a nice, cheap rubber coating that doesn't do all that much but the grip near the pointy end is nice and effective.

these pens are $.50 each in packs of two, online sales price them at around $8... so yeah, at a buck for two i don't really see anything too wrong with them but at four dollars a pen... are you kidding me? that's like the cost of a micron pen. overall though i would steer clear of this pen, there are far superior gel pens out there and worth the small increase in price.

websites:
facebook really, really sad.
amazon really expensive and out of stock

what they say:

• Rubberized barrel design
• 1.00 mm tip
• Superior gel ink
• Bold and smooth writing
• › See more product details

pen 83: jot permanent marker chisel tip

today's pen is a transitional pen that bridges the chisel tipped event and heralds the wonders that can be found at the local dollar store.

the jot permanent marker chisel tip comes in a package containing two markers, bringing the price down to around $.50 a pen, this would be a great price if the pen was a quality pen - sadly, it is not.

while the producing company got the aesthetics of the marks-a-lot body style (which i suspect actually all the surplus pre-redesign of the marks-a-lot.) the similarities really end there.

to begin with the bitching and moaning... the durability: the body is solid, tough plastic that can survive things like wedged in them in a window to keep the glass pane from closing all the way, can be useful in sculpting due to its cylindrical shape and the odd sized cap can be used for odd detail. the cap also stays where it is supposed to be which is nice because the in will wreck your self if you don't check (the pen) yourself, yo. but these things are true of the marks-a-lot.

also, like the marks-a-lot, the pen bleeds, both seepage and through the page, especially on thinner paper, and the felt tip wears down even faster than the brand name version. also, i noticed that theses pens dry out insanely fast, granted, i used these pens rather heavily for the examples but i haven't had not only one but two brand new pens die on me for one of these reviews, as is the case here. the last thing that i feel i should mention is the smell of the ink. as you probably know mostly all of the pens in the permanent marker family have a strong and distinct odor, that to me is not always unpleasant, and unfortunately that is not the case with this pen. it is pretty vile and probably, doing irreparable damage to my body, brain and on some sort of molecular level, and any money you might save by skimping on this marker is going to be offset buy the price of a filter mask, respiratory inconvenience and possible super-cancer... okay, so i'm not a doctor and i really can't say that any of that last part is true (except that you might want to look into a nice filter mask - handy things those.)  the only thing that i would use these pens for is writing on signs, student government posters, lost dog/cat fliers, chemical warfare and moving boxes - anything that you dot really care about but need to do and you don't want to waste the money on a quality pen that's going to be destroyed by the first time it's used.

i do not recommend this pen at all. do not buy it and burn any that you might come across in life. it is evil.

evil i say, pure stinky evil!

a pen a day event, # trois: dollar store pens

so yeah, times are  tough, and money is tight -
but those works of art aren't going to
create themselves.

pen 82: sharpie king size chisel tip

considering that the second post here on a pen a day was the single largest marker i have ever used, the sharpie magnum chisel tip, it is a little funny that with no foreplanning this pen, the sharpie king size chisel is being reviewed exactly eighty pens later. i don't know... maybe it isn't really all that funny after all.

anyway.

the sharpie king is available in three colors, black, blue and red. it is the middle child between the magnum and the smaller sharpies chisel tip and the chisel tip pro. this pen has all the features typical to the sharpie line, they are durable, the body is aluminum (i think, it's some kind of metal anyway) it is bold the ink is dark, and dries quickly. this pen does "squeak" at times which is almost as bad as nails on a chalkboard so be aware of that. the felt tip does tend to show signs of wear after light use and , since the ink lasts longer than the tip i tend to use the blunted tipped pens for fills or ina pinch on large format projects. the sharpie king has the same issues with the smell, bleed and bleed through, the glide varied depending on what you are using it on and if the cap does come off in transit... well it has a larger tip and a ton of ink just waiting to touch paper, fabric, cigarettes and skin... and it will ruin your day and maybe a pair of pants.

i have found this pen useful for detailing acrylic paintings, drawing on finished wood, metal and glass, it works really well with is siblings in the sharpie chisel family handling areas that are too small for the magnum and tasks that would take forever to fill with the smaller versions. this pen also works really well in its own right and can be used to tag, make signs, draw sloppy pictures of naughty bits on your buddy's face when he passes out at a party, labeling boxes when moving, throwing at the neighbors cat when it's eating your cat's food, and coloring in bleached spots or moth holes (the latter requires you coloring on your skin under the hole) on your dress/work clothes... oh and they work okay on scuffed black shoes as we..

these pens retail around $2-$3 a pen, you can buy them in four packs as well and those run about $8-$10. might find better prices online, but i'll let you look for yourself on that.

as to whether or not i would recommend or not, i would. it's a sharpie and therefore never a bad purchase, go. buy. one. now.

as always, if you go out and buy this pen and don't like it - madness - contact me, i'll give you shipping info and in exchange i will send you an awesome drawing drawn with the pen you so disliked.

website:
www.sharpie.com

what they say:

All hail.

• Industrial Strength for the toughest marking jobs
• Durable aluminum barrel and felt tip stand up to heavy use
• Excellent for marking corrugate, wood, metal, foil, stone, plastic, leather and more
• Marks on wet and oily surfaces
• Water resistant and dries quickly
• 3 bold colors

pen 81: sanford mr. sketch scented watercolor marker

as a fun study in contrasts (for me at least, i am easily amused.) i decided to follow yesterday's $300 pen set for one that will set you back less than $10. if you are roughly as old as i am or younger you probably have used these pens, in fact i was a little surprised to see that they are currently still in production and for sale not only online but worldwide and in actual stores like walmart, target, staples and pretty much everywhere art markers are sold. the particular pen that i used for this review has somehow survived at least ten years and several hundred miles that i moved during my twenties. this is happening, today's pen is the sanford mr. sketch scented watercolor marker, although it is probably remembered as the only markers that we were not only allowed to sniff, but kinda encouraged to. it kinda reminds me of those fake cigarette candy sticks that had a hole running down the length with powdered sugar inside, or the bubble gum cigarettes... yes, those did exist (and actually still do except they no longer can "puff" powder sugar out, the tip aren't dyed red and they are called candy sticks.)

but i digress.

these pens came in a variety of colors, limited in scope to the amount of "non-toxic" odors the were legally allowed to use. (i'm not saying that's accurate, just that it sounds as plausible as any other reason)

the reason that i was a bit surprised that they were still being made is that, even in the second grade i knew that all these pens had going for them was that they smelled nice and that, sadly, that did not translate to them tasting good - don't judge, you know you tried it too.

so other than the scented factor there really aren't any reason to buy these over say, a crayola set. the felt tip wears down extremely fast, especially when you consider that these pens are used by children, and children are hard on delicate things. they dried out quickly with use or if you left the cap off, water could kind of re-activate them but once dry, you might as well throw it out. these pens are smooth, good glide, thick bodied for little fingers, and messy, the ink will stain your hands and clothes, even if you're careful you'll probably end up with ink on the heel of your hand. so consider that before handing these over to a child.

i wouldn't recommend these pens, they don't send a good message about sniffing things like paint or markers, there are cleaner tools out there, they are not durable (the only reason i had one still was that it somehow survived years of pen purging, that i haven't used it at all, and will be discarding it after this post.) basically, if you want to get a kid a pen set go with crayola or rose art. you'll have better results with those brands.

websites:

it seems that sanford has opted not to include this product line on their website: http://www.sanfordb2b.com

you can find more information on these pens here: wikipedia and here: staples

what they say:

• Premium watercolor markers are long lasting and provide vibrant colors with fun scents
• Chisel tip for bold of fine print
• AP certified nontoxic
• Ink won't bleed through paper

(edit: for a nsfw version of the third sketch go here: nsfw)

week ten recap

pen 80: prismacolor chisel-fine double ended art marker

okay, so it only took me eighty posts to get to the single largest art supply investment (in terms of non-electronic) that i have made, these pens are hands down the standing titan of price tags that i have yet to surpass.

so since i've made a big deal about the price, i guess i should address the pricing on these pens. when i discovered these pen, around 2000-01, they were selling them individually for around $2-$3 as i recall (note that the pens that i own from this era are slightly different that the pens they sell now, i believe its mostly cosmetic changes but i haven't taken the opportunity to try one out) they came in different sets as well, primaires, metals, warm/cool/french grays, that were like twelve pens to a set. there were also sets of around like twenty-four, thirty-two, 120 and the holy grail, aka, the 144 pen complete set.

as i recall i think that i found that set, on sale, from an art supply store on lower market street in san francisco, a few blocks from the main campus of the college i was attending. the sale price was like 10% off and i believe that i paid around $300. i just looked this set up online and discovered that the price i remember paying is pretty damned close to what they still are selling for, go here: Sanford Berol Prismacolor Art Marker 144 Color Set if you're curious.

at the time of this purchase, i was still in the more traditional art classes, not so much the computer editing and animation courses and these pens made my life so much easier. the mid-term and final projects looked really sharp and professional, and over time i learned how to work around the peculiarities of these pens.

so let's start with the praise: these pens are bold, saturation is awesome, the bleed is potentially moderate but if you have something under the page you are working on its not all that bad, and when coloring around the outlines of whatever you can start to anticipate how much the bleed will creep and let the ink work for you, especially if you are moving slow. the pens dry very quickly, it is alcohol based and that means it evaporates, the smell of the ink is not unpleasant, and really the only thing that i can think to compare it to is itself which really doesn't help out much if you've never smelled one.

the inks can overlap to get some interesting results and the strength of their gray selection is extensive making for extremely fun layering work in monochromatic backgrounds, storyboards and concept art, this also lends itself to the other lighter colored pens and the darker ones will have limited effectiveness with the grays that fall into the 60%+ range.

the drawbacks are unfortunately numerous, however, many of them can be worked around if you're careful. first, when got the set home i discovered that several of the pens were dry, as in never had ink in them, lame, i had to argue with the store to get a replacement pen, luckily they were common colors and the store had them on the shelves, the other annoying discovery was that a few of the labels were all crooked and in some cases backwards indication the wrong direction for the wrong tip. i know that this sounds picky but come on, i paid $300, sale or not it was a lot of money at the time... who am i kidding, it still is. the ink, while it does dry quickly can be blended with the blending pen which is nice but that blender gets all mucky after a few uses so meh, also the caps, if not SECURELY, like fort knox secure, and you might think you've capped it but double check, for serious, because if any air gets to circulate inside the pen will dry out faster than something that's like crazy fast. i dunno, its late, sue me. the caps are tricky, they don't seem to stay on the pen very well, and if you're carrying them around in a bag they tend to fall off on their own. i have used up an entire pen several times from usage, mostly the black and various grays, but i have lost more pens to a loose cap than i'd like to remember.

i know that this post seems to be focus on a lot of negative things, but for the price tag, these pens should work better. as i mentioned earlier, they have made some changes to the pen design and i do not know if they have addressed any of these shortcomings.

i should also point out that even though they were expensive, they were incredibly useful, i loved these pens at the time, and the only reason i would not buy these pens now is that there are other brands, like copic, that are better quality and yes, more expensive. the other reason i don't think i would but a set like this again is that i do most of my coloring digitally these days, for the price of the pens i could get a pretty snazzy printer - yes, i know it's not the same, but that's just where my focus is these days.

website:

www.prismacolor.com

what they say:

Every artist can appreciate these double-ended art markers. The ink is formulated to give the richest color saturation with silky smooooooth coverage. The duality of the thick and skinny tips let you change it up whenever the mood strikes. One ink source ensures color consistency from either end. It’s an alcohol, dye-based ink that’s non toxic.

pen 79: prismacolor premier chisel tip

i believe that i bought this pen as part of a set around a year or two ago. despite the fact that i love microns, and to a lesser degree, staedtlers (these were in my pre-copic-era days) i decided to sink invest waste around $15 on this prisma set based on the fact that i thought i liked the prismacolor pen line that i bought and used back in my college days.

sadly this purchase was the final straw and has soured me on the prismacolor brand.

since i'm not reviewing the chisel/fine marker until tomorrow i won't get into the frustrations that i experienced prematurely, but i will say that with the perspective of hindsight i really see that i probably should have not been so surprised.

so to start with the positive. these pens have good flow, they have no odor, they dry instantly and is a very clean pen. i should also mention that they don't have any noticeable bleed, including (mostly) through the paper. the felt tip of the chisel model is fairly rigid but wears quickly, especially with heavy use. the price for a single chisel tip pen on amazon is around $2, you can also find the sets for a fairly wide range of prices, but if you're under $15 you are probably doing ok (don't forget to figure shipping into the price, yo.)

sadly that's the limit of things that i can point out as positive features.

the ink is rather light, it takes a few passes to get a fully saturated color, in this case, black. its a good thing that it takes a lot to bleed through the paper - you really have to be trying hard to do so - because of the lightness of the ink. this pen, like the other chisel tipped pens that i have reviewed, is an äll or nothing" pen which is a little ironic in a way because the lack of deep color doesn't really translate as a useful shading technique... although that joust might be me and my skill level with inking. the other major flaw that i have noticed is that if you decide to erase the pencil marks you used as guides, the ink will rub off as well, requiring a second round of inking to touch-up parts that lightened during the cleaning process.

overall, i would not recommend this brand of pen to anyone, they are too expensive for what they are and there are other brands out there that cost the same and work so much better. if you are thinking of buying this for yourself or as a gift for a developing artist i would strongly urge you to go to an art supply store and pick up either a micron set or a staedtler set, it's not that much more and the pens are far more durable than the prismacolors. meh.

website:
www.prismacolor.com

what they say:

These markers have you covered no matter the task at hand. Take your pick from multiple tip sizes to experience paintbrush-like strokes in the convenience of a marker. Go with the fine tip for serious precision and control. Lettering, outlining and free form drawing look exceptional with the chisel tip. But why limit yourself? Pick up an assorted set with a variety of tip types for all your drawing needs.

These markers contain premium pigmented acid-free, archival ink that is lightfast, permanent, non-toxic, and water resistant. Use these markers for crisp, detail work in artistic and technical applications.

pen 78: sakura pigma callipen

today's pen, the sakura pigma callipen, should have an asterisks next to it for two reasons: a: it isn't strictly a chisel tipped pen although it it does have a square-ish plastic tip, and b: this pen is apparently no longer in production.

i can't remember when i purchased this pen, it may have been back in those early art school days. this pen was produced by the same company that makes the holy micron pen that are universally loved. when i started doing a little research (read: i googled it.) i discovered that this particular pen does not seem to be in production any longer, although it seems that there are a few places online that you can still order from. sakura has since replaced that model with the pigma calligrapher, a pen that i have yet to use, because of this there really isn't any official company description that i can find for the discontinued pen.

the callipen that i have for this review is a plastic tipped 1.8mm calligraphy pen, and in this case, black. the tip is very rigid and durable, and i remember that back when i would use this for outlining or filling art, had a great flow, supersaturated black ink that made life so much easier as opposed to using the fine-tipped pens that i was using at the time, the fact that i was able to use it today and have a reasonability amount of ink flow is kind of impressive consider its age and the usage i have gotten out of it, no mistakes here, it is/was a workhorse of a pen. having never really pursued the fine art of calligraphy, i cant really say how effective it was in that field, but for the price of around $2-$5 (estimated) i feel like i more than got my money's worth. the question, would i buy another? my answer is probably not, i have since found better pens that perform better for around the same price, some of those being pens that simply did not exist when i bought this. i would be open to checking out their new line of calligraphy pens, if only because i like the quality of pen that sakura has produced for as long as i can remember using the micron.

since this pen is no longer in production there is no actual page for them on the sakura website, but there are pages for all the rest of their fine product line.

website:
www.sakuraofamerica.com