pen 88: jot gel pens

today's pen, the jot gel pen, is another example that dollar store pens don't necessarily have to suck. these pens come in a pack of two, so $.50 a piece, they put a good amount of ink onto the paper, they have good flow, fair glide, some bite, it doesn't skip or stutter, the value range is poor, it is another pen that basically is all or nothing. the body of this pen is thicker than most, and has a rubber grip for comfort. there really isn't anything that sticks out one way or another about this gel pen, however, when i searched for the company on the internet i found some concerning customer reviews about the quality and practices that greenbriar international inc. seem to practice which kind of makes me wonder about the toxicity of the ink... it's probably fine but i don't plan on using these pens again and will try and find some place where i can recycle them. yes, they performed well but when there are other options that work better and have a better record with the quality of product they produce i don't see the point of supporting a company that just seems to be more than a little sketchy and no, that wasn't an intended pun.


website:
dollar tree
yp customer feedback on company and it's products and practices ... not so good.

what they say:

Gel pens provide super smooth writing while comfort grip helps reduce hand fatigue. Great for offices, schools, bookstores, and resale. Case includes 48 – 2-ct. packs of Jot® retractable gel pens with 0.7mm tips assorted among packs of black pens with black ink and packs of blue pens with blue ink.

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.