Tinterias is a Spanish language podcast run by Jeffrey Coleman who is a professor at Northwestern University who also seems to have excellent taste in ink. He teamed up with Sailor to create a group of exclusive inks – Spicy Chipotle, Homemade Tortilla, Blue Corn, and Agave. Unfortunately, by the time I was able to get to the Tinterias table, they were sold out of one bottle, Spicy Chipotle, but that only means I have one more bottle to hunt down…

The first ink is Homemade Tortilla. This is a beautiful golden brown ink that shades dramatically and is very close to KWZ Honey with a touch less yellow in the mix.

Sailor x Tinterias Homemade Tortilla on Tomoe River (TR7) 52gsm paper:

Sailor x Tinterias Homemade Tortilla on Midori MD paper:

Sailor x Tinterias Homemade Tortilla on Midori Cotton paper:

Sailor x Tinterias Homemade Tortilla on Cosmo Air Light 83gsm paper:

The next ink is Blue Corn, a deep blackberry purple. I love how well this ink matches the actual color of blue corn – although I don’t think blue corn sheens at all. I could be wrong, though. Blue Corn is a touch bluer than Robert Oster Claret, but it is close and it is a few shades lighter than Vinta Ubi Mulberry.

Sailor x Tinterias Blue Corn on Tomoe River (TR7) 52gsm paper:

Sailor x Tinterias Blue Corn on Midori MD paper:

Sailor x Tinterias Blue Corn on Midori Cotton paper:

Sailor x Tinterias Blue Corn on Cosmo Air Light 83gsm paper:

The last ink today (due to being too slow on Spicy Chipotle), is Agave. Agave is a wonderful blue-grey ink that could be classified as a light blue-black ink. It is close to Wearingeul Mature but is better at shading and is slightly darker than Akkerman Koninginne Nach Blauw.

Sailor x Tinterias Agave on Tomoe River (TR7) 52gsm paper:

Sailor x Tinterias Agave on Midori MD paper:

Sailor x Tinterias Agave on Midori Cotton paper:

Sailor x Tinterias Agave on Cosmo Air Light 83gsm paper:

I’ve been enjoying these three inks thoroughly since picking them up. Homemade Tortilla and Agave shade gorgeously! I played around with Agave and a Sailor Fude nib for a while – not artistically, but it was fun seeing what the color can do!

I highly recommend all three inks I’ve shown here today. You can find them on the Tinterias podcast website where they are listed for $30 each (although both Homemade Tortilla and Spicy Chipotle are sold out currently) – I did not find shipping costs, however. The square glass bottles are 50mL each, so you’ll have plenty to play with as well, and at $0.60/mL, these inks are very well-priced for Sailor!

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Each of the inks in the Write & Draw line come in a 50mL glass bottle for $17.33, about $0.35 per mL.

The Write & Draw inks are all named for the color and an animal – none that match the usual color of the animal, however! Yellow Zebra, Brown Penguin, and Brown Colibri are up first.

Red Duck, Orange Skunk, and Pink Gazelle:

Pink Alpaca, Red Turtle, Pink Owl:

Violet Raccoon, Violet Bee, Violet Lion, and Blue Chameleon:

Octopus Write & Draw inks on Cosmo Air Light 83gsm paper:

Octopus Write & Draw inks on Midori MD paper:

Octopus Write & Draw inks on Tomoe River 52gsm (TR7) paper:

Octopus Write & Draw inks on Midori Cotton paper:

Next week I’ll show the remaining 12 Write & Draw inks along with a look at the level of water resistance offered by these pigment inks.

DISCLAIMER: The items included in this review were provided at a discount by Vanness Pen Shop for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

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This post today will be giving a first look at the two ink lines: the Cephalopod Series and the Avian Series. I will dive deeper into reviewing the characteristics of the inks in further posts, but I wanted to give an overview of the colors as soon as I could.

The first Series is Cephalopods. This line consists of Bobtail Squid Green, Colossal Squid Dark, Flapjack Octopus Orange, Vampire Squid Red, Blue-Ringed Octopus Blue, Spirula Green, Cuttlefish Brown, and Flying Squid Blue.

The Avian Series consists of Common Loon Black, Shoebill Stork Grey, Roseate Spoonbill Pink, American Goldfinch Yellow, Purple Gallinule Purple, Green Kingfisher Green, Pompadour Cotinga Burgundy, and Indigo Bunting Blue.

I was sent 0.5 ounce bottles of each ink – these are sold for $14.50 in 1.5 ounce bottles at various retailers.

Cephalopods:

Avian:

On Col-o-Ring cards, the only smearing I noticed was from my own clumsiness.

• Above: Cosmo Air Light paper

• Above: Cosmo Air Light paper

I attempted to remove the sticker that was used to close the bag ofCepholapod samples, but my clumsiness showed up again. I did want to show off the wonderful drawing on the sticker, however. Just ignore the fact that it is in pieces…

The Avian Sticker came off in one piece, though!

Cosmo Air Light shows plenty of shading and hints of sheen in Flying Squid, Blue-Ringed Octopus, Vampire Squid, Roseate Spoonbill Pink, and Common Loon Black. Haloing is also showing up in several colors.

• Above: Tomoe River Paper

• Above: Tomoe River Paper

The same five inks sheen on Tomoe River paper as well where the colors are softer and shading is less pronounced.

• Above: Midori MD Light paper

• Above: Midori MD Light paper

I love the depth of these inks on Midori MD Light paper. Vampire Squid sheens quite a bit here and Cuttlefish has a fascinating variety of layers.

As I said above, this is only meant to be a quick teaser of the Anderillium ink lines. In the coming weeks, I will dive deeper into how these inks perform. Don’t forget to check back next week!

DISCLAIMER: Some of the items included in this review were provided to us free of charge for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

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I was able to find a small box of 15mL bottles of the three new inks – Hotaru-Bi, Hana-Ikada, and Sui-Gyoku. They were packaged in a small booklet-box.

Hotaru-Bi is such a bright color that it is a bit tough to show in a photo.

When I first swatched this group, I was reminded of a stoplight trio. Not quite the same colors, but reminiscent of a traffic light.

Hotaru-Bi is a very bright but legible yellow-green. Ferris Wheel Press Fizzy Lime is the only color I have that is close – Hotaru-Bi is noticeably darker in writing, however.

Hana-Ikada is quite close to Pilot’s 100th Anniversary ink, Benzaiten. However, Hana-Ikada has subtle multi-color shading- light pink to an orangish coral.

Finally Sui-Gyoku. Comparing this ink to Iroshizuku Syo-Ro, you can see the blue-green difference. Again, some of the multi-color shading comes into play, ranging from turquoise blue to nearly emerald green.

I was a bit sloppy with swatches (during the Atlanta show), but below are the three new colors on Tomoe River paper.

Again, on Cosmo Air Light paper.

I’m happy with the new colors, and I think they look amazing as a trio. I am a bit disappointed that the Iroshizuku line will be losing three great inks, however. This trio won’t replace the three lost inks, although they are a welcome addition.

DISCLAIMER: The items included in this review were purchased by me. Sometimes items are purchased with funds from our amazing Patrons. You can help support this blog by joining our Patreon. Please see the About page for more details.

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Now on to show the ink I’m actually reviewing!

Scribo Cannella recently came to my attention when I ordered a sample from Vanness. Cannella is a wonderful light caramel, golden brown ink that has huge shading potential.

Cannella is darker than Robert Oster Honey Bee or Van Dieman’s Peanut Brittle. Close to Jacques Herbin Ambre de Baltique (much better behaved than Ambre, though).

Below is a writing sample on Tomoe River paper – the shading is great even in this extra fine nib.

In heavy drops, Cannella is a deep brown and golden brown.

No true sheen. The shading is fabulous.

Scribo packages their ink in heavy bottles that contain 90mL of ink for $35 ($0.39 per mL). You can also pick up a sample at Vanness priced at $3.10 for 4mL. The price is a good deal – ink and a paperweight in one! The price per mL is low for the quality of the ink, but the quantity of ink may deter some. However, if you find a Scribo color that you love, grab a bottle! But be careful not to drop it on your toes!

DISCLAIMER: The items included in this review were purchased at full price by me. Please see the About page for more details.

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Robert Oster has started to release inks inspired by various cities in the United States. As of today, seven inks have been released:

Napa, California- a deep wine red
Chicago, Illinois- steely, snow-inspired blue
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma- a grassy plains green
Kansas City, Kansas- a golden brown inspired by the wheat belt
Miami, Florida- a blue-green inspired by the water
New York, New York- bright red for The Big Apple
Las Vegas, Nevada- a shimmering purple inspired by the glitz of Las Vegas

I purchased my samples from Vanness where they were $3.00 ($3.75 for Las Vegas) for 4mL and the bottles run $18 for 50mL ($26 for Las Vegas).

Oklahoma City is a grassy green color, somewhere between Robert Oster Lemon Grass and Robert Oster Grun-Schwarz. This is going to be one that Ana likes!

Napa is a fabulous burgundy – very much a wine color.

Chicago. This one is probably my favorite (other than Las Vegas, because, of course, it’s purple)This is an ink that shows multiple layers of color – not quite multi-chromatic, but almost. It is very close in color to several vintage iron gall blue-black inks.

New York is a bold red lighter than Robert Oster Red Candy.

Kansas City is a great ink for shading. I would say ripe wheat is about right for this color description – a brownish gold.

Miami is an ink that I had expected to be more turquoise. Like Chicago, it is close to several vintage blue-black iron gall inks but it leans much more towards the blue side.

The swatches I had seen of Robert Oster Las Vegas looked nothing like the color that came out of this sample. Las Vegas is a mid-lavender with plenty of sparkle – either silver or a pale blue. Although the sparkle is hard to see in this photo, the second photo below is better.

WONDERFUL sparkle. Amazing purple. This ink makes me feel like I’m 8 years old again.

I mentioned that Chicago and Miami both looked like vintage blue-black inks – here they are side by side.

Below are swatches of the seven inks on Tomoe River Paper:

And Las Vegas shimmer close-up on Tomoe River paper:

The seven inks on Cosmo Air Light paper:

And the Las Vegas shimmer shot on Cosmo Air Light paper:

Tomoe River paper is on the left and Cosmo Air Light paper on the right. The difference in how color shows on the two paper types still amazes me – on CAL, Miami is darker but Chicago and Napa are lighter.

So there you have it! Robert Oster Cities of America inks:

DISCLAIMER: The items included in this review were provided at a discount for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

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Cult Pens is an amazing store located in Great Britain with a huge selection of inks, pens, paper, storage containers – everything to delight a fountain pen user. Cult Pens recently celebrated a big anniversary – 16 years. To celebrate this event, they released a new line of inks that are made by Diamine and expanded another line of highly sheening inks (the inks are each named after Cult Pens staff members). While ordering, I found that they had also received new Sailor inks exclusive to their store.

The three inks are Nori, Suiseki, and Momiji. The boxes are labeled on the side with Green, Brown, and Yellow. Helpful.

The ink is available at Cult Pens for $27.95 for a 50mL bottle – just a bit more than $0.50 per mL. Quite reasonable pricing for Sailor inks lately! Free shipping to the US is available with a $135 spend and shipping is available to anywhere.

The three inks all behave like the Sailor Manyo inks although I did find the brown (Suiseki) to be a bit on the dry side. I wouldn’t classify it as a dry ink, but it was different than the other two inks.

The first ink is Nori – seaweed. This color is closest to Sailor Epinard (Spinich) but a bit softer. Maybe the word should be dustier? Even in writing, the color is soft – a bit less saturated – giving it a vintage feel.

Suiseki is the word for small landscape rocks – meaning rocks that look like a natural landscape in and of themselves. (I’m not a translator and cannot speak or read Japanese but I can use Google and this color is supposed to be rock color). Kobe #40 is very close but doesn’t shade as nicely. It is a soft greyish-brown with a hint of peach.

Sailor Momiji (a Japanese maple tree) is a honey gold color with beautiful shading. It is closest to Robert Oster African Gold but a bit darker – less of a green undertone than KWZ Honey. With the steel nib I used for the swatch, the writing varied from medium gold to dark brown.

I was surprised by these colors – they don’t seem to fit in with current ink trends which seem to be towards multi-chromatic or color-shifting inks. These are, however, color groups that do not have many options already available. When the group of three is seen together, there is a calm tone – nature in ink.

The first swatches below are on Tomoe River paper:

And then again on Cosmo Air Light paper:

Finally, Tomoe River paper on the left and Cosmo Air Light paper on the right. Suiseki shows the most change between the two papers. Nori looks so much softer on the CAL paper!

I’m very happy I found this trio and I’ll be presenting more Cult Pens exclusive inks in the near future. Do you have a favorite store-exclusive ink?

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My selections include:

• Papier Plume Yellow (30 mL, $8.00)
• Rohrer and Klingner Helianthus Sunflower (50 mL, $11.95)
• Vinta Sunrise Hanan (30 mL, $12.00)
• Robert Oster Aussie Gold (50 mL, $17.00)

Papier Plume Yellow is probably the closest to Illuminating, a bright sunny yellow that is the very color I think of when I think of yellow. While the ink is beautiful and can shade nicely, my biggest complaint about it is that I don’t think it’s terribly legible. While I couldn’t do without this sunny yellow in a rainbow, I just don’t know how practical is it for fountain pen usage.

Rohrer and Klingner Helianthus Sunflower is a gorgeous yellow-orange that reminds me of fields of sunflowers or egg yolks. It is beautifully legible though there’s not a ton of shading in it. I also don’t know if it quite hits the yellow spot for me – it’s just a little on the orange side. I tend to think of this color as  more of a goldenrod?

Vinta Sunrise Hanan is a yellow that leans a bit gold. There is more shading in this one, but it takes a bit of a step back on the legibility scale, particularly with my glass nib. I just love the way it shades on the Col-o-ring card though!

And finally Robert Oster Aussie Gold is a deep golden yellow, the color of summer wheat fields. This one has some glorious shading as most of the Robert Oster inks doo, and is quite legible in writing.

As you can see from my Col-o-ring Oversize, I don’t have too many yellows in the ink stash – Robert Oster Honey Bee and Franklin Christoph Honey Comb cover the gold spectrum, and Colorverse Gluon and Platinum Citrus Black cover the yellow-green/olive end of the spectrum.

In almost any other color of ink I enjoy having a large variety of hues to choose from, but I guess the lighter nature of yellows just keeps me from buying too many.

• Paper: Baron Fig Mastermind Desk Pad ($16)
• Pen: Delike Glass Signature Pen ($37.80)
• Swatches: Col-o-Ring Ink Testing Book ($10) and Col-o-Dex Rotary Cards ($15), Col-o-Ring Oversize ($15)

DISCLAIMER: Some of the items included in this review were provided to us free of charge for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

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I’ve divided up the Colors of Nature inks into various themes. This group is the Grain set. First up is Grain Rain. I love this color and I was disappointed with the feathering here. The pink and yellow show up separately making the overall color a peach.

Once there is a good Grain Rain, you get Grain in Ear. This is a great yellow that is a bit lighter than PR Buttercup but darker than Montblanc Lucky Pig.

Time marches on, giving way to Grain Full. Somewhere between RO Honey Bee and Callifolio Inti, Grain Full Has definite multi-chromatic qualities where the dark yellow-brown separates from the orange.

This may be the set with the most dramatic difference between the two tested papers – Cosmo Air Light first followed by Tomoe River paper second. There is even a textural difference between the two.

The second group is… the group that Didn’t Fit Well Into Other Groups (DFWIOG). First up is Waking of Insects. This is a beautiful dirty green, very close to Diamine Safari.

Pure Brightness is a touch bluer than Ferris Wheel Press Mirror of Moraine.

The final DFWIOG ink is Rain Water. This contains more blue than Pure Brightness and is close to Faber Castell Turquoise.

I apologize for the random splatters of Grain in Ear on the page. This again proves that cats and ink should never mix. The first photo here is Cosmo Air Light paper and the second is Tomoe River. Again, there are color differences between the two paper types but also a textural difference. Tomoe River paper has a grainy texture while Cosmo Air Light is crisp.

The two papers side by side so you can see the differences under the same lighting conditions.

The last two inks today could be grouped in with part 3, but I’ve placed them in part 2 because the numbers worked out that way. I have elegantly named it Condensation Through the Year (CTtY). Yes, I know Rain Water could be with this group.

White Dew is lighter than Diamine Ochre and not quite as red as SBRE Brown.

Cold Dew is a fabulous gray and seems to be warmer than my cold grays but colder than my warm grays.  Bungubox Melancholic Grey is the closest I could find.

Both White Dew and Cold Dew take on a cooler tone on Cosmo Air Light paper (first photo below) than on the Tomoe River paper (second photo below).

The full eight inks presented today lined up together:

As I mentioned in part 1, these IWI inks have quite an issue with feathering. They all have a watery consistency that allows some beautiful color separation – an amazing quality in inks used for artwork or on paper with slow absorption. Tomoe River paper seems to handle IWI inks with little to no feathering while still showing the multi-chromatic characteristics. Again, this is a topic I will revisit in part 3, next Thursday.

DISCLAIMER: The items included in this review were purchased by me and I was not compensated to write this review. Please see the About page for more details.

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* This photo is from Vanness Pens

The Jungle set – well, I haven’t been able to purchase this set yet. I’m pretty certain it has sold so quickly because the animals are incredibly cute.

I did purchase several samples of the inks and Ana sent me the rest of the samples so I could review them all together. So here we go! (These samples were all purchased from Vanness)

The first ink here is Monteverde Jungle Toucan. It is a slightly blue-leaning black, and not incredibly dark. It’s an average black ink.

Jungle Elephant is a dark blue-ish purple. It’s close to Kobe #32 but has more blue undertones.

Jungle Chameleon surprised me when I swatched it. It’s close to KWZ Brown Pink or a dark, slightly less pink version of Monteverde Rose Noir.

Jungle Crocodile comes in as a forest green with a touch of black sheen on the edges and is very close to Vinta Elysium. it could definitely work in an office setting as an adventurous black.

Jungle Zebra is a beautiful navy/blue-black. It looks greenish next to true blue inks and blue when it’s compared to greens. Lovely color.

Jungle Turtle is slightly lighter than Pilot Ebisu. I think it’s too light for me to use in most pens, but would be amazing in a highlighter pen. Also, it is absolutely my favorite illustration on the Jungle set!

Jungle Hippo is a medium blue in hue but darker than most blues I have in my library. I’m not typically a huge fan of blues like this but Hippo is dark enough to be pleasant. A touch of purple undertone helps!

Gorilla is an interesting orange-ish burgundy. It has a touch redder than Urushi Red. I did see some feathering on the Col-o-Ring card here which I will discuss more in a bit.

Jungle Giraffe has plenty of orange in the mix – very close to Papier Plume Red Beans and Rice. This ink had significant feathering on the swatch card but I love the color.

Jungle Lion is my favorite of the entire Jungle set. It also has an adorable lion on the bottle! It’s an interesting orange-yellow-brown mixture that is unique to my collection so far, like a lighter version of 3 Oysters Hwangto. I love how the ink color looks in writing – light enough to see the unique color but still dark enough to be legible.

Now to talk about the feathering I’ve seen in this set. Giraffe is by far the worst with Gorilla coming in second. Could there be an issue with the red dye in the batch? This is typically worse when I use a dip nib as I did here, so I’m hoping in a fountain pen it won’t show as much. But this is not something I’ve seen before with Monteverde inks!

The second batch of feathering inks in the Jungle set is Turtle and Zebra. The feathering is not nearly as obvious as Giraffe and Gorilla, but still concerning. Could Monteverde have changed their typical ink formulation here? Extensive testing will be in order along with contacting the company.

Overall, I love this set. I will be testing the feathering inks further and investigating what has happened. But between the adorable illustrations and the colors of Lion, Hippo, and Chameleon, I think the set is a great new one. If the feathering problems can be remedied, I would recommend purchasing the set wholeheartedly. As of this writing, an individual bottle or three would be the better call.

DISCLAIMER: Some items included in this review were purchased by me and some by the Well-Appointed Desk for the purposes of this review and I was not compensated to write this post. Please see the About page for more details.

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