More Live Music – Different Fountain Pens

Here are a few more of the sketches I did last weekend at the Ireby Music Festival.

I started off working with my new Super 5 sketching pen and some Noodlers blue/black ink. The Super 5 glides beautifully, has a good, consistent flow (I hate it when pens stutter and dry on me) and doesn’t seem to leak (my Noodlers pen was a nightmare for that – now consigned to that stationers in the sky…).

I must say though, I still prefer my trusty Sailor. There is some slight variation in the line weight with the Super 5, you can just about tell it’s not a fine-liner but, personally, I am looking for a more expressive mark that responds more like a graphite stick or a good old dip pen. This is with the Sailor:

I know some people who have found the Sailor tricky to get the hang of – the line variation is controlled by the angle at which you hold the pen – but I fell in love immediately. I really like the way that it encourages me to draw from the elbow, rather than the wrist, in itself a more expressive action.

I think the Super 5 will still be handy though, especially on those occasions where I am working in a little A6 pad. The thicker marks of the Sailor can be a bit much at that scale. I have never tried a Hero, which seems to be the other name that crops up a lot. How does that compare?