A t2 visit with a difference

.. no ink lines to my cup of tea (oh! I AM enjoying this!) and more time and pages used sketching people.

Friday Night at Bathers, Balmoral

Went to see a friends wonderful exhibition
www.erinhill.bigcartel.com/category/exhibition-at-bather-...

I arrived early (as it turned out the others did too) so I did a few sketches to fill in time. It was incredibly windy and Bathers Pavilion is a very challenging building to sketch...


A great dineer chatting about art, sketching and travel and we didn't have our sketchbooks out!
...so we shared dessert so we could all sketch it!!!

Here is my sketch of the dessert last night. I always like having more than one object on a spread so I added my cup of tea (how surprising) but as the dessert is the main focus scribbled text on the right hand page.

120316 No lines!

120316 No lines!, a photo by borromini bear on Flickr.

here is my sketch from lunchtime with no lines ...lots of fun and I think it will help my painting to do this more often!

Current ink pen collection

Current ink pen collection, a photo by borromini bear on Flickr.

Due to popular demand... Here is my collection of current fountain pens. Last nights photo (of felt pens) was fairly boring to me – I would be happy to give all those pens away but this collection ...no way! These are my babies! I am not a fountain pen junkie – ie. I am not rushing out trying EVERY brand.... a lamy junkie would be more accurate. I do love lamy pens!!
But most importantly I would ALWAYS choose to draw and write in ink if I could. I love the flow of ink across the page and I love the way that it makes my handwriting look neater!

Ok... From L to R

My new and my old Lamy Joy (old style) pen with EF nib (Noodlers black ink) This old style is not longer available in Australia so I was very excited in July 2011 to find an old style pen for sale in Newcastle upon Tyne in UK. The reason I bought a NEW (old style) pen was because I had worn the old pen out and the lid would not stay on. I have since fixed this (in true Liz-hack-style) by- putting a little bit of superglue around the insde of the lid – just enough to create adequate friction.

-Yellow Lamy safari containing my noodlers polar brown ink (hmm... They don’t do a brown safari!)

-Red Lamy Safari with Noodlers Widow Maker ink (this was a moment of weakness at Xmas time... I didn’t need this but wanted at souvenir from a wonderful stationery shop in Leura)

-Lamy Vista (clear safari) with Noodlers Polar Blue ink (love this!)

-New style Lamy joy pen with a GOLD ef nib. The new style joy is a fraction heavier than the old style... I prefer the old black and red to have in my hand. This nib is lovely but I am afraid to take it out on location (the nib cost 2 x the price of the pen)

-Pilot Parallel Pen in 1.8mm (I also have the 3,5mm size!) Thanks to Josu for this extravagent purchase (It was cheap though!)

-Noodlers Flex Pen with Lexington Grey ink... Never really warmed to this and it leaked on the plane once.

-Rotring Art Pen – I use this at work. It is even lighter than the Lamy Joy (old style) but for some reason I don’t like writing with it...

-Fancy Lamy pen that I bought in the early days to hold my gold nib... But it is too heavy so has a calligraphy nib now.

Historic Ink pen collection

Historic Ink pen collection, a photo by borromini bear on Flickr.

Here are some old fountain pens... Me and ink pens go back a long way (thanks to my dad who has lovely handwriting – impossible to read though... “Yes I know Dad, you find my handwriting hard to read too!!!”)
From Lto R (a very humble collection)

(Sadly the old blue parker pen that dad gave me and I used as a teenager must have been thrown out!)

-A cheap sheaffer pen that I bought when I was 17 – lovely flow. I used it duirng my first 2 years at uni. My tutor used to use it when he was reviewing my work and then keep it all day because he loved it so much. (I also had a calligraphy epn ... Iwas into that in my late teens as well)

-(3-5th years I used a rotring art pen – that is now more but I now have a new one (see my current pen photo))

-A parker pen that I bought with Xmas money from work in the mid 90s. I used a fountain pen at work for years and the secretary used to fill up my cartridges with a syringe! (last night I put noodlers in it and am giving it another go)

-Another sheaffer (branded Colorbond) We were given these at an architecture conference in 2000 in the sample bag – every pen had a tiny crack in the barrel near the nib so we all got ink on our fingers. 2 months later we were all sent a replacement pen and an apology.

-One of the original rapidograph set I bought (it is a staedtler brand as I liked the cute case that the set came in)

-I soon realised that Rotring were better so this is the trusty .25 I bought back 3rd or 4th year uni.

Not sure if any one is interested in these details (I did this mainly for my own amusement)

But I do have a question... Why do we all rave about Lamy pens??? I used to LOVE the cheap sheaffer nibs and they gave me such a consistent flow of ink.