Author Topic: Diamine Inkvent 2021  (Read 8482 times)

Offline K-2

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Diamine Inkvent 2021
« on: December 01, 2021, 12:49:34 PM »
In 2019 Diamine released an Advent Calendar full of tiny bottles of ink - in other words: The Best Advent Calendar Ever.  25 beautiful inks formulated for fountain pens - with properties like shading, shimmer, and sheen.  Happily, they released full-size (50ml) bottles of the 2019 inks in 2020, so that I could stop hoarding my tiny bottles of favorites.

Diamine has done it again this year: the 2021 Diamine Inkvent Calendar dropped in September, and I pestered my spouse into buying me one.  I will admit that I opened it early.  But like last time (when I opened it early, because I'm a child, apparently - yes I know it's supposed to be bad luck), I am determined to open the doors/inks in order, and not proceed until I've done a test swatch and ink drawing with each, using the name of the ink as a prompt for the drawing.  Kind of like Inktober, but for Advent.  Unlike Inktober, I won't get around to posting every day, but I'll eventually get through all of them.  I hope if others (ahem, @AnasaziWrites ) have also procured an Inkvent Calendar, they might join me for the fun.

As participants on the Forum have often noted - you can use fountain pen inks with dip pens if you doctor them a bit.  I also use fountain pen inks for drawing and painting.  All the drawings I posted in the Inktober 2021 thread were done with fountain pen inks for instance.  They have some wonderful properties of shading and chromatography, making them a very exciting art medium.  Nick Stewart shows off their amazing range on his blog: https://nickstewart.ink/

Hence, I'm posting to the "Tools and Supplies" area, since this thread will produce a catalogue of lovely, colorful inks that may be helpful for some future project.

Procedurally:

For the purposes of consistency, all of my test swatches are done on Col-O-Ring paper.  The ink is applied onto wetted paper to test for shading and chromatography.  A line of bleach and "INKVENT 2021" is applied with a Nikko G nib on an area of high saturation.  The italic "Diamine" is drawn with a #6 Mitchell, the blackletter "Inkvent" is drawn with a #3 Mitchell, the name of the ink itself is written in cursive with a medium flex vintage Gillott nib in an oblique holder.  I do not add any gum arabic for testing purposes, to get a sense of the consistency of the ink and its suitability for different uses.  So sometimes it blobs a little, which tells me how I'll need to adjust later on.  I've also described what I'm seeing in words, because lighting and monitors produce different appearances, and for accessibility purposes, because some readers may be unable to distinguish between certain colors.

Drawings are done with the ink of the day (name of the ink used as prompt for the drawing), water, and sometimes bleach, with various water color brushes, ruling pens, and dip nibs.  Unless otherwise noted, they are all done in a Stillman & Birn Beta Series spiral bound notebook with medium-grain, cold press, 270gsm paper.

Diamine marks each ink with the designations: "standard" (shading, but no shimmer, no sheen), "shimmer" (containing metallic particulates), and "sheen" (caused by a residue that is not absorbed into the paper, making some portions reflect a different, often shiny, color).  Sometimes with a combination of shimmer and sheen.
* Hey, Diamine - if you're reading this and maybe like my work with your ink, contact me!  I work on commission!


Advent started on 28 Nov this year, but some people observe it starting on 1 Dec, so I didn't want to spoil it for anyone.  But we can get started now.  So here we go:

"Seize the Night" - a dark plummy-brown mauve, "standard" ink that nonetheless seems to have some mustard-gold sheen in the especially saturated areas.  Bleeds out violets and periwinkle.  Bleach produces a relatively clean, ivory line.





Offline darrin1200

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #1 on: December 02, 2021, 08:01:09 AM »
Amazing work K-2. I’m looking forward to the rest.
Darrin McArthur
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Offline K-2

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #2 on: December 02, 2021, 02:07:54 PM »
"Garland" - a dark teal ink with subtle blue shimmer and vivid ruby sheen.  On wetted paper it bleeds out cyan and green, down to delicate soft blues at the lightest end of the shading.  Clean ivory-white reaction to bleach (and in heavily inked areas, a neon blue).

Offline AnasaziWrites

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #3 on: December 02, 2021, 05:32:23 PM »
Inkvent calendar in the house. I've opened two, but have not tried them yet, as I am attempting to get my Christmas cards out early (the recent holiday exchange card I sent to my wife at our address took a week to get here). Look forward to trying them out and will post here when I do.

Offline K-2

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #4 on: December 03, 2021, 01:31:20 PM »
"Ash" - a cool, medium grey, "standard" ink, with beautiful shading and chromatography.  On wetted paper, it bleeds out bright cyan, dusty taupes, wispy grey, and etherial blues.  Neon white (almost glowing pink) reaction to bleach.

BTW - as an exercise, I'm committing to drawing portrait studies for each of the inks, based on the name of the ink - hence yesterday's "Garland" = Judy Garland; day 1 was Josephine Baker for "Seize the Night".

My traumatic head injury a couple or three years ago left me with neurological aftereffects, including a sort of "face-blindness".  I was never very good at recognizing people's faces, and now I'm even worse - the condition is called "prosopagnosia".  I'm trying to train/retrain myself in how to recognize faces by using this year's Inkvent as an opportunity to practice studying what and how the topography and proportions of faces contribute to their individual legibility.  So maybe it can be a game to see if you (or I) can recognize any of them!


Offline K-2

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #5 on: December 04, 2021, 08:22:50 PM »
"Tempest" - a moody, dark, blue-green, with gold shimmer, and (although not labeled as such) a subtle coppery sheen.  Beautiful chromatography on wetted paper, bleeding out a variety of bright and medium blues, vivid cyan, an intriguing celadon, and dove greys.  Clean, bone-white reaction to bleach.

It may be too early to have a favorite, but I'm impressed with the potential of this ink - so much so, that I did two drawings to explore its range more fully.


Offline K-2

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #6 on: December 05, 2021, 02:04:30 PM »
"Harmony" - a medium violet "standard" ink, well-balanced between red and blue.  Subtle chromatogrphy bleeding out dusty pinks, lavenders, and hints of periwinkle.  Crisp lines for writing, even without gum arabic, and a neon white reaction to bleach.  A very pretty ink!


Offline Erica McPhee

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #7 on: December 05, 2021, 04:40:17 PM »
Tempest and Harmony are my favorite colors so far. Your illustrations are superb. We are so fortunate to have you sharing with us! Thank you!
Warm Regards,
Erica
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Offline K-2

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #8 on: December 06, 2021, 04:05:31 PM »
@Erica McPhee - you are too kind!  Thank you for your kind words about my illustrations.  I feel fortunate to have such a friendly and supportive environment in which to display and discuss my ink experiments.  Thanks to you and all the members here for making Flourish Forum a great community of artists and calligraphers at all stages of development.  It's a very special corner of the internet!

As we approach the end of only the first week, it's remarkable that there are already several inks that I have marked for my wish list.  I hope they come out with full sized bottles like they did last time!

Today's ink is another beautiful stunner, with shading, chromatography, sheen and shimmer.

"Winter Spice" - a rich brown ink with sparkly blue shimmer and vivid green sheen.  Smooth shading into warm, pinky/peach tans and pale champaign, with a surprising hit of minty green coming out in the chromatography.  Interesting reaction to bleach, depending on ink saturation - from dull gold to glowing violet on areas with heavy ink.

The idea of brown ink has been a bit divisive on the forum, but it's my favorite shade to sketch with, since the sepia-tones give everything an old-fashioned, nostalgic feel, and this one has so many tricks up its sleeve!


Offline Cyril Jayant

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #9 on: December 06, 2021, 06:30:56 PM »
Beautiful work and I love most of the inks . I am a fan of Diamine !!!

Offline Zivio

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #10 on: December 06, 2021, 08:21:52 PM »
Very much enjoying your wit and humor in the reification of the Diamine ink names and the Inktober words using beautiful art.  Such a joy to behold, and wishing you many joys in return!
Foment Compassion, Practice Peace

Offline K-2

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #11 on: December 08, 2021, 12:13:02 AM »
@Cyril Jayant and @Zivio - Thank you for your kind thoughts about my drawings.
Cyril - maybe you'll like one of the Diamine invent inks enough to buy a full sized bottle if they come out with them next year!

"Candle Light" - A lovely "standard" shading ink, bleeding out yellows from dark amber to sunny lemon.  Understated but clean reaction to bleach.

I honestly enjoyed drawing with this one way more than I thought I would.  The tonal range is superb for a "yellow" ink!  It's quite similar to Noodler's "Honey Brown" ink, but without the smeary oily residue and the baggage that comes with that brand's very outspoken owner.


Offline K-2

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #12 on: December 08, 2021, 04:13:14 PM »
The first person who saw my drawing for "Candle Light" immediately said, "Oh, you should have done Princess Di for that song," and then we got into a friendly argument about which version of "Candle in the Wind" was better.  But then, I didn't have to choose after all, because the very next ink was....

"Raspberry Rose" - an aptly named, pretty, dark pink standard ink, shading from soft petal pink to ripe raspberries.  Bright white reaction to bleach.


Offline Erica McPhee

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #13 on: December 09, 2021, 12:25:16 PM »
Absolutely stunning! I am wondering how you can compile this work. It would make a fabulous gallery display. Have you shared with Diamine?

Fun fact: Princess Diana and I share an 8th great-grandmother which means my children and I are cousins to Prince William and Prince Harry.  ;D
Warm Regards,
Erica
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Offline K-2

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Re: Diamine Inkvent 2021
« Reply #14 on: December 09, 2021, 03:30:13 PM »
You are too kind! @Erica McPhee (or should I call you "your leastest highness" after your connection with the British royals?  ;)) -- I'm afraid most of these drawings are bound up in a sketchbook, so they won't be matted and framed and galleried unless I cut the binding apart.  It does make for kind of a cool "book" of drawings though.

I was trying to think of how to approach Diamine on this front - I suppose they probably have their own in-house artists & illustrators?  But I've never really seen anything quite like this online (which could just be because I'm not really a user of Twitter/Insta/FB).  Anyway, I think other illustrators would like to see the ink range, although most people working in the biz need something less unpredictable serendipitous to draw with than fountain pen ink - it often doesn't reproduce well, especially with the shimmer & sheen.

I gave a close friend of mine one of the Inktober pictures (IRL hard copy) as a gift, and she had a terrible experience trying to have it scanned and reproduced as a holiday card.  Literally none of the chromatography came though.

There's a reason why illustrators' inks are usually very pure, one-dimensional, smooth shading hues!  The comics/manga illustrators even use pre-set values of grey.

Today's ink: I call shenanigans!  We already had a dark blue-green gold-shimmer ink called "Tempest", and now we have a dark blue silver-shimmer ink called...
"Storm" - a dark blue ink with loads of silvery shimmer, bleeding out powder blues, soft lilac, hints of robin's egg and cyan in the chromatography.  Neon reaction bleach.  In other words - another stunner!  even if it has a semi-redundant name.

At the end of the month, we'll have to have a bit of a recap to discuss which 2021 Inkvent inks were favorites - and which ones might be worth springing for the full 50ml bottle if Diamine offers them.