Diamine Shimmer Inks 2017 Cobalt Jazz

**Chrissy** · October 18th, 2017, 04:43 AM

I’m reviewing samples of the new set of Diamine Shimmer inks.
This one is Diamine Cobalt Jazz

It is a strong, saturated cobalt blue colour with plenty of red shading and gold shimmer.

I found it a wet and well flowing ink.
It had very good lubrication with the pens I tried it with.
With broader nibs it looks much more saturated than it does with finer nibs, although it’s wet enough to show the gold shimmer with all nibs.
It showed through on some of the papers I used.
The pens I used were a Lamy Al-Star with M nib, Lamy Nexx M Stub 1.1mm nib, Lamy Nexx M F nib.
The comparison inks were swabbed with a cotton bud and their ink names were written with a glass dip pen.

I consider Cobalt Jazz a reasonably well-behaved ink. I didn’t experience any ignition or clogging problems with it. I had no problem cleaning it out of pens. I found that it stained my thumb and middle finger while I was writing with it, if I hadn’t cleaned the grip of the pen carefully enough. In those cases it was more difficult to clean off my skin. However, this is always the case with strong, saturated cobalt blue inks. I was able to wash it off with bar soap, but it took a couple of attempts with warm water.

It is not sold as a water resistant ink but it is water resistant.

The Mebin UK Notebook I used was supplied by someone on FPN who sold TR 68gsm Notebooks. The paper in the Mebin UK Notebook is quite thick at 95gsm, it’s acid free, and has a really smooth surface with no drag or tooth at all. Inks generally take longer to dry on this paper, so wetter inks tend to pool and I knew that they would show their shimmer well enough for me to photograph the sheen.

The Moleskine Notebook is a UK clone, and I found there was very little spread on it.

Flow Rate: Wet, very good.
Lubrication: Wet, very good.
Nib Dry-out: Not noticed.
Start-up: Immediate.
Saturation: A saturated ink.
Shading Potential: Very good. Red shading can easily be seen.
Sheen: Gold shimmer
Show-Through:
- Tomoe River 52gsm.
- Cheaper generic 80gsm printer papers & lined pads.
- Field Notes
Spread / Feathering: Not seen
Nib Creep / “Crud”: Not seen, even after over a week in the pen
Staining (pen): Not seen - easy clean-up
Staining (hands): Occasionally seen - soap & water clean-up.
Clogging: Not seen. Seems unlikely.
Water resistance: Not sold as waterproof, but has some water resistance..
Availability: Will be available from Diamine Inks web-site and other outlets.