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Chrissy
July 16th, 2015, 09:16 AM
This is my review of Diamine Mediterranean Blue.

I decided to try a sample of this ink because one of my correspondents used it in a letter to me and I thought it was a very pretty blue. When I first wrote with it I thought it didn't come across as a particularly saturated ink and I expected it to look more saturated, especially as the pen has been filled with it for several days before I wrote with it.

My Waterman Phileas has a replacement 18ct gold L'Etalon M nib fitted into it, and that was the only pen I filled with this ink I don't think it's going to look significantly different with a F or stub nib.

It's a nice colour, and I quite like this shade of blue, but you might think it should look brighter than it actually does when you write with it.

As usual for a Diamine ink, it's a well behaved ink. It shows slight shading. I found it flowed smoothly across the page, and had no problems with lubrication in the Phileas that I used.

This ink exhibits no showthrough and no bleedthrough on my thick Xerox ColorPrint paper.


The water test on the review form shows this isn't a waterproof ink, but it's quite resistant.


Bearing in mind the paper I use is thick with a shiny surface, and I used a M nib, this ink only took 8-10 secs to dry. That's really quick on this paper


It flows through the pen well and lubricates the nib well. I saw no skips or hard starts while I did swabs and dry time tests.


It is currently available in 80ml glass bottles, 30ml plastic refill bottles or cartridges.


Diamine (http://www.diamineinks.co.uk/) sell it directly to end-users on their web-site.


It's a reasonable price

20238

Laura N
July 16th, 2015, 11:37 AM
I like this one! It sort of looks like a darker Quink maybe? Gorgeous shading.

Cerulean is one of my favorite words, too. :)

mhosea
July 16th, 2015, 12:00 PM
It sort of looks like a darker Quink maybe?

One of the problems I've personally had with scanning blue inks is that the green component doesn't come through very well, and consequently the scan comes out looking more purely blue than seems right. I think of Mediterranean Blue as being close to pure blue in the spectrum between turquoise and a more traditional blue. For example, in decreasing "turquoiseness", I use Visconti Turquoise, Pelikan Turquoise, Mediterranean Blue, Asa Blue, and then onward to blues that don't seem to have any green in them.

Chrissy
July 16th, 2015, 03:43 PM
It sort of looks like a darker Quink maybe?

One of the problems I've personally had with scanning blue inks is that the green component doesn't come through very well, and consequently the scan comes out looking more purely blue than seems right. I think of Mediterranean Blue as being close to pure blue in the spectrum between turquoise and a more traditional blue. For example, in decreasing "turquoiseness", I use Visconti Turquoise, Pelikan Turquoise, Mediterranean Blue, Asa Blue, and then onward to blues that don't seem to have any green in them.

I sometimes have that problem with scanning too. In fact I may as well explain here that the reason I scribble the 4 or 5 blocks in the top right hand corner of my reviews is so that I can more easily compare the colours on the scan with those on the actual sheet, when I get it into Photoshop.

They give me a reasonably good idea how much the scan is out on colour. I always increase the contrast a bit, as that's almost like it increases the sharpness, but on blues I usually have to adjust colour balance or hue/saturation as well. On this one it was far too red/blue. I had to move the slider to cyan/red -20 to get the shade how it looked on the paper and that was a surprise as it doesn't seem to have added any green, but it has reduced the red/blue just enough to get a good colour match.

On the other hand, I can only see it how it looks on my screen. I have to cross my fingers and hope that it's the right colour on everyone else's screen. :)

Chrissy
July 16th, 2015, 03:48 PM
I like this one! It sort of looks like a darker Quink maybe? Gorgeous shading.

Cerulean is one of my favorite words, too. :)

You are right. I should have compared it with Quink Blue, as I have some odd cartridges lying about somewhere. I thought of Quink when I wrote with it though.

I like Cerulean Blue. It makes me think of the sea, and this is Mediterranean Blue after all :)