heath
January 14th, 2014, 09:04 AM
Ok, I'm sure this has been brought up before but after Ed Jelley's post on FP friendly and pocket notebooks trying to figure out what fountain pen friendly really means I decided to do a post on what I usually mean by it (http://penpaperinkletter.com/defining-fountain-pen-friendly/). I'm posting my thoughts here and I'd love to hear your comments on my point of view on the subject and your idea of what FP friendly means in general.
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After reading Ed Jelley’s “rant” on what does fountain pen friendly really mean I decided to give my two cents on the matter as well. I often times use the term in reviews so it will also be helpful for my readers to know what I mean by the term. If you don’t care about my thinking then you can skip to the end for the simple definition.
First we must define Fountain Pen. Well, not really. It’s just a fountain pen. But that being said there are differences in fountain pens that need to be accounted for in this discussion as well as the paper. Things like wetness and nib width factor in. Ok, next to define friendly. I am actually serious about this one because to on person the term might mean it is “good enough” and to others it might mean they were “made for each other.”
So, how good does it have to be? I actually use the term with some caveats most of the time. For instance I might say a notebook is fountain pen friendly as long as you only use one side, or let it dry for a period of time. The main point is that it is capable of handling the ink flow from an average fountain pen. It can’t have feathering issues or have bleedthrough. For me though, if I give the caveat, it can have some show through. Most would agree the Tomoe River paper is FP friendly but it’s just not possible to use both sides with most pens.
And back to my earlier point about differences in fountain pens. Again, I use caveats a good bit here as in a book might be FP friendly with M or F nibs that are on the dry side. If it goes beyond the ability to handle a medium nib without major show through I’ll often go out of my way to mention that so people will know it can be used with broader, wetter pens.
So to try and have a concise definition, fountain pen friendly for me means it can be used with at least a fine nib, average wetness pen without feathering or bleedthrough. If it can handle more or can only be used on one side or needs extra dry time I think that is an aside to the FP friendly moniker. Some paper is more FP friendly than others but the line needs to be drawn so we can know what to give a chance or what to avoid altogether.
An example might be that Field Notes notebooks, although great for some, are not quite fountain pen friendly. You can use a fountain pen in them, and I have, but you will likely get some feathering and probably some bleedthrough. Moleskine is in the same boat. On the other hand Word. Notebooks, Scout Notebooks and Kokuyo Campus notebooks are all FP friendly to at least the degree that you can use fountain pens in them and with some pen and ink combos you can have a feather-free, bleedthrough-free writing experience.
In all this I am sure that some will define it in different ways. Some will say if you can’t use a flex nib with a super wet ink it isn’t truly fountain pen friendly. If that’s where we draw the line though I can think of very few that can even get close.
I know I haven’t laid out a perfect, systematic way of determining if a paper is FP friendly or not but hopefully you will at least know what I, am most people I think, mean when we say fountain pen friendly paper.
I’d love to hear what you think it means too!
-Heath
@WeThePPIL
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After reading Ed Jelley’s “rant” on what does fountain pen friendly really mean I decided to give my two cents on the matter as well. I often times use the term in reviews so it will also be helpful for my readers to know what I mean by the term. If you don’t care about my thinking then you can skip to the end for the simple definition.
First we must define Fountain Pen. Well, not really. It’s just a fountain pen. But that being said there are differences in fountain pens that need to be accounted for in this discussion as well as the paper. Things like wetness and nib width factor in. Ok, next to define friendly. I am actually serious about this one because to on person the term might mean it is “good enough” and to others it might mean they were “made for each other.”
So, how good does it have to be? I actually use the term with some caveats most of the time. For instance I might say a notebook is fountain pen friendly as long as you only use one side, or let it dry for a period of time. The main point is that it is capable of handling the ink flow from an average fountain pen. It can’t have feathering issues or have bleedthrough. For me though, if I give the caveat, it can have some show through. Most would agree the Tomoe River paper is FP friendly but it’s just not possible to use both sides with most pens.
And back to my earlier point about differences in fountain pens. Again, I use caveats a good bit here as in a book might be FP friendly with M or F nibs that are on the dry side. If it goes beyond the ability to handle a medium nib without major show through I’ll often go out of my way to mention that so people will know it can be used with broader, wetter pens.
So to try and have a concise definition, fountain pen friendly for me means it can be used with at least a fine nib, average wetness pen without feathering or bleedthrough. If it can handle more or can only be used on one side or needs extra dry time I think that is an aside to the FP friendly moniker. Some paper is more FP friendly than others but the line needs to be drawn so we can know what to give a chance or what to avoid altogether.
An example might be that Field Notes notebooks, although great for some, are not quite fountain pen friendly. You can use a fountain pen in them, and I have, but you will likely get some feathering and probably some bleedthrough. Moleskine is in the same boat. On the other hand Word. Notebooks, Scout Notebooks and Kokuyo Campus notebooks are all FP friendly to at least the degree that you can use fountain pens in them and with some pen and ink combos you can have a feather-free, bleedthrough-free writing experience.
In all this I am sure that some will define it in different ways. Some will say if you can’t use a flex nib with a super wet ink it isn’t truly fountain pen friendly. If that’s where we draw the line though I can think of very few that can even get close.
I know I haven’t laid out a perfect, systematic way of determining if a paper is FP friendly or not but hopefully you will at least know what I, am most people I think, mean when we say fountain pen friendly paper.
I’d love to hear what you think it means too!
-Heath
@WeThePPIL