Review – Pentel Finito Porous Point Pen

Looking for a porous-point pen, and none of the standard ones are doing it for you? Maybe you might want to look at the Pentel Finito porous-point extra fine pen.

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The cap is all plastic, with a clip molded into it that does the job, but isn’t spectacular in any way. Inside is a small piece of plastic that covers the tip and is held in place by a spring, keeping a tight seal on the tip. This is visible through the clear plastic of the cap. The barrel is a black-covered plastic and has all necessary info on it. The grip section is clear and through it one can see the fins of the feed and a small bit of the ink reservoir. The grip section is very smooth and can easily become slippery. After a small bit of metal tapering, there is an extra-fine porous point at the end.

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The ink is fairly black, and fairly standard, not really permanent or fade-proof. The point does spew a lot of ink out: in fact, I would tend to call this pen a fine rather than an extra fine point due to the sheer amount of ink it leaves on the page. This makes the line considerably wider than just the point of the pen. This gushing also leads to points of bleed-through that are not seen in higher-quality porous point pens like Sharpies or Microns.

Overall I’d say the Finito is a mediocre pen that has no purpose as an art supply. There are many pens out there that do what this pen does better, and for the same price. If you want a pen that gushes, or will not dry out for long periods of time this pen may be worth a look, but I’d try something else first.

Review – Papermate Inkjoy Green, Pink, Orange, and Light Blue

In a previous entry I looked at the more standard Papermate Inkjoy colors, now it’s time for the less standard colors, like light blue, pink, orange, and green.

inkjoy tests 2

The light blue is a sky-colored blue. It is the hardest to read of any of the Inkjoy colors, though it is still fairly visible when not cluttered. It has a very natural feel and is very sky-like. It is very neutral anyway. It doesn’t look like a color that takes a stance, if that makes any sense. It’d make a nice color for both drawing and work.

Next pink, which thankfully isn’t a very aggressive pink. It’s definitely not hot, it’s more of a magenta color, but not quite. It is not a very natural color, though, as it doesn’t look like a rock or a flower. Might be good for a personal thing, or some corrections or something similar.

Third is orange, which I must say looks almost exactly like Pilot G-2 Orange, which I have previously reviewed. Subtle, but not very useful, perhaps flowers or the fruit, but it could be work-friendly, if you’re in a less formal office setting.

Finally green, which is a quite deep, more forest color. A very natural and neutral color. Again a fine informal office color, and a nice forest or swamp color. Though very limited in its natural colors. One of the least useful, but most usable, colors in the set.

Overall these four colors are unintrusive and subtle, with various office and home applications, but very little artistic applications save a few specific places.

Review – Papermate Inkjoy Black, Red, Blue, and Purple

In my tradition (now) of taking a look at the uses of standard office supplies in art, I’ll be looking at the Papermate Inkjoy pens and their different colors. Today will be the standard colors of black, red, blue, and purple.

Not Entirely Representative

Not Entirely Representative

Papermate tends to make standard colors, and their black is no exception. One of the deeper Papermate blacks, the Inkjoy black is nice and constant, though is a bit blue-greyish. Not quite black, but very good for a ballpoint pen.

The red is also fairly standard. It’s light, but not light enough to say it’s pinkish. It is very subdued and pleasant, not as aggressive as most reds, making it a bit more natural.

The blue is very deep, but not very saturated. In low light it still looks blue, but one wouldn’t mistake it for a sky blue. Again, like the red, the low saturation makes it look less aggressive than some other hues. It’s got a very nice, watery feel to it.

And finally the purple, which again is deep but not saturated. It is unmistakably purple but not very aggressive. Unlike the others, though, this leads to a less natural look as most natural purples are deep and aggressive or light and flowery. This one is in between, which means it would be at home on your papers but not in artwork.

Overall, Papermate did a good job with these colors for the workplace. They definitely weren’t designed for art, though they could be worked in. Not superb but good enough. We’ll see what the next four have in store.

Review – Bic Tech Ballpoint and Stylus

Well, sometimes now-a-days art isn’t always done on a physical medium. Tablets, smart phones, and touch-screen devices are becoming more prevalent these days and for artistic purposes your finger isn’t the most precise thing in the world. Fortunately, Bic has a solution for both mediums (maybe) the Bic Tech pen and stylus.

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The barrel of the pen is a fairly standard Bic barrel with a slightly grippy (grip) section, a hole for the ballpoint and a logo. Halfway up the pen is where things get interesting. The top half of the pen is a chrome-colored plastic which I personally don’t like but doesn’t look terrible. Just above another Bic logo in the center is the click mechanism, which is unique in its side mounting. The lever protrudes out to the side sightly, but not enough to really get caught or accidentally pulled. It has a slight curve to it, making it a great finger place and making for easy disengagement of the fingers or caught objects (again preventing accidental usage). I would say my only problem with it is it gets scratches from fingernails far too easily. The clip is absolutely nothing special, in fact it doesn’t even clip, it more just hangs on a pocket or something so that’s cheap. At the top is the stylus which I’ll talk about in just a second.

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The pen itself is nothing remarkable. It does appear to be smoother than a normal Bic ballpoint. But it is almost the exact same shade of unimpressive grey-black as every Bic pen.

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Now on to the stylus, which is the standard stylus end that has been popping up all over the place recently. It works. It is obviously not the most expensive or precise thing but it gets the job done. It is better than a finger, I can tell you that much. I can’t attest to the durability of such things, but I can say that it feels likely to break, though the pen isn’t expensive and by that time you’ve probably gotten your money’s worth out of it.

So what is the Bic Teach pen like overall? Mediocre. It does an alright job at being both a stylus and a pen, but does neither fantastically. But for the money it really shouldn’t. If you’re looking into the prospect of such a device or are on a very slim budget (or possibly don’t care) this might work for you, otherwise I’d suggest looking elsewhere.

Review – Pilot G2 Teal, Hunter Green, Navy, Periwinkle, and Caramel

This week I’m gonna take a look at some of the weirder colors of Pilot’s G2 pens. Let’s dive right in.

third pilot pen comparison

First up is teal, which is a deep, bluish-green, almost like an aquatic plant. It’s very subdued and seems almost workplace-friendly (sort of like a blue-black, but with green). It goes on the page a bit thick and is a bit of a hard start when it’s not been written with for a while. A very soothing color overall.

Next up is hunter green, which is a deep, swampy green. It looks like a camouflage color, which I guess it’s supposed to. It isn’t the most pleasant of colors to stare at, but it is quite subtle. This color is probably the thickest ink and has the most problems with startup and skipping of the bunch.

Third is navy, which is a blue-black. It doesn’t really remind me of any previous navy colors I’ve seen, it is simply a very dark blue, but not a deep blue. It looks just like a combination of blue and black. Very work-friendly, I would say, but has no real art application save for maybe a night ocean.

Fourth is periwinkle, which is a light, sky blue. This is one of the lightest and easiest to read light blues I’ve seen. It isn’t quite as light as possible, but that makes it readable. It has a bit of shading (inconsistent color) but not too much. This is likely the most versatile ink color of the bunch, being a close to work-friendly “happy” color, and a realistic color that could be found in both water and skies.

And finally is caramel. Caramel is a light, almost hard-to-read brown. Again it is subdued enough to not hurt one’s eyes, but is very light and not particularly pretty. It does flow well, and really looks like caramel, so if you need a caramel colored ink, this is the ink for you.

That concludes my look at the Pilot G2 pen color types. I hope these were useful, they really do cover the gamut and provide ink colors for a variety of different uses. Unfortunately, I believe they only come in a large, expensive pack, so I would recommend having uses for a few of these pens before purchasing them.  They are great reliable writers with most of the ink colors, especially the more common ones (which are available individually) and can be used almost anywhere.