De Atramentis Artist Inks

I've posted before about the lovely De Atramentis Document Inks, created in Germany in 2014. These were a game changer when they first came out and I still love sketching with them. Mostly I use the Brown, various variations of Grey, and the Black, but I have also made a lovely burnt sienna ink, a raw sienna ink and some fun oranges and greens to draw with over the years.

Here are my previous posts.

Mixing Document Inks November 2014, updated January 2015, which shows a number of two-colour and a few three-colour mixes, and their ratios. 

De Atramentis Inks - Mixing Document Greys  November 2014, updated January 2015. This was in answer to a question about how to mix greys using other colours. I tend to make them with Blue and Brown.

De Atramentis Inks mixed with Black  November 2014

De Atramentis Document Ink Mixes - Magenta, Blue and Yellow  December 2014, update January 2015. This explores many three-colour mixes using the Blue rather than Cyan as the primary blue.

De Atramentis Document Ink colours  January 2015

More Three-Colour Mixes with De Atramentis Inks January 2015. This explores a range of three-colour mixes.

Documented Inks Revisited October 2018 which shows the inks mixed with Black and with White.

They also appear in Fountain Pen Inks June 2018, Coloured Drawing Inks November 2014 and Packing inks and pens September 2015 and a few others, and whenever I talk about my sketching supplies. 

Over the years, the colour range has expanded and the bottles have changed size from 35ml to 50ml. The current bottles are larger rounded bottles but will shortly change to elegant square bottles with larger lids. I'll update with a photo once these are available.

The current range as shown on the De Atramentis website shows 17 colours. They are now called 'Artist Inks' but have the same properties as the original 'Document Inks'. They are nano-pigmented, waterproof and lightfast mixable inks designed for fountain pens. 

De Atramentis Artist Inks - White, Yellow, Orange, Red, Dark Red, Magenta.

De Atramentis Artist Inks - Violet, Blue, Dark Blue, Cyan, Turquoise, Dark Green.

De Atramentis Artist Inks - Green, Brown, Sepia, Grey, Black.

There is also a thinner available called Artist Ink Thinner so you can dilute the colours without changing the properties. 

The colours are the same as the original Document colours, apart from the Green, which is now brighter. The current Dark Green is similar to the original Document Green I used for my mixing experiments.

Treat the Blue as an ultramarine or warm blue for mixing purposes. Treat the Cyan as a phthalo or cool blue for mixing. The Red is the warm red and the Magenta is the cool red for mixing purposes. I still love the colours you can create exploring the triad of Blue, Magenta and Yellow.

There are many more pigmented inks available now than there were when these were first released, which is terrific for artists who want to sketch with colourful waterproof inks in our fountain pens. I've explored many of them in this post but have stuck with the De Atramentis inks in my own pens.

These inks are available directly from De Atramentis in Germany; from Goulet.com in the US, from LarryPost.com.au in Australia and many other places. 

Disclosure: I was kindly sent this range of inks by the manufacturer, but all opinions are my own. 

Super 5 fountain pen and inks

I was given a Super5 fountain pen to try. It's not intended as a drawing pen but has quite a nice 0.5mm italic nib for writing. It is quite heavy for a plastic pen so not one I'd be grabbing for over some of my other favourites but as I have recently posted about a number of pens thought I'd add this one.

Of more interest perhaps is the Super5 range of waterproof inks, which can be seen on their website here. The colours are unusual. There is a black (called Darmstadt) and a very useful looking grey (Frankfurt), a blue (Atlantic), an olive green (Dublin), a dull yellow (Delhi) and an Indian red (Australia).

They rate from 6 - 8 on the Blue Wool Scale, with the black rating the highest (7-8), which is acceptable, and they claim to be totally waterproof.

The Super5 Inks, from http://papierlabor.de/en/shop/inks/super5-ink-waterproof/

I haven't tried them - the blue in the pen was from the regular non-waterproof range - but I would be happy to hear from those who have. In the meantime I am perfectly happy to keep using the De Atramentis inks and mixing my own colours.

(If you want to see these mixes please search my blog or click Mixing De Atramentis Inks and you'll see some of the huge range of colours that can be created.)