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Let the Fountain Pens Flow

nytimes.com

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Re: Let the Fountain Pens Flow

#111

Post by MrMember »

Doxin wrote: post #108
finaliteration wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the usefulness of learning cursive writing Honest question - What do you see about it as being useful? I was taught to write in cursive when I was younger but I honestly don’t feel like it has ever been all that useful (especially given that most of my communication and writing is done on a computer/smartphone).

It's much faster when you learn it properly and write it with the proper instrument. Ball point pens are awful for cursive, but when writing with a fountain pen you'll almost automatically switch back to cursive.

I've never used a fountain pen, how well do they work for lefties? I sometimes have problems smearing ballpoint ink with my palm, do fountain pens smear more, less, or about the same?

Re: Let the Fountain Pens Flow

#112

Post by steeef »

MBCook wrote: post #15

You can get a Pilot Metropolitan from Amazon for about $14, and there are other fountain pens that are a little cheaper. It’s not like you need to spend $120 to start trying. I started maybe two years ago with a set of Pilot Varsity disposable fountain pens that I bought from Amazon for $9 or so. I liked the feeling so when one of them started to run low on ink I decided to buy a ‘real’ (non-disposable) fountain pen.…

Happy Metropolitan user here too. I bought a couple other inexpensive fountain pens to try them out (Lamy Safari, Pilot Prera Iro-Ai), but I came back to the Metropolitan. The weight and writing-smoothness are outstanding considering how cheap it is.

Re: Let the Fountain Pens Flow

#113

Post by JohnBooty »

ternaryoperator wrote: post #105
JohnBooty wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honest question. How would one write about a trend/subculture/community/etc without... writing about the sorts of people who comprise it and the community itself? As somebody who's always been into pens but never taken the plunge into fountain pens, I found this to be the most interesting part of the article. Sure, it could have been a simple list of links about places where one can buy pens or whatever. But I alread…

I am totally on board with your point. Giving color to the feel of a community is indeed an important part of reporting. And I think in that context, the inclusion of demographics make sense despite OP's displeasure. What I object to is the characterization of a single individual based on his looks ("Hair like mink"). Not only does it tell the reader nothing useful, it doesn't give any sense of the community being co…

By all logical measures, what you say about those superficial descriptions is of course correct.

However illogical it may be, though: I enjoy reading them! Though in this case, perhaps the article would have been better served by a picture of this person (who's apparently a big deal in the pen world)

Certainly there is some threshold after which I'd consider those physical descriptions distracting. I'm not sure what that threshold is.

Re: Let the Fountain Pens Flow

#114

Post by ginko »

jypepin wrote: post #55

I grew up in France, where schools don't allow you to use anything else but fountain pens. They don't teach you how to use one - to me, it's always been the same thing as using a ball pen, except you trade the convenience (you have to change the ink cartridge) for practicality (you can erase the ink with special eraser) while keeping some style (it's still ink, not pencil, kept for drawing). Getting a new pen felt we…

I had to use a fountain pen in elementary and middle school in Austria and hate-hate-hated them. Switched to ballpoint pens in high school and finally got rid of the constantly ink stained fingers and dried up and bent tips. It's also when I switched back from writing cursive to printed letters.

I later retried using a fountain pen in university under the assumption that perhaps I've used too much force or I was using low-quality pens, but the result was still the same, minus the bent tip perhaps. Good riddance!

Re: Let the Fountain Pens Flow

#115

Post by 1123581321 »

MrMember wrote: post #111
Doxin wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's much faster when you learn it properly and write it with the proper instrument. Ball point pens are awful for cursive, but when writing with a fountain pen you'll almost automatically switch back to cursive.

I've never used a fountain pen, how well do they work for lefties? I sometimes have problems smearing ballpoint ink with my palm, do fountain pens smear more, less, or about the same?

I’m a lefty and fountain pen smearing is an issue. Doubtless there are techniques and inks to optimize for quick drying better than I managed, so I’d encourage you to try and find out for yourself. It depends on how you’re able to position your hand and I’ve only ever managed to write by dragging either all the time or inadvertently when trying to keep my palm raised. It’s a shame because the pens and their output can be quite elegant.

Re: Let the Fountain Pens Flow

#116

Post by 1123581321 »

wrycoder wrote: post #13
pseudolus wrote: post #4

The aesthetic value of fountain pens is undeniable but for the left-handed amongst us who refuse to twist their writing hand into some bizarre contortion, the fountain pen will never be viable. My personal left-handed recollections of using fountain pens all involve smears of ink on the side of my hands and smudged lettering.

I'm a lefty, and with fast drying ink, a fountain pen doesn't smear. Unlike ballpoint or pencil does when your hand moves across it. The "bizarre contortion" is needed anyway to get the stroke weighting correct, unless you use one of those weird offset nibs, which aren't readily available in quality pens. Off topic, I once got a B+ on a high school physics test, but the teacher told me he marked me down from an A for…

I did about half of my high school trig class with a neon orange gel pen. After I handed in one test, the teacher informed me that it was the last she would accept from me in that color. She never marked me down, though!

Re: Let the Fountain Pens Flow

#117

Post by gdpgreg »

mfringel wrote: post #24

I started using fountain pens a couple of years ago, and still do for my daily writing. I write rather a lot; I don't bring my laptop into meetings unless I need to. Combine that with my handwriting being relatively neat, small, and stylized, and I needed something with a sufficiently fine nib, and ink that would flow well through it. It turned into a fascinating optimization problem, during which I ended up down the…

You can get nibs tuned and modified, I once had the opportunity to use a VP with a reverse oblique nib, changes everything.
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