Nathan at Noodler's has really outdone himself on this ink! It's a fast-dry formula, and it seems to be REALLY fast! Nathan designed this ink specifically for higher-end papers like Rhodia and Clairefontaine (that he demonstrates in the video) that are made to repel ink, for them to dry fast enough (.5-1 second) for left-handed writers to use wet-writing pens.
There are two inks, Bernanke Black and Bernanke Blue....no subtly on this one!! For those who aren't familiar, Ben Bernanke is our current Federal Reserve Chairman, and Nathan *hints* at his feelings about Bernanke's monetary policy, you may pick up on that a bit in the latter half of the video. ;) Nathan designed these inks for Bernanke so that he can continue to print money as fast as possible without worrying about ink smearing! He put Ben's picture right on the bottle!!
Nathan has gotten some attention before with his politically charged messages on his bottles, which are always a bit tongue-in-cheek. Think Nikita, Tiananmen, #41 Brown.... Bernanke Black and Blue are no exceptions! They may be the most blatant and obviously political messages he's ever done on a bottle of ink. Whether you agree with his opinions or not, you have to admit that it takes some serious gall to put your views out there like Nathan does!
But stirring political issues aside, the ink itself looks to be pretty incredible. Some of the visual detail is lost in the video, but it appears to dry in record time even on fine papers. My favorite part is watching Nathan continually beating his fist down on the table to try to smear the ink! Love it!
The one question I have that I'm sure a lot of you are wondering is whether there are any flow issues or issues with ink drying on the nib as there are with other fast-drying inks. These are things that I'll look to investigate as soon as we get the ink in, which should be tomorrow.
Though this ink did exist before in a retailer-exclusive form under a different name, it will no longer be sold that way. It should be available soon through your favorite Noodler's retailer. If that happens to be us, then GREAT! You can get it from Goulet Pens here.
What do you think?
very cool. i applaud the man for his wit and backbone! i giggle every time i see my nikita bottle.
ReplyDeleteI don't NEED a super fast-drying ink, but the idea is very cool. I'll be excited to see just how saturated the blue is.
ReplyDelete- Stephanie
I'm going to try slamming my fist on the page to check dry times from now on. Interesting microcosmic analysis of "shadow" price increases, I'm surprised we aren't seeing more.
ReplyDeleteNathan emphasizes that these are meant to be fast-drying on high end papers, which I applaud. But as someone who does a good amount of writing with a fountain pen on cheap paper (e.g., Staples brand notebooks) I'd like to know how this behaves on the less pricey stuff too. Would you guys keep that in mind when you do your tests, please? Thanks.
ReplyDeleteWhat kind of pen is that?
ReplyDeleteThe video was a hoot, loved it. Might be interesting inks to try out.
ReplyDeleteI think the political diatribe was embarrassing to Nathan, frankly.
ReplyDeleteOh boy I just love Nathan. But I wonder if his outspokenness won't hurt him in the long run. I'm not sure combining business with politics is a good thing but then again, it seems that Nathan is doing all this as a passion more than anything. Personally I don't care what his political views are because his products are great and I can understand his feelings because it looks like we are all in deep doo-doo.
ReplyDeleteGreat commentary but the blog post link opens a blank page.
ReplyDeleteTo Brandon, the pen used is the Noodler's piston-filler pen. As a comment on the video itself, he always seems angry when he does this, and I notice that his manual dexterity seems to be getting worse. Like him calling out the others with a bit of tongue-in-cheek humor. Now I need to get Tiananmen, and #41 Brown to see the other "jokes".
ReplyDelete@Amanda, giggling is good! Nathan likes to poke fun a bit, and though he has his own political views, they're always done with a bit of lighthearted jest ;)
ReplyDelete@Anonymous, I don't know how saturated the blue is, but I should have the ink pretty soon to report.
@Jason, I don't know how effective the fist-slamming is, but it sure is entertaining!
@Elenita, typically, inks dry even faster on 'cheaper' papers than ones like Rhodia and Clairefontaine. That's actually one of the biggest complaints about highly saturated inks like some of the Noodler's ones, is the extended dry times on nicer papers. My prediction is that these inks will dry incredibly fast on cheap paper.
@Brandon, he's using two Noodler's piston-fill pens
@William, we will have samples of them like we do with all of our other inks, so you can always try them that way :)
@Anonymous, I hear where you're coming from. Nathan's views certainly aren't publicized for the sake of marketing, they're just what he believes. Whatever your own views of him, I think this is an ink that has a place in the pen world.
@Peninkcillin, I don't think he cares whether his views will hurt or help his business. He's made it public on many accounts (even in this video) that he won't hire anyone because of Massachusetts' tax laws, so he's really only trying to keep himself busy. Well, he reached that point a while ago, and I think he's already busier than anyone else out there, so probably the last thing he's really worried about is trying to drum up even more sales to make him even busier. He clearly runs his business based on his principles, not on political correctness :P
@Anonymous, I don't know why the link won't work. I removed it because I just couldn't get it working. There is a working link from Nathan's page on YouTube, which you can get to from the video link.
@Vargouille, thanks for answering @Brandon for me, I got a day behind commenting :( I noticed a little shakiness in his hands too, honestly though I notice it a lot more when he's worked up about his topic. I suspect a lot of it is probably him getting excite (or nervous?) during the filming of his videos.
What makes Nathan's/Noodler's products so great is the passion that goes into them. I speculate that these inks would not have be reborn, at least in this fashion and title, had he not witnessed simultaneous inflation of his costs. It is obvious these increases hit a nerve with him. From his previous videos, it is easy to tell he hates raising prices and wants to keep his products affordable to the masses without outsourcing. The video was fantastic. As always, thanks for sharing Brian. :)
ReplyDeleteI'm very curious about these other political angles. Brown #41 was pretty obvious, but the others are not. I hope I'm not going to have to buy every Noodler's color to get all the jokes!
ReplyDeleteIf these inks were formerly exclusive to some retailer,
ReplyDeletewhat ink is the black ink based on ? Do you know?
Are they bulletproof?
@Nathaniel, it's obvious Nathan hates to raise prices! I don't know all of the factors that went into him bringing this ink back, but it seems like a lot of things going on just kind of 'fit' the theme.
ReplyDelete@Note Booker, I'm not sure all of the background motivation Nathan has for all of his politically controversial inks, I just know what they say on the bottle. Perhaps I need to find out the motivation and do a post on it!
Nathan cracks me up! I love the fist pounding!
ReplyDeleteWhen compared to standard Noodler's blacks and blues, how does it perform color wise. What is the downside of it being a fast dry? I guess that's the better question.
Also, I understand what he's saying about inflation. Believe me, I understand. However, I don't believe for one instant that he literally has pennies of markup on a bottle of ink. I am simply not buying it. He'll never do it, nor am I overly interested, but I would have to see the spread sheets!
From my experience in life, those who cry about lack of money the most have the most of it. Trust me, I've had the life experience. I am surrounded by people that whine about how little money they make and then the following week they spend $5k on a new horse. Come to think of it, I go to a school with a high concentration of poverty stricken, lower class people (many of them adults) and I rarely hear any of them speak of the lack of money. I've heard the people who survived the depression era say, "I never knew I was poor." I think that's probably why those students don't bark about it too much.
Nathan cracks me up! I love the fist pounding!
ReplyDeleteWhen compared to standard Noodler's blacks and blues, how does it perform color wise. What is the downside of it being a fast dry? I guess that's the better question.
Also, I understand what he's saying about inflation. Believe me, I understand. However, I don't believe for one instant that he literally has pennies of markup on a bottle of ink. I am simply not buying it. He'll never do it, nor am I overly interested, but I would have to see the spread sheets!
From my experience in life, those who cry about lack of money the most have the most of it. Trust me, I've had the life experience. I am surrounded by people that whine about how little money they make and then the following week they spend $5k on a new horse. Come to think of it, I go to a school with a high concentration of poverty stricken, lower class people (many of them adults) and I rarely hear any of them speak of the lack of money. I've heard the people who survived the depression era say, "I never knew I was poor." I think that's probably why those students don't bark about it too much.
@Nathaniel, it's obvious Nathan hates to raise prices! I don't know all of the factors that went into him bringing this ink back, but it seems like a lot of things going on just kind of 'fit' the theme.
ReplyDelete@Note Booker, I'm not sure all of the background motivation Nathan has for all of his politically controversial inks, I just know what they say on the bottle. Perhaps I need to find out the motivation and do a post on it!
I'm very curious about these other political angles. Brown #41 was pretty obvious, but the others are not. I hope I'm not going to have to buy every Noodler's color to get all the jokes!
ReplyDelete@Amanda, giggling is good! Nathan likes to poke fun a bit, and though he has his own political views, they're always done with a bit of lighthearted jest ;)
ReplyDelete@Anonymous, I don't know how saturated the blue is, but I should have the ink pretty soon to report.
@Jason, I don't know how effective the fist-slamming is, but it sure is entertaining!
@Elenita, typically, inks dry even faster on 'cheaper' papers than ones like Rhodia and Clairefontaine. That's actually one of the biggest complaints about highly saturated inks like some of the Noodler's ones, is the extended dry times on nicer papers. My prediction is that these inks will dry incredibly fast on cheap paper.
@Brandon, he's using two Noodler's piston-fill pens
@William, we will have samples of them like we do with all of our other inks, so you can always try them that way :)
@Anonymous, I hear where you're coming from. Nathan's views certainly aren't publicized for the sake of marketing, they're just what he believes. Whatever your own views of him, I think this is an ink that has a place in the pen world.
@Peninkcillin, I don't think he cares whether his views will hurt or help his business. He's made it public on many accounts (even in this video) that he won't hire anyone because of Massachusetts' tax laws, so he's really only trying to keep himself busy. Well, he reached that point a while ago, and I think he's already busier than anyone else out there, so probably the last thing he's really worried about is trying to drum up even more sales to make him even busier. He clearly runs his business based on his principles, not on political correctness :P
@Anonymous, I don't know why the link won't work. I removed it because I just couldn't get it working. There is a working link from Nathan's page on YouTube, which you can get to from the video link.
@Vargouille, thanks for answering @Brandon for me, I got a day behind commenting :( I noticed a little shakiness in his hands too, honestly though I notice it a lot more when he's worked up about his topic. I suspect a lot of it is probably him getting excite (or nervous?) during the filming of his videos.
To Brandon, the pen used is the Noodler's piston-filler pen. As a comment on the video itself, he always seems angry when he does this, and I notice that his manual dexterity seems to be getting worse. Like him calling out the others with a bit of tongue-in-cheek humor. Now I need to get Tiananmen, and #41 Brown to see the other "jokes".
ReplyDeleteGreat commentary but the blog post link opens a blank page.
ReplyDeleteOh boy I just love Nathan. But I wonder if his outspokenness won't hurt him in the long run. I'm not sure combining business with politics is a good thing but then again, it seems that Nathan is doing all this as a passion more than anything. Personally I don't care what his political views are because his products are great and I can understand his feelings because it looks like we are all in deep doo-doo.
ReplyDeleteWhat kind of pen is that?
ReplyDeleteNathan emphasizes that these are meant to be fast-drying on high end papers, which I applaud. But as someone who does a good amount of writing with a fountain pen on cheap paper (e.g., Staples brand notebooks) I'd like to know how this behaves on the less pricey stuff too. Would you guys keep that in mind when you do your tests, please? Thanks.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to try slamming my fist on the page to check dry times from now on. Interesting microcosmic analysis of "shadow" price increases, I'm surprised we aren't seeing more.
ReplyDeletevery cool. i applaud the man for his wit and backbone! i giggle every time i see my nikita bottle.
ReplyDeleteJUST NOW got my Bernanke Blue and tried it out on Clairfontaine paper. I tested by scribbling, then waiting a certain number of seconds before smudging with my paper. Only the immediate (0 seconds) smudge caught some still-wet ink. See the results in the first image.
ReplyDeleteI tested again using my Moleskine planner (which, IMHO, does not have the best paper) and using the same test, I get significant smudging. See the results in the second image.
I don't know how this works because I would expect cheaper paper to wick the ink in faster and thus dry faster.
Regarding see-through: My Clairfontaine paper exhibited just a trace amount of see-through and no bleed-through. Moleskine paper had slightly more see-through and no bleed-through.
The test was performed with a Hero aerometric hooded fine nib (ala Parker 51 style).
Drew
Forgot the Moleskine' image
ReplyDeleteMoleskine image:
ReplyDeleteTrying to post the Moleskine image this way (can't seem to reply to myself...)
ReplyDeleteDoes Nathan remind anyone else of Lewis Black? Or is it just me? I've never seen Nathan's face so in his videos I keep imagining Lewis Black pounding his fist on the page.
ReplyDeleteDrew
One final test. I tried this exact same test with same pen and same method on several other papers. So far, only the Moleskine' had the negative response. On all other papers (even cheap copier paper) I could only occasionally get a smudge when wiping my finger over the ink immediately after writing.
ReplyDeleteI wonder what it is with Moleskine' paper? Kindof inconvenient, cuz I dig Moleskine' planners and such.