Added 1 new A* page:While at my local everything store this week to purchase their bulk toiletries, I couldn't resist a stroll down their art supplies aisle, and noticed they had a pen by Pentel that I haven't tried before, the Pentel Stylo, advertising itself as a sketching pen. It's got a "unique" triangular nib made of hard foam or something, which I guess is supposed to act kind of like a traditional metal "crow quill" nib, letting you vary the width of your line with hand pressure. I like Pentel's "Pocket Brush" brush pen, and the Stylo was only about $3, so I let curiosity get the better of me picked it up. ("Stylo," incidentally, is French for "pen." Clever, non? :"P)
The Stylo has a nice chunky body in a dark wine color, rather similar to Rotring's Tikky Graphic pens if maybe feeling not as substantial or precisely machined. You do get a *little* width variation out of the foamy nib thing, but not much—not nearly as much as you'd get out of a flexible metal nib, and only a bit more than you get out of, say, a 0.5 Tikky Graphic, and with not as generous a flow of ink, although it isn't too bad in that respect. The ink *is* darker than the Tikky Graphic, but not waterproof, I don't think (I didn't test it, but it isn't advertised as such).
The foamy nib produces a sort of nails on chalkboard feeling of drag against the paper that is not pleasant, and also feels somewhat imprecise. If you can get over the shudderific foam rubbing feel, you can doodle okay with it, but for my money I'd spend the extra 50 cents and have myself a Tikky instead. But it was fun to try a new pen, anyway! Here's the test sheet I made with it in my notebook: top half is the Stylo, with two sizes of Tikky Graphic below that, and a Pocket Brush doodle at the bottom:
I might get up to streaming some more Pocket Brush doodling this weekend, we'll see! No Stylo doodling, though—it's joining so many others in my art supply cupboard of shame. : o
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