Pens are funny things. And, as I discover, the ones I like using are increasingly hard to come by.
When I deliver my Comic Art Masterclasses (of which I do about 100 days worth every year, so they're a big part of my business) I draw on a flipchart. And I use a black pen. I use this same pen to draw caricatures of the pupils faces, drawing up to 30 in each class, so up to 60 each day. Adding to this the occasional caricaturing gigs I do at events and parties, I draw well over 5000 faces a year. And to do that I have to have the right black marker pen.
Until the last year or so I'd been able to stroll into any branch of Staples and pick up their Staples Duramark pens (see top item in photo, above). Then one day I walked into Staples, and it was no longer Staples, it was Office Outlet. And my favourite pens had disappeared.
But I looked online and I found that Staples Duramark pens, with their nice chiselled tip and shapely tapered body giving a perfect drawing and lasting half a day or 50 to 60 caricatures, were still to be found. And it was still less than a tenner for a pack of ten, all was well with the world.
Until early this year when, suddenly, Staples Duramark pens changed. They'd kept the same name, they were on the same Staples website, but they'd changed into a new pen (see the second pen down, above). The chisel tip wasn't so fine, the body was a horrible fat shape, and worst of all the ink had changed into a liquid that bled profusely. It bled not only through the sheets of the flipchart, so that my initial flipchart drawing (with which I start the day at school, given enough time, see below) had bled through ruining the second page of the flipchart, but also through the caricature pages, giving me an extra page with a ghost image on (which I quite like, but that's beside the point).
Point is, for reasons (I assume) of economy, Staples Duramark pens had changed from a good pen, that did a good job, and served my needs perfectly, to a less good pen, that didn't.
So now I'm shopping around. Obviously the days of getting ten good chisel tip marker pens for under a tenner are over. But since I do this professionally, and I get paid enough to allow for the costs, it looks like an upgrade is in order, so I've bought the above five pens, which I will be road-testing at my classes at the Royal Academy in London on Monday, and in New Ross County Wexford on Wednesday. They all cost between £1.99 and £2.50 each (from Rymans in Bristol by the way, since Office Outlet is now in receivership and about to disappear), so my pen costs and going up 2 to 3 times. Let us see which, if any, of these products becomes my new pen of choice.
The contenders are:
1) Staedtler Lumolour
2) Pentel Permanent Marker
3) Edding 2200C
4) Pilot 400
5) Sharpie W10
Let the trials begin.
UPDATE: May 6 at the Royal Academy I tried out the Staedtler Lumocolor & the Edding 2200C. Both are too dry and scratchy on the flipchart, but the Edding 2200C is very good for cariactures.
So good in fact that, on May 9th (after the Edding had continued to do good service at school in New Ross, meaning it held out for over 100 caricatures, which is very good indeed) I went into Ryman's in Bristol to stock up for that Saturday's caricaturing stint at Imogen & Ben's wedding. They were out of stock. So...
May 11: At Imogen and Ben's wedding I tested out the Pentel Permanent Marker for the caricatures and am pleased to confirm that it, too, is good. It lasted for all approximately 100 caricatures I did on the day. So we have a replacement for the Staples Duramark. Which is good because...
May 10: I was expecting a delivery of Staples Duramarks and they sent me totally different pens (colour fineliners). They said I'd get my proper order the next day. But lo, at time of writing on May 14th, they've still not come. Staples is a basket case sadly.
Kev F Sutherland, as well as writing and drawing for The Beano, Marvel, Doctor Who et al, runs Comic Art Masterclasses in schools, libraries & art centres. email for details. Facebook, Twitter. Promo video here.
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