Adam Whittaker from Exaclair has very kindly sent me a sample of the new silver shimmer ink from Jacques Herbin to test – Kyanite du Nepal – a continuation of the 1798 range (for the Cornaline d’Egypt review click here). The obvious question is how do these differ from the Diamine Shimmer inks? Well, this looks very similar to Diamine Blue Lightning but I would point out that the Jacques Herbins are far more heavily ink concentrated, which will give more of a pronounced sheen.
This particular ink has limited chromatography, but plenty of shading qualities. It looks like a heavily concentrated cyan with shimmer. Not Jacques Herbin’s finest creation (for that click Emeraud de Chivor) but if you are a collector of the range, then you may have to shell out to keep your collection current. And it comes in 1 size – the big wax topped square bottle with the wax seal.
This is quite a wet ink, so don’t overload your dip pens. The colour is pretty consistent across various paper surfaces. The silver is more evident when using Rhodia and Tamoe River with the rich deep magenta sheen more evident on the cartridge paper.
Personally I’m a great of the full J Herbin range. I like their history and quality. They are a unique brand. I have tested their standard range for art journalling and can confirm that they are fabulous for writing, drawing and painting – click for video.
Tests conducted on Tamoe River paper, Rhodia dot matrix, cartridge paper and Bockingford Rough 200lb watercolour paper with handwriting using a Noodler’s Creeper pen and abstract calligraphy created with an automatic pen.
Swatch cards are now available to buy. Click for details. If you’d like to know how to create these yourself, why not check out my tutorials course? Click for details.
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FOUNTAIN PEN INK ART 