Black Pens in Sketching and how to choose the best fit

Finding the perfect black pen

In my work I like to use black pens or liners over my initial pencil work before or after adding the watercolours to give it that sketchy look. When working in special watercolour sketchbooks I use fountain pens but that’s for another post. For my daily sketching in pocket moleskine diary I use liners (to read more about it go here ). Let me elaborate. The paper in the pocket moleskine is not watercolour paper so it is much thinner making the fountain pen ink bleed right through the pages while liners don’t.

What to look for when choosing your black pens

Four things: Ink type, tip size, tip strength and durability. First the ink in it has to be permanent this is to avoid lines from bleeding into your work when applying colour. You need to find the correct thickness for the line work that corresponds with the size of the image, that would mean that the smaller the image the finer the liner and vice versa. But for me the most important thing is to find a liner that doesn’t loose its black tip after a period of use. If you have a close look at any liner type black pen you will notice it has a barrel that is housing your ink saturated tip. Unfortunately most of these tips end sinking into the barrel before your ink in the pen dries out. In many cases there is still much ink in it to keep it going longer. The last thing is durability. To find a pen that is stubborn enough and can take battering when one is not patient to wait for the paint to dry. I have killed many pens going into the sketch while the paint is still wet. This last characteristic is very hard to find.

Black pen brands I have used so far:

Sakura Pigma Micron

• Ink Type: Permanent.
• Tip Size: Available in different sizes.
• Tip Strength: Not strong and sinks into the barrel over time.
• Durability: Doesn’t work well with wet paint.

Faber-Castell Ecco Pigment

• Ink Type: Permanent.
• Tip Size: Available in different sizes.
• Tip Strength: Not strong and sinks into the barrel over time.
• Durability: Doesn’t work well with wet paint.

Dylusions Paint Pen in Black Marble

• Ink Type: Acrylic paint thus does not react with water once dry.
• Tip Size: Only one size. It’s called fine point but I would say it is around 0.3 or above.
• Tip Strength: It is a valve action paint pen and has sensitivity issues which needs special type of handling (you can read more about it here)
• Durability: Doesn’t work well with wet paint.

When looking closely into this pen I do realize it is not really falling under the category of liner pens because it has different ink and mechanism, however I have chosen to include it here because I do use it in rare occasions specially over my Copic white paint (read about it here).

Sakura Sign Pen

• Ink Type: Permanent.
• Tip Size: Not sure, I have only one size.
• Tip Strength: The winner! The tip doesn’t sink in no matter how hard handed I am and stays put long after the ink is gone and dried out.
• Durability: Doesn’t work well with wet paint.

I need to explain more about this pen. I love it so much and this is my preferred one so far, unfortunately sakura having so many different pens on the market I wasn’t able to trace this one to link it. Mine was gifted from a company here in Kuwait and they ran out of them so they are not on their website either.

Uni Pin Fine Line by Mitsubishi

• Ink Type: Permanent.
• Tip Size: Available in different sizes.
• Tip Strength: So far holding really well ( will update after longer period of use).
• Durability: Really good, I often go too fast while the paint is still wet and it hadn’t died on me yet!