Search the Community

Ink Shoot-Out : Robert Oster Muddy Swamp vs Papier Plume Bayou Nightfall A couple of months ago, I discovered Robert Oster Muddy Swamp – a beautifully complex ink, kind of a murky grey-green-blue – and one that totally fits my taste. I also noticed that it looks amazingly similar to Papier Plume’s Bayou Nightfall. Two great-looking inks that deserve a more in-depth comparison. I wonder which one I will like the most. The sun is slowly setting over the small village of Santa Maria. Soft golden rays sweeping through the open door of the local cantina; playful bajo music drifting to the street. Then a shadow falls through the door… a tall stranger enters and settles at the bar. His steely eyes fall on the raven-haired waitress, moving seductively through the room. “Hey Sheila,” he shouts, “that tequila has my name on it. Be a nice lass and bring it to Rick Dundee.” The bajo stops playing, silence falls. The slender Don Alejandro Vegas raises from his chair, and approaches the stranger. “Ola señor, in this town we treat ladies with respect. So please apologize, or else…” Eyes lock, fists get balled, a fight is in the air… Enter... the Ink Shoot-Out. A brutal fight spanning five rounds, where two inks engage in fierce battle to determine who is the winner. Tonight’s fight is a bare-knuckles special, set in Santa Maria’s cantina. In the left corner, the tall and strong stranger from Down Under – Robert Oster Muddy Swamp. In the right corner, the slender and fast-moving caballero from Southern America: Papier Plume Bayou Nightfall. The local crowd sets aside chairs and tables, forming a ring – anticipations are high, this promises to be an interesting fight. The barman approaches: “Caballeros, no biting, no hitting beneath the belt. May the best man win.” The barman claps his hands, signaling the start of the first round. May the best ink win… Round 1 – First Impressions Both inks make a stellar first impression. The colours are simply amazing, a murky mix of greys and greens and blues, mixed with a wonderful complexity. These inks look beautiful – both in written text and in swabs. I love the toned-down nature of their colour, which feels restful and relaxed. No eye-searing vibrancy, just a soft beauty that looks great on paper. Shading is elegant and aesthetically pleasing, firmly present but never too harsh. Great looking stuff! In this first round, both champions give their best, and both throw serious punches, trying to impress their opponent (and no doubt also that seductive señorita in the corner): Muddy Swamp definitely has the stronger swing. The ink writes wet and saturated, with a strong presence on the paper. Bayou Nightfall writes less lubricated, with a lighter colour tone that looks more soothing and subtle. The saturation swab shows that Bayou Nightfall has a broader colour span, which translates to stronger shading compared to its Robert Oster counterpart. Both inks make a great first impression. The Australian Muddy Swamp definitely writes more smoothly, leaving a more saturated line with a slightly darker colour. On the other hand, the Papier Plume ink shows a bit more character in its shading. But there’s also that flicker of uncertainty in Bayou Nightfall’s eye… take a close look at the text in the intro pic with the Fallout guys. This was done on 80 gsm HP Multipurpose paper – a medium quality print paper. The Papier Plume ink shows a tiny bit of feathering, best noticeable in the word “Papier”. Not much, but there is that flicker of uncertainty… A great first round, and both inks certainly impress the crowd. The Australian ink seems a bit more confident, but it’s too early to tell whether it will dominate the fight. As such, the first round ends with a draw. Both fighter’s are really closely matched! Round 2 – Writing Sample The writing sample was done on a Rhodia N°16 Notepad with 80 gsm paper. Both inks behaved flawlessly, with no feathering and no show-through or bleed-through. With the EF nib, Bayou Nightfall showed sub-par lubrication, and struggled with the paper. This results in writing that looks a bit too light, and shading that looks a bit too harsh. In contrast, the Robert Oster ink writes wet and smooth with good contrast, even in the finest nib. Rick Dundee’s fist connects with Don Alejandro’s chin with a snapping crunch. Ouch! That’s a punch that counts. The crowd jumps up and cheers, showing its approval. The Papier Plume ink recovers when nib sizes broaden. With M-nibs and above, the feeling of sub-par lubrication disappears, and the ink again feels well-balanced. Overall, Muddy Swamp looks a bit darker and more saturated, while Bayou Nightfall looks a bit lighter, and – to my eye – shows a bit more of a green tinge. This extra layer of complexity is evident when looking at the chromatographies of both inks. But in this round we don’t score looks, but focus on the writing, and here the strength of the Australian’s fist clearly dominates. This round is a definite win for the Robert Oster ink. The crowd is loving the fight, and even the raven-haired señorita can’t hide her fascination. A great display of testosterone-filled masculinity with fighters that still look closely matched. Round 3 – Pen on Paper This round allows the battling inks to show how they behave on a range of fine writing papers. From top to bottom, we have : Midori notebook paper, Tomoe River 52 gsm, Original Crown Mill cotton paper, Clairefontaine Triomphe 90 gsm and Paperblanks 120 gsm journal paper. All scribbling and writing was done with a Lamy Safari M-nib. Both champions did well, with no show-through nor bleed-through. But this round is not about technicalities, it is about aesthetics and beauty. Are the fighters able to make the paper shine? One thing is immediately apparent: these inks work well with both white and creamy paper. They also look stunningly similar. Bayou Nightfall is just a touch lighter, and shows a bit more character in the shading – due to its wider saturation span. But the differences are really minor. Both inks truly succeed in making the paper shine! In this round both champions really throw their punches, trying to impress the wide-eyed señorita. Rick Dundee relies on his strength, focuses on the attack and puts his weight behind his punches. Don Alejandro on the other hand brings his speed and mobility into play, evades the Australian’s punches and delivers some lightning-fast hits himself. What a fight! The audience is really enjoying the show. A great round, but no winner emerges – the fighters appear evenly matched. Round 4 – Ink Properties Both inks have drying times in the 15-20 second range with the M-nib in my Lamy Safari. The American ink dries just a tad faster than Muddy Swamp. To test their smudge resistance, I rubbed the text with a moist Q-tip cotton swab. Here, the Robert Oster ink shows a bit more smudging – probably due to its higher saturation. But in either case, the written word remains crisp and clear. To test water resistance, I dripped water on the grid and let it sit there for 15 minutes, after which I removed the water with a paper towel. Both champions can survive a watery accident, but it’s clear that Bayou Nightfall handles this case the best - there’s less spreading of the dyes. Overall, there seems to be a slight advantage here for the Papier Plume ink. Not a great round. The champions seem to be tiring. They keep circling one another, without much initiative from either side. But there is that slightly better water resistance with Bayou Nightfall, so it wins this round on points (although just barely). Round 5 – The Fun Factor Welcome to the final round. Here I give you a purely personal impression of both inks, where I judge which of them I like most when doing some fun stuff like doodling and drawing. And for this round, both inks are simply amazing. I did the drawing on HP Permium Plus Photo paper. The background uses heavily water-diluted ink, applied with a cotton pad. For the ground, I poured the remaining ink on the photo paper, and let it dry completely. The trees were drawn with the side of a plastic card, dipped in pure ink. As a final touch, I added the small people to the setting with a dip pen. Both inks are a pleasure to draw with. On the photo paper, Muddy Swamp remains true to its grey-blue-green character, but shows some purple tones rising to the surface. Bayou Nightfall on the other hand really surfaces those green undertones, which add some fascinating complexity. Both inks are great looking in this more artistic setting. I really enjoyed using them both. For this round, both fighters recovered completely, and gave their best, impressing the crowd with the intensity of their moves and punches. At the end of the round, the judge hesitates. Which fighter showed most artistry? The judge’s eyes drift to the side, falling on the señorita who clearly enjoyed all this masculine display. A seductive smile lifts her lips, clearly targeted at the tall stranger. At this sign, the judge lifts the Australian’s arm, declaring him the winner of this round. The Verdict Both inks are great-looking muted inks, murky grey-blue-greens that look fantastic on all types of paper. You can’t go wrong with either of these. I must admit that I was rooting for Bayou Nightfall at the start of the fight. But hey… in the end the beautiful señorita got her way, and so I declare Robert Oster Muddy Swamp the winner of this exciting shoot-out.

Papier Plume - Bayou Nightfall (New Orleans Collection) Papier Plume is a stationary shop in New Orleans, that’s been getting some attention lately on this forum with their “New Orleans Inks”, that celebrate the rich colours and history of the city. One of their inks in this series is Bayou Nightfall, an ink with a grey-green-blue hue, that’s unlike any colour in my collection. Definitely an ink with a unique personality. Bayou Nightfall’s colour is rather unique – it’s kind of a dark blue-leaning teal with heavy grey undertones, a mix of grey-green-blue that’s hard to describe. But the resulting mix is beautiful, and captures the ambiance of a nightfall, when the Bayou landscape’s colours fade away, and darkness descends. The shading is really noticeable, but well executed. There’s quite a bit of contrast between the light and darker parts, which tends to be exaggerated in a scan (in real-life I find the shading to be quite pleasing). The ink itself writes quite wet, but lacks a bit of lubrication (which I found to be true of other Papier Plume inks I tested). Saturation is quite good though, even in finer nibs. I did notice however that the ink behaves very differently in dry and wet pens. With drier pens, saturation depends on the speed of your writing, resulting in heavily shaded text, with a broader contrast range between light and dark parts. With wet pens, the text is more evenly saturated, and shading is more subtle. Personally, I prefer the way the ink looks in my wetter pens. The writing sample below shows the ink with my dry Lamy Safari pens, and with my wet Parker and Pelikan pens. The difference in saturation is really obvious. The ink has a wonderfully dynamic colour span. To illustrate this, I did a swab where I really saturated portions of the paper with ink, pooling it on. This beautifully illustrates the dynamics of Bayou Nightfall. The range moves from a very light blue-grey to a deep dark blue-black colour, capturing the dynamics of a nightfall. On the smudge test – rubbing text with a moist Q-tip cotton swab – the ink behaved perfectly. Water resistance is amazing – the ink effortlessly survived even longer exposures to water. Kudos! This is also apparent from the lower part of the chromatography, which shows that the grey components of the ink remain on the paper. Only the light-blue dies in the ink are very water-soluable. If you need a water-resistant ink, Bayou Nightfall certainly fits the bill. Be aware though that this is a slow-drying ink, especially in wetter pens. With my Safari M test pen, drying times were acceptable, with a decent 20-25 seconds on the slow-drying Tomoe River paper. With wet pens though, drying times on Tomoe River climb to over a minute, with some parts of the text requiring almost a full two minutes to dry completely. This is something to keep in mind. I’ve tested the ink on a wide variety of paper – from crappy Moleskine to high-end Tomoe River. On each scrap of paper I show you:An ink swab, made with a cotton Q-tip1-2-3 pass swab, to show increasing saturationAn ink scribble made with a Lamy Safari M-nib fountain penThe name of the paper used, written with a Lamy Safari B-nibA small text sample, written with an M-nibThe source of the quote, written with a wet Parker Sonnet (F-nib)Drying times of the ink on the paper (with the M-nib)Bayou Nightfall looks really nice on most papers in my test set. I don’t like the way it looks on the very yellow Life Noble notebook paper, and I find it to be too pale on Moleskine en Leuchtturm 1917. On the other papers though, the text looks stunning, with very good contrast to the paper. There’s one but though… the ink exhibits some small but noticeable feathering on the more absorbent papers. This is especially noticeable where a wet pen is used - take a look at the quote sources written with a wet Parket Sonnet (F-nib) on the Fantasticpaper, Paperblanks and Moleskine writing samples. At the end of the review, I also show the back-side of the different paper types, in the same order. The ink behaved superbly on most paper types. Only with Moleskine and Graf von Faber Castell was there significant show-through and some bleed-through. Bayou Nightfall is a well-behaving ink in this respect. Inkxperiment – Nazca spiderI’ve recently started to experiment with ink drawings, keeping things simple and more-or-less abstract. I find it to be a fun extension of the hobby, and have found single-ink drawings a nice challenge. It also gives you an idea of what the ink is capable of in a more artistic setting. For this drawing I used 300 gsm rough watercolour paper. I started off with water-diluted ink for the lighter parts in the drawing, gradually adding more ink to the mix for the darker parts. The spider square is painted with pure Bayou Nightfall. After drying, I used a small brush with a 25% bleach-solution to draw in the Nazca spider. The bleach reacts quite nicely with this ink, leaving a golden-yellow trace. The end result gives you a good idea of the colour span that Bayou Nightfall is capable of. ConclusionBayou Nightfall from Papier Plume is a grey-green-blue ink, with a unique colour that really captures the ink’s name. The ink has excellent contrast with the paper, shades nicely, and is water-resistant to boot. On the downside, the ink is rather slow-drying and can exhibit some minor feathering on more absorbent papers. Overall though, I’m quite pleased with this ink despite its minor shortcomings. I can forgive a lot for the unique colour I get in return. Well worth your attention! Technical test results on Rhodia N° 16 notepad paper, written with Lamy Safari, M-nib Backside of writing samples on different paper types