Sepia Toned Ink Comparison - 32 Inks

[mehandiratta]

this is just outstanding comparative....

thank you so much....

[ca49reber]

Thank you for this review. It has been extremely helpful. I looked at the review & read the posts. Now I want all the inks that are no longer available!

[vaughnteegarden]

I joined the forum just to say thank you for this post. The variety of sepia-tone inks is bewildering, and your post helped me choose one. Thank you!

[dannyboy]

Here I am six years down the road from first reading your post and I'm still using your guide to all those wonderful sepia tones! I guess now you'd have some new ones to add, especially the new Pelikan Smoky Quartz. Again thanks for what continues to be a helpful guide to all of us who so love brown tones!!

[dcpritch]

I joined the forum just to say thank you for this post. The variety of sepia-tone inks is bewildering, and your post helped me choose one. Thank you!

Here I am six years down the road from first reading your post and I'm still using your guide to all those wonderful sepia tones! I guess now you'd have some new ones to add, especially the new Pelikan Smoky Quartz. Again thanks for what continues to be a helpful guide to all of us who so love brown tones!!

 

Thanks for the encouragement! I'm really glad to hear that this comparison remains helpful after a few years, and especially with the vast universe of new inks.

 

As you suggested Danny, if I were doing this comparison today there would be many more to choose from. I'm not sure I could again manage the time it took to put this together - literally weeks of evenings after work writing samples, cleaning pens, organizing, scanning, posting - I get hives just thinking about it!

 

Certainly, though, the comparisons and reviews and thought going into ink these days on FPN is amazing. This is by far the best place in the world for dizzying choices and amazing detail. I'm glad to have been a very small contributor and I continue to learn from everyone here.

[Sandy1]

Hi

 

As ever, Member dcpritch continues to impress time after time and over time.

 

We graciously await your Sepia Toned Ink Comparison - 144 Inks.

 

Bye,

S1

Edited June 30, 2017 by Sandy1

[NicolausPiscator]

Thank you for this stunning comparison!

[dcpritch]

We graciously await your Sepia Toned Ink Comparison - 144 Inks.

 

Oh nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

[Helen350]

Stunning work! Sepia was my great-grandfather's favorite color. Apart from blue and black inks, he only used sepia.

[Sandy1]

 

Oh nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

 

 

Hi,

 

We will be playing croquet on the lawn, nibbling watercress sandwiches and morsels of smoked goose, and and and waiting for the 144

 

Bye,

S1

Edited July 3, 2017 by Sandy1

[sansenri]

I stumbled across this while playing around with Pinterest to pin the nicest ink comparisons.

I am sure this is still today a great job and precious reference on this ink colour.

 

I just wanted to add a few words on the origin of Sepia colour despite it was very well described in the foreword.

If you have ever fished cattlefish or eaten Sepia black recepies (believe me taste is truly wonderful, in the southern part of Italy where cattlefish is an appreciated food, the most fantastic spaghetti recipe is "spaghetti al nero di seppia" - cattlefish black spaghetti -) you would know that the natural ink (italians do call the sepia ink, inchiostro) is a very dark colour a sort of greyish black.

Here is an image

 

Northern Italy cooks "risotto al nero di seppia" which is very similar but using rice.

The closest match to this looks like Whaleman's Sepia!

 

But on the other hand it is also true, as an old time amature photographer who used to develop and print his own photos in chemical baths can confirm, that dcpritch's son's description of "old timey pictures" was also very fitting.

Fitting of course to a different colour of sepia.

 

Sepia toning in photography used to be obtained by treating photographs either in sodium sulphide toning baths, or (in order to avoid the rotten egg smell of this formula) in thiourea toners.

Originally the sepia toning was done because sodium sulphide would react with silver in the photo to yield the more stable silver sulphide salt.

This would greatly improve the stability of the final result and hence the life of the photo. It was a sort of archival method.

 

the resulting brown toned image was a rather dark reddish brown colour,

a landscape image of the American master of landscape photography Ansel Adams shows this colour very well

this is "chemical" sepia (today it is done electronically...), so to speak, but has become the most know definition of sepia.

Based on this definition Omas and Visconti sepia inks would look closer.

 

Thiourea sepia toners on the other hand yield a slightly lighter tone of brown with greater tendency to yellow. Diamine raw Siena looks close (although we would be opening a different discussion here as to what colour is Terra di Siena, in the variants naturale (raw) and bruciata (burnt))

 

But having said that just for the fun of finding correspondence of colours, I am really enyoing the review and started looking for some of these inks (I own only Café de Iles so far, shame...)

[dcpritch]

I just wanted to add a few words on the origin of Sepia colour ...

 

sansenri, thank you so much for your addition to this thread. The explanations of different processes and approaches to sepia color is helpful to my understanding of the completely different tones we see from different ink makers.

 

I love how this thread continues to evolve and enlighten, all through the contributions of others ...

 

 

... except for that last little bit by Sandy1 about the 144, which has been giving me nightmares.

[Sandy1]

[juneping]

thank you for this wonderful review..!!

[crahptacular]

 

I just wanted to add a few words on the origin of Sepia colour despite it was very well described in the foreword.

This post was a great read. Thanks!

[dcpritch]

thank you for this wonderful review..!!

This post was a great read. Thanks!

 

Thanks for looking, and don't forget to take a gander at Part 2 of this review for even more info: https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/topic/209498-sepia-toned-ink-comparison-32-inks/

[goodpens]

Thank you for this amazing comparison, dcpritch. Im surprised I didnt see it years ago, but it is perfect right now. Autumn is here and I want to use many of these colors.

[Tuderte]

I, too, would like to add my profound appreciation (and complete admiration) to the super-human dedication David has shown in compiling this comparison. I've been prevaricating for some time about whether I should buy the Pilot Iroshizuku Tsukushi and thought to myself 'I'll just check FPN to see if anyone has done a review' ..... never in my wildest dreams did I expect to find such a comprehensive review of sepia-toned inks - and, I might add, never in my wildest dreams did I think I would read all seven pages of this review PLUS the three pages of Part 2 ......

 

 

Thank you so very much, I'm so grateful for the wealth of information you have provided. My only problem now is that there would appear to be a several other inks that I would also like to try (3 of the Diamine - to mix together in equal parts and see what I get) and also two of the J. Herbin) - one can never have too much ink!

[dcpritch]

..... never in my wildest dreams did I expect to find such a comprehensive review of sepia-toned inks - and, I might add, never in my wildest dreams did I think I would read all seven pages of this review PLUS the three pages of Part 2 ......

 

and never did I expect this exhaustive review would be so well received. Thank you for your kind words and for contributing to the base of knowledge we all share.

[Karmachanic]

Big thank you to all, and especially to dcpritch. I used your fab posts as the starting point in a search for a brownish (my photography background showing) sepia. I was reasonably happy with Diamine Golden Honey Herbin Ambre. But Kobe #21 Taisanji Yellow arrived in the mail today. I'm smitten!! What a marvelous ink. The search is over.

 

I have a hand that looks like a spider stepped into some ink. Forewarned I'll post a sample for your collective viewing pleasure perhaps tomorrow.

Edited July 8, 2019 by Karmachanic