Rohrer & Klingner Alt-Goldgrün

[namrehsnoom]

Rohrer and Klingner Alt-Goldgrün

 

Rohrer and Klinger – founded in 1892 in Leipzig, Germany – is a company that is mainly focusing on inks for all purposes, including fountain pen inks. Their inks come in very recognizable retro-style 50 ml bottles. R&K have produced a number of truly renowned inks, and this Alt-Goldgrün is one of them. It’s only quite recently though that I got a bottle of it and wetted my pens with it. Probably already reviewed ad nauseum, but I’d still like to take a shot at it and give you my own opinion.

 

The ink’s name – Alt-Goldgrün – fits the colour really well. At its heart it’s a yellow-green ink and a lovely one at that. But what truly adds to its character are the rose-brown undertones that rise to the surface where the ink gets more saturated. Really well executed! The ink lays down a well-saturated line, even when using finer nibs. Shading is on the strong side – a little bit too strong for my personal taste. I also noticed that the ink writes fairly dry, especially in my Lamy Safari test pens. For me, the sweet spot for this ink is a wet-writing pen with an F or M nib. The stronger saturation results in less contrast-rich shading and elevates the rose-brown undertones. The result is pure eye-candy.

 

The chromatography shows a complex mix of dyes – light-blue, yellow and lots of rose. And this combination of dyes works remarkably well. The addition of the rose dye is simply brilliant – this elevates the ink above the level of a run-of-the-mill olive-green and gives it that rose-brown shimmer in saturated parts. Rohrer & Klingner’s ink-makers sure now their craft!

 

To show you the impact of saturation on the ink’s look & feel on paper, I made some scribbles where I really saturated portions of a piece of 52 gsm Tomoe River paper with ink. This gives you a good idea of what the ink is capable of in terms of colour range. Alt-Goldgrün has a fairly wide contrast range with a really light green colour in the non-saturated parts. This translates to relatively heavy shading – a bit too harsh for my taste. This is easily remedied by using a wetter pen – the more saturated line means that your writing moves to the darker part of the contrast range, which tones down the shading. Still very present, but no longer too contrast-rich. 

 

Technically, the ink felt a bit dry-writing in my Lamy Safari test pens, especially with the finer nibs.  Not so much an issue of wetness, but more of lubrication. With the finer nibs, you definitely feel more feedback from the paper while writing. With broader nibs, lubrication improves, and the ink starts writing much more fluently. In the writing samples below, I use my typical variety of different paper types. This gives you a good feel for what the ink is capable of. On each scrap of paper, I show you:

• An ink swab, made with a cotton Q-tip
• 1-2-3 pass swab, to show increasing saturation
• An ink scribble made with an M-nib Safari fountain pen
• The name of the paper used, written with B-nib Lamy Safari
• A small text sample, written with the M-nib Lamy Safari
• Source of the quote, with a Platinum 3776 with B-nib
• Drying times of the ink on the paper, with the M-nib Lamy Safari

 

I’ve also added a photo to give you another view on the ink. Scanned images and photos often capture different aspects of the ink’s colour & contrast. That’s why I present them both. In this case, both scan and photo capture the ink’s colour well. The shading is more realistic in the photo though (my scanner often tends to exaggerate the contrast in heavy-shading inks).

 

Alt-Goldgrün looks good on all types of paper, both white and more creamy ones. I personally prefer it on pure white paper, just because there’s more contrast with the page. The ink definitely prefers hard-surface and high-quality paper. On more absorbent and lower quality papers (Moleskine, printing paper), you can see a tiny bit of feathering, and you also get some see-through and bleed-through. Drying times are on the long side on hard-surface paper, ranging from 20 to 30 seconds. Not a problem for me, because I use it mainly for journaling and not in a work-context where faster drying times are a requirement.

Writing with different nib sizes
The picture below shows the effect of nib sizes on the writing. Alt-Goldgrün can handle all nib-sizes but looks at its best in finer nibs (my opinion). With broader nibs the shading becomes a bit too extreme for me (but then I prefer my shading to be soft and not too visible). In my opinion, you get the best results with wet pens and F/M nibs: the rose undertones will come to the surface, and the shading looks more pleasant. Anyway… it’s worth the time and effort to search for the perfect pen/nib combination, because this Rohrer & Klingner ink certainly deserves it.

 

Related inks
To show off related inks, I use my nine-grid format, with the currently reviewed ink at the center. This format shows the name of related inks, a saturation sample, a 1-2-3 swab and a water resistance test – all in a very compact format. This Alt-Goldgrün has no close relatives in my ink collection. As such, I’m glad that I got me a bottle.

 

Inkxperiment – quarky proton
As a personal challenge, I try to create interesting drawings using only the ink I’m reviewing. It’s a fun extension of the hobby, and these single-ink drawings often present a real challenge. It also gives you an idea of what the ink is capable of in a more artistic setting.

Inspiration for this inkxperiment comes from recent research results in quantum physics, that showed the inherent complexity of the proton. Earlier physics experiments showed that the proton consists of more elementary particles – namely two up-quarks and a down-quark, bound together by the strong force. Reality is more complex though, with more transient particles coming and going in a sea of quantum foam. I tried to capture this idea in my inkxperiment.

 

I started with an A4 sheet of HP photo paper and used heavily water-diluted ink to paint in the spherical contours of the proton. I then added three circles representing the quarks, with strong force lines between them. The quantum foam was added with a piece of carpet anti-slip material. Unfortunately, the drawing failed spectacularly and didn’t come out the way I intended. The more-or-less spherical boundaries of the proton are lost, and there is no dynamic feel in the end result. I don’t see the blazing forces of nature in action. No matter, I still had fun making the drawing. Even though this inkxperiment botched, it still shows quite well the broad spectrum of colour tones you can extract from the Alt-Goldgrün ink.

 

Inkxpired – computational art
I love experimenting with pen/ink/paper and have added another layer as part of the hobby. I’m exploring computational art, inspired by the ink drawings I do during ink reviews. Another fun offshoot of the hobby… and all that starting with a few drops of dye-coloured water on paper.

For this computational derivation, I tried to steer the inkxperiment drawing in the direction that I intended. To bring out the spherical contours of the proton, I started by applying a fish-eye lens filter to the drawing. That worked surprisingly well – the quarks and strong forces are still there, but the result looks much more dynamic. Next, I applied a solarize filter that resulted in violet-blue & white colours. This worked wonders for the sea of quantum foam. I really like the end result with its futuristic feel of barely contained quantum forces. As far as I’m concerned, this saves the unsuccessful inkxperiment!

 

Conclusion
Rohrer and Klingner make some great inks, and this golden-green Alt-Goldgrün is definitely one of them. A beautiful olive-green with rose-brown undertones, and a rather unique colour. A bit too harsh in the shading department for my tastes, but nothing that can’t be solved by the right pen/nib combination. I’m glad that I added it to my ink collection.

 

Technical test results on Rhodia N° 16 notepad paper, written with Lamy Safari, M-nib

 

Back-side of writing samples on different paper types
 

 

[lapis]

Excellent review of yours as always (sorry to repeat myself here). You already said it above but I have to repeat here, too, because that's the first thing I thought of when I first saw your review here (five minutes ago): it (this ink) is in fact, truly, a one-time, all-time masterpiece in that there are really no (or only very few) other inks anywhere out there (IMO) which come in -- right off the bat -- as a comparison, let alone as a competitor in colour. One ink which everybody should get their hands on!

[yazeh]

Excellent review as usual

Herbin Vert Olive is a lighter version of Alt-Goldgrün btw. 

Alt-Goldgrün, like most murky green-yellow reacts very well with bleach. It turns into a pale yellow.

[LizEF]

48 minutes ago, namrehsnoom said:

I tried to capture this idea in my inkxperiment.

Wow!  Talk about ambitious!   Even though it's not what you intended, you did a great job @namrehsnoom!  And...

 

51 minutes ago, namrehsnoom said:

As far as I’m concerned, this saves the unsuccessful inkxperiment!

...While I like the ink version well enough, the computational version is spectacular!   Thanks for sharing these with us.

 

And thanks for the ink review.  This is a great ink, IMO, but one I suspect people will either love or hate - it's in that weird color range.

[Misfit]

I have this ink.  I got it as an alternative when the Diamine Music set was only available as a set. Another thorough, excellent review. Using different nibs and paper really helps. Thank you so much. 

[Sailor Kenshin]

Fantastic review, thanks.  I LOVE the chroma!

[mizgeorge]

Wonderful review as always - and so much eye candy! I've had this ink for what feels like a very long time and had no idea it had so much rose in there. I shall have to revisit it very soon.

 

Thank you as ever @namrehsnoom - you never fail to delight and surprise.

[langere]

This is a brilliant review.  Alt-Goldgrun is the only Rohrer & Klingner ink I possess and your review makes me happy that is so.

 

Erick                    

[fireant]

What a fantastic review! This is one of my favorite inks.

[amk]

The R+K purples I'm getting rather tired of (been using them continuously for a couple of months), but Alt-Goldgruen is always a joy. It's one of my go-to greens, not too emerald and not so light that it is difficult to read.

 

By the way, I *love* the proton 'failure'. If only my successes were half as good as your failures. 🙂

[JulieParadise]

Aaaah, thank you so much for this review and for your ink reviews in general; these are such a treat! ❤️

[TitoThePencilPimp]

Have used 3 50mL bottles in a Pelikan m400 white tortoise. The only ink it drinks. One of my favorite greens

[InesF]

Thank you @namrehsnoom for this comprehensive ink review that gives the ink the stage it deserves.

I'm loving both, the original drawing and the digitally transformed artwork! 👍

[Kho]

I just bought a bottle of this ink. It's a beautiful color and really the only green shade I own that I find interesting to look at. 

[SashK]

This is one of those classic inks that you just have to have as part of your base collection. As always, as long as this color intrigues you. 

 

I first used it in Germany in a lowly-lit room on MD paper and didn't think much of it. New bottle, forgot about it for a few months. Tried it again on white OG Tomoe River with a Zoom nib and was sold. Superb shading. 

 

Again, there's a reason this ink shows up on a lot of starter ink lists. 

[Bo Bo Olson]

Great review...That is a must have ink....even if I don't use it much.

 

I am lucky and because of your review will use my semi-flex nibbed pens, so it will not be dry....perhaps that is why I never thought of it as a dry ink.

I hate coming to Ink Reviews...I get the urge to ink a pen, and I want to stay at 7 or less so I can use up more ink*....And I have 9 inked.

 

*Once I normally had 17 inked, so one really don't use up much ink that way.

[Dankoh69]

Amazing review.

 

Amazing colour.. Been using it for a few years but it just doesn't work with one of my favourite pens. For the other pens, it's lovely.