Customer Reviews

(2 customer reviews)

1 out of 1 people found the following review helpful

  ADDENDUM: I've been using..., August 23, 2010

By foxinthestars

ADDENDUM: I've been using this since my previous review and wanted to update. The hair brush side is still just the same, but the hard felt-tip side has lost some of its shine---given I've been using it pretty abusively (note-taking rather than careful artistic strokes). It's gotten a bit fuzzy and won't give its finest lines or best line variation anymore, and it's developed some flow problems. Now I can only write with it for short periods before it gets dry, but it would probably still be suitable for slower, more deliberate strokes. I'd have to say it doesn't hold up well as a writing pen, but as felt-tip brush pens go, it's still above-average.

1 out of 1 people found the following review helpful

  I love brush pens for..., July 16, 2010

By foxinthestars

I love brush pens for art, but I got this one in particular for studying the Kanji---using the Heisig system, so I'm switching back and forth from writing kanji to writing mnemonic stories about them in English. So far I'm really enjoying it!

The "hard" tip doesn't seem all that hard to me; it's still a little squishier than ideal for jotting notes, but serviceable. As a brush-pen, it has a strange but pleasant rubbery feel, and although I haven't been using it for long, it also seems more resilient against fuzzing out and losing its shape than other felt "brush pens" I've tried (like the Faber-Castell Pitt); it's good enough to pleasantly surprise me, and while it doesn't have the dramatic responsiveness of a hair brush, it is more controllable, so I'm sure it would be a good complement to the hair brush for doing art.

The hair brush is of good quality with good flow, spring, and response; I do love hair brushes, and writing kanji with this is fun; with slight changes in pressure I can write fine enough for dense strokes and give dramatic treatment to simpler ones. Its tip is a bit larger than that of Kuretake's Fragrant and Sutra Writing hair brush pens (also available here at JetPens; see my reviews there). Although a lot of fineness with a hair brush is more about the lightness of your touch than the size of the brush itself, I would rate this one just a little lower for fine and delicate strokes. Still, it has the greatness I expect in a hair brush pen.

My one warning: unlike the Fragrant and Sutra Writing pens, this one is not waterproof. After it dried for a few minutes, I gave the ink a thirty-second soak; it didn't feather and it faded very little, but it did give off grey clouds and streaks of fugitive ink, so if you're an artist and want to do overwashes, I'd recommend one of those others (or the Pentel Pocket brush pen) instead.