Does FPN need another black ink review? I didn't see anything for Velvet Black, so I thought I'd give it a shot.

Velvet Black has been brought up in other discussions, but not reviewed on it's own merits, I believe. In reference to it, some have mentioned a longish drying time and the ink having some brownish overtones.

In my experience the drying time is neither short nor long. With regard to the overtones, my eyes aren't discerning enough to notice anything -- until I did the soak test and those brownish overtones come through...

More images will follow this post.

A comparison with other common black inks:

After a 20 minute soak in cold tap water.

Note the brown overtones from the PR while the Quink and Waterman turn bluish. Does this happen with most common black inks, or is this exhibit 1 for those prone to conspiracy that SANFORD is now forcing a common recipe between Waterman and Quink?

Cool review! I particularly like the soak test, very interesting how the PR turns a bit brownish while the other blacks turn blue. As an aside, when I was playing around with PR Ultra Black, I noticed that when I dipped the nib of a pen filled with it in water, the color was overwhelmingly purple!

I have a bottle of Velvet Black I haven't used yet, I'll have to give it a shot.

EDIT: Looking at the ink comparison scan again, I see the Velvet Black also displays some purple properties.

Your eye's aren't deceiving you...

There is a wash of brown/red/purple in the haze you see around "PR Black Velvet."

The Quinks and Waterman have a blue cloud, and it seems as if there is no trace of black left anywhere.

Maybe the ones that turned blue in the water are composed of two components, one a water-soluble black ink, and the other a water-insoluble blue ink? I guess such an ink would have to be called "blue-black"?

I hear tell of inks that are actually combinations of two types, such as "archival" ink actually being a combination of dye-based ink (which doesn't last long, but flows well) and pigment-based ink (which does last long, but doesn't flow well)...

--Rob

Thanks for the review catsmelt. I always have time to look at new blacks.

Probably depends on what dyes are used to get black -- to the best of my knowledge, there is no "black" single component dye.

I've run paper chromatrography on several -- most are a combination of red, blue, and green inks, sometimes some yellow as well. The only one that seems to be a single spot is Noodler's black, and that may just be because the dye/dyes don't move at all in water/ethanol on cellulose paper. Silica gel TLC might show differences, but I don't have any plates to play with.

Peter

I just tried some Noodler's Polar Black. Dry or soaked in water 20 minutes, there's absolutely no difference. Aside from the paper being wrinkly, you couldn't even tell it was soaked.

--Rob

Thanks for the review.This PR ink was the first i had ever used.Good ink but not my favourite black.I prefered either Visconti's or Watermans black.
Does a fine job for normal everyday use though.

JD

To my eyes, the PR made the other inks look blue-black even before seeing the soak test - especially the new Quink.

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Col

It's probably my monitor and my lack of digital imaging skills, but to my eye the real-life comparison blacks differ only by shade or saturation. The least saturated by far is the new Quink black.

I'd consider Cross blue-black cartridge as the blackest B-B I've come across, and these comparison inks still look black relative to that.

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And thanks for everyone else's feedback. I'm continually surprised by the interest in black ink. In a good way, that is.

I think there's bound to be variation on how people view the sample, depending on screen resolution, colour depth and so on; I expect your eyes looking at the paper are a more reliable benchmark in this case!

I can only say though, that when I scrolled down to see the saturated sample, somehow I wasn't entirely surprised. And when you think about it, what is it that makes one black ink less black than another, if it isn't the presence of another colour? True black (if such a thing exists beyond the dreams of alchemists) would be a complete absence of colour.

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Col