Drawing With An Omas Flexible Nib, And Some Thoughts About Omas

[fpupulin]

In the last few weeks I have bound, even if a little rough, three folders of loose sheets that have long occupied too much space on my desk. As the last step in the process, I created the dust jackets with the "titles" of the collections, and I wanted to add the logo of our “home" publishing company…

When I was not yet twenty years old, I owned an oval brass box with a hinged lid. On the bottom of the box I had glued a sheet of paper with the drawing of a medieval little dragon. I have always been fascinated by the fantastic figures of the medieval "bestiaries", those who adorned the illuminated letters in the manuscripts as well as those carved in profusion on the capitals and gargoyles of the Romanesque and Gothic cathedrals.

A few years ago, to "extract" my old drawing from the box, I copied it onto a new sheet. I used a Montblanc 149 with an extra-fine nib, with Montblanc Toffee Brown ink. Now, however, that I wanted to use it as the model for our logo, I could not find my drawing any more. I was able to download the image that I had posted in this forum at that time, which hopefully served to sketch the thumbnail of the logo, but I did not find trace of the original drawing in brown ink.

So, I decided to draw it again, for the third time.

For this third version of the little dragon I chose the flexible nib of an Omas GentlemEn (plural, with "e", a celluloid pen from the Sixties), paired with Edelstein Tanzanite ink. The Extra Lucens nib is a fantastic tool for drawing. It allows a great variation in the thickness of the strokes, to the full advantage of the expressiveness of the drawing.

And now, forgive me for a personal rant on the Omas nibs.

I own them not in large number, but they represent almost every generation of the Omas production, as well as those that Bock produced for the Omas pens. I find them obviously different in behavior and “function", but equal in quality. Among the flexibles, the prize goes in my opinion to the Omas Extra nib, followed closely by the Extra Lucens. It seems to me that there is no substantial difference in the performance of these nibs in the different sizes they were produced, senior, junior and "lady". Anyone writes with equal flexibility. The nibs made in-home by Omas in the 90s are not flexible, but they have a certain elastic resistance that makes them lively and fun to use. And finally, the nibs made by Bock, both for the old-generation pens and the new versions of the Paragon, Milord, etc., are rigid but a pleasure to use. My most recent nib on a Oma pen, an extra-fine mounted on a New Paragon, is simply fantastic.

I think, to put it briefly, that with an Omas nib you can not go wrong.

So now, three years after Omas closed its doors, I still can not understand the true reasons for the debacle of this great company. The pens were beautiful, the materials unique and precious, the solutions often innovative, and the prices ... high but certainly less than the cost of the NOS Omas pens that today everyone wants to buy and that no longer have the guarantee of a company that support them.

For me, it's simply a mystery... Bah... Better that I return to the desk to write or draw something with one of my Omas pens...

Edited September 5, 2018 by fpupulin

[zaddick]

Regenerated for the third time? You sure that is a dragon and not a phoenix?

 

Lovely work as always. Your comments about Omas nibs are also of interest. Thank you for sharing.

[fpupulin]

Regenerated for the third time? You sure that is a dragon and not a phoenix?

 

 

 

Ha ha ha, zaddick, that's good! Ha ha ha!

[europen]

Well, fpupulin, you have expressed my thoughts on OMAS so exactly I can add practically nothing, except an echo: for me OMAS has always been the irreproachable, the epitome, and the prized effort in pen-making -- elegance, distinction, and usefulness in a sensual and almost visceral package. The OMAS I own are a privilege to use, and the inglorious end of this finest of pen makers is a sad chapter in the industry.

 

Only good news is that many older OMAS and even some from its last decades are still on the market and still purchasable, even if no new genuine OMAS will ever be seen again.