Building the Perfect Gray Ink (Inksy Witch Moonshadow / The Book of Shadow)

[Miz Black Crow]

The Backstory - The Book of Shadow

 

This is going to begin a little off-topic, but will result in a rich, shading, quick-drying, absolutely waterproof, shadow-gray ink, I promise. And it's worth understanding what I wanted when I set out to make this ink. 

 

Our story begins with my very favorite novel: American Gods, by Neil Gaiman. It's a book that features a bunch of down-at-heel gods, coin tricks, storms, one of the best monologues I've ever read, an out-of-this-world road trip... and a main character named Shadow Moon. 

 

I've been watching a bunch of prop replication videos courtesy of Adam Savage, and I realized that I wanted to make a prop for the novel: the journal that Shadow kept, and pasted receipts in, and drew maps of his journey in, and recounted his dreams in, and so on. (To be clear, this prop exists only in my head. It doesn't exist in the novel.)

 

While there are a lot of things involved in creating a prop like this - bookbinding, art, prop document creation, etc. - a main feature is going to be the building of a weathered, beaten-up, dirty, grimy journal, handwritten rather than printed, and then absolutely schmeared with grime. 

 

The Criteria - An Ink for Shadow Moon

 

In short, I realized that I needed a "hero ink" - an ink that Shadow would have used as his daily driver. An ink that can survive weathering with things like coffee, and graphite powder, and any form of grime I can throw at it. A deep, dark, shadow gray, that can withstand weathering and come out beautiful. 

 

Shadow's ink must: 

 

• Resist at least 15 minutes soak time in water (since, if I coffee stain or ink stain this book, the pages will get at least that long) 
• Be a dark gray, blue-leaning but not overtly blue-gray, like a shadow, like a thundercloud, like a warning and a threat
• Shade, to show off the above, but not so much as to distract the reader from the contents
• Be well-behaved on relatively cheap paper, as I'm making the journal itself by hand and I don't know the paper as well as I'd like to

 

The Candidates - Inks On Hand

 

- Thunderstorm, by Robert Oster

This was the ink I desperately wanted to be perfect for this project: Robert Oster Thunderstorm. It's rich, it shades, it's not quite black, and the novel itself even has a theme of a storm that breaks in the middle of the novel - the cover itself is a thunderstorm! Unfortunately, when I did a water soak test of just 15 minutes' duration, Thunderstorm completely washed off the page, making it completely impossible to use for this project. 

 

- Fuyu Syogun, by Pilot Iroshizuku

Fuyu Syogun is one of my favorite inks. Aptly named for Old Man Winter, who would surely have appeared in the novel as a god, IFS is lovely. And in the water resistance test, it held on much better than Thunderstorm did! The problem with IFS for this application is its paleness. It simply isn't dark enough to count as a "shadow" ink. It's too hard to read in finer nibs. 

 

- Lexington Gray, by Noodler's Ink

Lexington Gray came the closest, but it was far from perfect. On the plus side, Lexington Gray is completely waterproof, not moving a muscle in a soaking test. On the minus side, my bottle feathers like crazy when the ink is too strong on the page, and the color is like graphite, not like a shadow, not like the rolling of thunder in a threatening sky. It looks like a pencil. Shadow Moon does not write in pencil. It also feathers all to hell on poor paper. 

 

With my hopes of an off-the-shelf solution dashed -- specifically, a solution off my shelf, as I'm trying to keep this project budget to a minimum -- I realized I was going to have to make my own ink. 

 

The Inkgredients

 

I began by depositing 10mL of Lexington Gray into a fresh jar. 

Adding a single mL of water for a 10:1 ink:water ratio didn't seem to improve performance in deeper ink pools

Adding a second mL of water (now a 10:2 ink:water ratio) tidied performance when ink pooled on Rhodia, taming the feathering and spreading issue I was having 

 

Now to add the thundercloud.... 

 

I considered adding more traditional blues, like Waterman's Serenity or Private Reserve American Blue, but realized that if I mixed a non-waterproof blue into a waterproof gray, even if the inks played nicely with each other, when I soaked the journal the blue would wash off and leave the pencil-gray of Lexington behind. The blue also had to be waterproof and play well with Noodler's. In short, I needed a Noodler's blue. That left me two choices to hand: the semi-waterproof, sapphire-hued Liberty's Elysium, or the completely waterproof, already-grayish 54th Massachussets. 54th Mass won out, and I used a pipette to slowly add in 54th Mass until I got to where I wanted to be. 

 

The formula, as shown below, is: 

- 10 mL Noodler's Lexington Gray

- 2 mL of tap water 

- Approximately 200 drops of Noodler's 54th Massachusetts. (Note: if it looks blue, you've gone too far!) 

 

The Result: Inksy Witch Moonshadow

What came out of this project was frankly shocking in its performance. It does better than it seems to have any right to. It not only is the exact kind of gray I was going for, it shades exactly how I'd hoped it would. It also refused to budge even a droplet of ink under a 20 minute long water soak. 

 

And much to my surprise, it even seems to behave well on cheap copy paper, and on the Cognitive Surplus notebooks I have a love/hate relationship with. 

 

In short: I couldn't be happier. I have the hero ink I wanted, the materials on hand to make plenty of it, and something I can use with oodles of confidence. I may even replace Thunderstorm with this ink. 

 

(Note: Inksy Witch is the silly name I give to the inks I mix myself.) 

 

A Note on Noodler's

 

Should you decide to build yourself a batch of this ink - and I highly suggest you do, if you have the components to hand - remember that Nathan Tardiff's inks are all mixed by hand, and he has a lot of "batch variation". (I suspect this "batch variation" is why my Lexington has always feathered so badly....) 

 

Because of that, I would use the above formula as a jumping-off point for finding your own perfect gray, rather than as a hard and fast rule. 

 

Next up: to make or designate inks for Laura, Sam, Wednesday, Nancy, Ibis, and all the others. But for now, I'll rest on my laurels with an ink I adore.

[Miz Black Crow]

Mods - So sorry! I should have put this in Inky Recipes. Would it be possible to have it moved? Please and thank you!

[mhguda]

Thank you for this recipe. It inspired me to do something with some Noodler's inks that have been languishing in my ink stash for years: Black, and 54th Massachusetts. The first was not black enough to my taste, the latter was just... not what I wanted.

So now I mixed those together, added some Blue, and some water, and hey presto! Storm mix (in your honor). First I tried it in a relatively small quantity, and when it worked pretty well, I made a whole 90ml of it. Approximate proportions: 10:4:4:4.

One pen inked so far.

[txomsy]

Thanks for the recipe. I too also find Noodler's Lexington Grey too graphite-like, so it is a welcome recipe.

[Miz Black Crow]

1 hour ago, mhguda said:

Thank you for this recipe. It inspired me to do something with some Noodler's inks that have been languishing in my ink stash for years: Black, and 54th Massachusetts. The first was not black enough to my taste, the latter was just... not what I wanted.

So now I mixed those together, added some Blue, and some water, and hey presto! Storm mix (in your honor). First I tried it in a relatively small quantity, and when it worked pretty well, I made a whole 90ml of it. Approximate proportions: 10:4:4:4.

One pen inked so far.

That's so gracious of you! I'd love to see what you came up with when you have a moment to share a photo. Can I ask what blue you used? 

[mhguda]

I used Noodler's blue (American eel). It's actually a blue I do like. The 54th Mass, much less so... and the black was so meh I sacrificed with no qualms.

I will try and take a picture at some point, but I doubt the subtle undertones that I like of this mix will show up in a picture or scan...

[inkstainedruth]

@Miz Black Crow That looks like a really interesting mix (and I LOVE the idea behind it -- Neil Gaiman is one of my favorite authors, AND apparently uses fountain pens for his first drafts!).  The series, while somewhat different from the novel, had one episode that absolutely sent chills down my spine at the end of it (Mr. Wednesday is running a burlesque house in Chicago in the 1930s, and at the end of the episode, after the death of Donar, is sitting on the edge of the stage singing "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?"

My issue, though, is that Noodler's inks have a tendency to vary greatly from batch to batch (Nathan Tardif considers it a "feature").  My sample of 54th Massachusetts was very different in color from the full bottle I got; and the sample I tried of Lexington Gray was really pale in comparison to what I'd seen in reviews.

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[Misfit]

Congratulations on persevering, and making the perfect ink for your purpose. It looks really nice.  I think I might check out American Gods from the library. I was aware Neil Gaiman used fountain pens, but must admit I’ve never read any of his books. 

[Miz Black Crow]

30 minutes ago, Misfit said:

Congratulations on persevering, and making the perfect ink for your purpose. It looks really nice.  I think I might check out American Gods from the library. I was aware Neil Gaiman used fountain pens, but must admit I’ve never read any of his books. 

I genuinely envy you! I've read this book at least once a year for the last 20 years, and when I re read it the other day I still was making realizations and connections. I wish you an enjoyable adventure. 

 

1 hour ago, inkstainedruth said:

@Miz Black Crow That looks like a really interesting mix (and I LOVE the idea behind it -- Neil Gaiman is one of my favorite authors, AND apparently uses fountain pens for his first drafts!).  The series, while somewhat different from the novel, had one episode that absolutely sent chills down my spine at the end of it (Mr. Wednesday is running a burlesque house in Chicago in the 1930s, and at the end of the episode, after the death of Donar, is sitting on the edge of the stage singing "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?"

My issue, though, is that Noodler's inks have a tendency to vary greatly from batch to batch (Nathan Tardif considers it a "feature").  My sample of 54th Massachusetts was very different in color from the full bottle I got; and the sample I tried of Lexington Gray was really pale in comparison to what I'd seen in reviews.

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

He does indeed use fountain pens! Unsharpen did a list here: 

https://unsharpen.com/what-fountain-pens-does-neil-gaiman-use/

 

And there are a few pages visible here: https://www.buzzfeed.com/hayleycampbell/the-art-of-neil-gaiman

 

As for Mr. Wednesday's song, Ian McShane has an incredible voice! The audiobook reader for the regular novel (not the full cast edition) has a voice that's a dead ringer for Ian McShane, which makes you feel like Wednesday is reading you the whole book. 

 

Also, I absolutely respect that objection to Noodler's. I'm not sure if I'll re-buy my bottles as I empty them. But ultimately I love the combination of shading and water resistance enough that I'll have to carefully consider what to buy instead. 

[Misfit]

@Miz Black Crow Thank you for the good wishes. I’ll be more inclined now to follow through. I’ve been checking out some books, and not reading them.  I expect that won’t happen with American Gods. 

[inkstainedruth]

Neil Gaiman is sneaky.  Some of his books (Neverwhere being a prime example) I started out going, "Ehhh...." but then a couple of chapters in I couldn't put the thing down.

Oh, and I found a video online a few years where he gets up with his wife's band at I'm guessing some SF con, and sings the them song from Fireball XL-5 (one of the old Gerry & Sylvia Anderson "Supermarionation" shows I watched when I was a little kid).

Admittedly though, if I ever get to something he's at, I want him to autograph my copy of Art Matters (a collection of essays which includes the text of the commencement speech he did a number of years ago at some college -- which is also on YouTube, IIRC).

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[Misfit]

I have American Gods on hold at the library. All copies are checked out. 

[Mercian]

On 4/3/2024 at 11:54 PM, Miz Black Crow said:

Our story begins with my very favorite novel: American Gods, by Neil Gaiman. It's a book that features a bunch of down-at-heel gods, coin tricks, storms, one of the best monologues I've ever read, an out-of-this-world road trip... and a main character named Shadow Moon. 

 

 

That novel also inspired at least one person’s username on here too 😉

 

On 4/3/2024 at 11:54 PM, Miz Black Crow said:

The Criteria - An Ink for Shadow Moon

 

In short, I realized that I needed a "hero ink" - an ink that Shadow would have used as his daily driver. An ink that can survive weathering with things like coffee, and graphite powder, and any form of grime I can throw at it. A deep, dark, shadow gray, that can withstand weathering and come out beautiful. 

 

Shadow's ink must: 

 

• Resist at least 15 minutes soak time in water (since, if I coffee stain or ink stain this book, the pages will get at least that long) 
• Be a dark gray, blue-leaning but not overtly blue-gray, like a shadow, like a thundercloud, like a warning and a threat
• Shade, to show off the above, but not so much as to distract the reader from the contents
• Be well-behaved on relatively cheap paper, as I'm making the journal itself by hand and I don't know the paper as well as I'd like to

Your list of criteria sounds/reads very much like a description of a traditional iron-gall blue-black ink 

 

Those contain a blue dye (and go on to the page as blue), but they also contain iron salts. As the iron salts oxidise they turn black. The ink tends to finish up being a blue-tinged grey colour, except in the case of inks that contain a very large amount of iron salts. Those, when written with a very ‘wet’-writing pen, will lay down enough iron-salts that the ink oxidises to black. Hence ‘blue-black’ ink (starts out blue, turns black).

 

Iron-gall inks are famed for good performance on cheap paper - tight lines, very little bleedthrough, very little feathering. Great water-resistance. And they give shading that is uniquely beautiful 😊

 

I recommend that you read a few reviews on here of each of:

Rohrer & Klingner ‘Salix’ (the i-g inks that stays ‘bluest’ after curing);

Pelikan 4001 Blue-black (readily available, inexpensive, awesome);
Diamine Registrars’ Ink or ESS Registrars’ Ink if you want a ‘heavy iron-gall’ ink that will be very water-resistant and (from the wettest pens) turn fully black (with grey undertones) and;

Akkerman #10 Blauw/zwart.

 

Other i-g blue-black inks are also available nowadays, made e.g. by Hero and by KWZI, and by a couple of German manufacturers of ‘Urkundentinte’ (which means ‘Document ink’ for use in official Archives).

 

I have recently ‘restored’ the pictures to the reviews of three of these inks by one of FPN’s best reviewers, ‘Sandy1’.

Her reviews were peerlessly detailed, and showed each ink on several types of paper, from several pens. They are a fantastically informative resource!

 

Links to my ‘restored’ versions of her reviews of:

1- R&K Salix;

2- Pelikan 4001 Blue-black (for this one, you will need to click on the ‘Expand’ button on the quote inside my post);

3- ESSRI (the ink recommended by HMG to our Registrars and Passport Office).

 

Here is a link to a review of the Akkerman i-g ink, by lapis.

 

I recommend that you also go back to the start of those threads, and read other members’ replies. I especially recommend Sandy1’s comments about the enhanced pen cleaning/maintenance regime that one should practice when using ‘heavy iron-gall’ inks.

 

Sandy1’s review of ESSRI in particular generated lots of interest and many replies (the most replies to any Ink Review on FPN to-date), with other users also uploading photos of their own experiences with the ink.

Enjoy!

 

Slàinte,
M.

[Misfit]

I picked up American Gods today at the library. It is a 10th anniversary edition, with restored text. It is longer than the version that won all the awards, according to Gaiman. 

[Mercian]

11 hours ago, Misfit said:

I picked up American Gods today at the library. It is a 10th anniversary edition, with restored text. It is longer than the version that won all the awards, according to Gaiman. 

My own copy of American Gods is also the 2013 edition. It includes an ‘epilogue’ short story, and another short story (The Monarch of the Glen) that features Shadow as its protagonist.

I think that there may also be a later edition of the novel, which has a few more corrections in it.

 

It’s a really fun read 😊

[txomsy]

I have tried to restrain, but I have to say that when I read American Gods years ago, I didn't like it at all. So much so I got rid of my copy. I already knew it was a smash hit and highly appreciated book in the US (that's why I bought it), but it just didn't appeal to me.

 

[Mercian]

Just now, txomsy said:

I have tried to restrain, but I have to say that when I read American Gods years ago, I didn't like it at all. So much so I got rid of my copy. I already knew it was a smash hit and highly appreciated book in the US (that's why I bought it), but it just didn't appeal to me.

 

In reading the novel, it probably helps to be British, and therefore share the author’s British (i.e. twisted ) way of seeing the world, and/or sense of humour.

 

I can totally see how it would be an off-putting/silly book for many people.

[Misfit]

@txomsy in the first pages of the book, it’s Neil Gaiman telling about how the book came together, how it was received. He noted people either love it or hate it. I’ve only read one chapter. I read a chapter in another library book. However, since I had to wait a bit to get American Gods, I suspect I won’t be able to renew it. I’ll read more, and learn what side I’ll be on (like or dislike).

[manolo]

I did not find American Gods extremely good, just good.

But...I enjoyed a lot "the graveyard book".

I read yeeeears ago in this forum that Gaiman used fountain pens. 

[inkstainedruth]

Trying to remember if I've read _The Graveyard Book_.  I know I've read most of his stuff at this point.

And I keep meaning to wander down to a Pittsburgh store that's a combination card shop/novelty shop/book shop (and pen dealer!) because I've never read the "Sandman" series of comics/graphic novels.  OTOH, I giggled all the way through Good Omens -- both the novel and the TV miniseries version.  I was really tempted to spring for streaming services to be able to see it (especially when I found at that David Tennant was going to be Crowley) but then found out a friend of ours had a bunch of streaming services so we said, "Hey -- can we come over to your place and binge watch it?" (Of course, we haven't yet had a chance to see the second season of that, which apparently was put together from notes he and Terry Prachett had started for a sequel....)

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth