I’m brand new to fountain pens and I really appreciate this series of videos you’ve been posting. Thank you for educating me!! Incidentally, I just saw the newsletter post on Stationery Fest and my hat’s off to whomever designed the cool logo!

We NEED a Yoseka shirt that says "Ink Friendly"!!!!

I'm so glad to see Apica Premium get a great shout out here -- I don't often see it highlighted next to Midori MD, Life, and Tome River, but it really does do a fantastic job and I hope this video encourages more people to try it out.

I'm a big Midori MD paper fan. It never fails to deliver a rewarding writing experience for me. I love the slight toothiness the paper offers as feedback. It lets me know my nib is actually making contact with the paper. It's not scratchy at all but it's akin to writing with a sharp pencil. Just a great paper imho. Nice video, Daisy. I still haven't visited Yoseka yet but it is high on my list of things to do. Hope to meet you and all your wonderful staff when I do.

a thing I don't hear about a lot about but think is important is how much resting your hand on the paper effects writing over it. with some papers like MD, it causes the ink to not stick to the page and become difficult to write, for others like kokuyo, it can cause feathering in those spots! in personal experience MD is really really sensitive to my personal hand oils, I cant touch the paper at all if I want to write over it. and (old) tomoe river island very forgiving to resting my hand as I write. I wonder if this is why people have been having issues with patches of their new hobonichi books feathering? I have a new book but I now use a pencil board to rest my hand on so I don't touch the paper with my hand, and I haven't had any issues at all. (also, it doesn't matter if your hands are dry, they still have oils, that's how skin is unfortunately. my hands are super super dry and still cause problems! even right after being washed and dried!)

Excellent education and great presentation. Two notes: First, people talk about "coated" paper or "coated" stock, but no one ever explains what "coated" means. Frankly, I've been involved in publishing for 50 years and still have never heard a good explanation of this concept. Second, you made no mention of archival properties of paper. Many folks, especially those of us taking the care to use fountain pens, want a paper that will be here in a hundred years. This is something that should be considered when selecting a writing paper. I don't much care about it for my grocery list, but a letter to a family member may have historical value. Thanks.

I didn't say it in my first comment because I got too focused on the task 😂 I thought this video was great!! I love how you don't say someone couldn't use paper with different qualities, even feathering, just a guide of what most people seem to enjoy. it gives a lot of room for beginners to explore and find what they like without hard rules restricting them!

From my experiences, some of fountain pen non-friendly paper can become friendly with the help of a shitajiki/pencil board or a clipboard. Like, these boards cancel bleedthrough, at the very least. If you're a binder notebook person, like me, I really recommend clipboards if you really want nicer writing results. But some papers can still result in hairy or "blooming" (not feathering for sure, but gets wider) lines. Just, don't swatch ink on non-friendly papers. Like, the Tsubame Fools notes' paper results in wider lines, but no feathering and bleedthrough. God bless.

TRP (old and new) and Stalogy are my favs. Ink friendliness is the only category that matters to me 😊 though I like Stalogy for the white color which is because I think colors pop way better on white then cream!

You should also talk about bigger nib sizes vs smaller nib sizes contribute greatly to drying time. I use mostly ef nibs and do not have trouble with ink drying time, I notice that you used a medium nib, so it lays down more ink and of course it would take a longer time to dry than say an ef nib. I don’t feel this is spoken about enough, it really does make a great difference, and should be considered when purchasing fountain pens. It could make or break a person when entering the hobby.

really helpful video, thank you!

MD paper and Hobonichi Tomoe are my personal favorites! 🎉

I love the inclusion of ink-friendly papers. It's only in more recent years we've had access to such beautiful varied colours - especially here in the UK. Although we do have the wonderful Diamine in Liverpool. They remind me of the incredible qualities of silk which are so well understood in East Asia.

This is a quality video. All aspects vevry well described! Great job!!

Greatly appreciated! Love the video, learned a lot, even as a frequent user of a fountain pens. Lovely. Keep the great work.

This is one of your best videos so far!! It’s cozy and I get to learn something new :)

You're a great teacher :) Thank you for sharing.

Enjoyed the video. Another point about ink shading. You focused on so-called chromo shading inks, which lay down multiple colors in your writing or drawing. But sometimes an ink will just appear darker at certain points, but still be of the same color. This is regular shading, not chromo shading. I guess my point is that a shading ink doesn't necessarily display multiple colors.

this is wonderful, thank you for sharing ☺☺☺

Very interesting video, well appreciated!

Fountain pen and ink aficionado quickly discover paper substrates are enormously critical getting the message conveyed. Thanks for steering people in this regard. (T-R rocks. 😂)

I probably got lost somewhere but you never talked about the sizing of the paper. For those who don't know, the sizing is the outermost layer covering the actual paper, the layer where you actually write and is responsible for most of the characteristics that make it fountain pen friendly or not. If interested, there are several threads in the fountain pen Reddit where the sizing is discussed. Here in Mexico paper in general is very expensive and fountain pen friendly paper is even more expensive and scarce, but in recent years there's been a plethora of Kawaii asian paper that is cheap and fountain pen friendly, you don't need to spend a lot to enjoy your inks, those offerings made me forget about all the other super expensive brands 😊 Surprisingly, Kokuyo paper is relatively cheap here, so that's probably the only branded paper I use 😎

I seem to get the most satisfaction with my fountain pens while writing on Tomoe River paper. (speaking as a left-hander). That preference was hard-won through trial and error so I appreciate the helpfulness of this video! Thanks for the great, personable and informative videos! But, Please water that plant! 🧐😀

I loe Tomoe River, and also MD, but for different reasons. Cosmo air light is unfortunately (from what I hear) no longer available. Cosmo Air Snow is a reasonable replacement, though, and is still available. A newer paper which is not widely available in the US is Iroful, which, I find, really makes some colors really pop.

What a super tutorial! I have found that I rather like a bit of traction ("tooth" or "feedback") when I write, so Midori MD fills that need with the fewest irksome qualities. I'd be happier if I could get that feel in bright white as well as "cream" or "ivory", and emphatically without a gummed pad that sometimes rips the paper, and that pointless corner cut off the edge. Do Midori offer such a paper? I'd love to know! I write a lot of letters. Thanks!

I'm also new to fountain pens and have really enjoyed your indepth breakdown of all the factors to consider with pens, paper, nibs, etc. I was wondering, does it damage your pen & nib to use just regular printer paper or average lined notebooks, or is it just less of a pleasant experience. I'm curious if I wanted to jot something on printer paper for example, will I actually damage my pen? Thanks!

What timing i just started to look 👍

Please water the plant in the background. It looks like the one on my shelf yesterday. 😅 Thankfully, those pothos are resilient.

Sorry if I missed it, but what size tip are you using? And has anyone tested Erin Condren paper with a fountain pen?

I don't mind ghosting personally. Definitely not keen on feathering.

What does the CD in Apica stand for? What does the MD n Midori stand for?

8 could be blank/dot/grid/lined

I also take into account how water resistant the printing in the notebooks are - the dots, the lines etc. In some notebooks, the paper is less absorbent where the dots or lines are, and to me this can be distracting.

i always joke that textured paper makes me itchy, im a big tomoe river paper fan ◜◡◝

have you used Mnemosyne paper at all?

I disagree with your rule on smooth paper= slower dry time. I use a super smooth paper for my notebooks and its also fast drying. I don't propose to know why that is, but I thought it important to share.

unfortunately with the background music on my hearing isn't good enough anymore to hear the difference between the smooth and the more textured paper. It might have been better to skip the music in the background for that bit.

Hahaha bleed through 😂😂😂. I used a Faber Castell ohp for a couple decades, that pen will bleed through card.