If you've read the previous pages, you will know that I had been sketching digitally for several months until the pendulum started to swing back towards traditional analog sketching with a pencil. I came to enjoy both worlds at the same time, sketching with an Apple pencil on my iPad Mini as well as with a graphite pencil on watercolor paper, and even combining the two for hybrid digital/analog sketches.

It was just a matter of time before ink sketching would return as well. This would mean the return of the fude nib pen as that was my point of departure when I stopped ink sketching.

So I got out my Sailor Fude de Mannen pen and started to sketch with it for a while, easing my grip on the barrel, and found out that it is very useful for drawing people after all. The Fude de Mannen is popular with sketchers, but some artists on the web say that they started with the Fude de Mannen and then moved on to Chinese models.

Chinese pen sellers don't usually advertise these as fude (foo-deh) nib pens because fude is a Japanese word for brush, and brush pens are also called fude pens. Chinese websites call these pens calligraphy or bent nib pens. Of course, a calligraphy pen is something entirely different in the west, and a bent nib could mean a damaged pen.

I knew from past experience that if you order something from Chinese vendors via websites such as AliExpress or even Etsy, the shipping can be notoriously slow; your item may get stuck for up to two months in various places along the way before it ever leaves China. But I decided to bite the bullet and order a Chinese bent nib pen and endure the long wait.

I also got the huge Duke 551 Confucius bent nib pen. This is a fairly well known fude pen model which stands out from the rest. It often appeared in YouTube videos of Urban Sketchers in Asia and subsequently became popular with artists around the world. It's a big, heavy pen that can get very wide lines as well as fine lines. It's a bit harder to handle than the Duke 209, especially when standing on a moving train.

If you are familiar with this model, then you will immediately notice that there is something different about mine; the cap is brass, but it's supposed to have a black lacquer finish with a silver image of Confucius and some Chinese kanji script, but they are missing on my pen. That's because I sanded them off and polished the underlying brass surface. I confess that I felt uncomfortable carrying a pen that had an image of Confucius along with a Confucian quote. But the cap is so heavy that I never post it anyway.

Below is a quick sketch I made with the Duke 551. It can get some very expressive lines.

Several months later I ordered another Duke fountain pen. This was the Duke Uranus 962 with bent nib. What attracted me to this model is its size; it is very slim and light-weight.

This pen has a nib cover like the Duke 551 which probably lets more ink get to the nib quicker, or possbly it keeps the ink wet longer. The line it makes is identical to the Duke 209 -- it is probably the same nib -- but it feels so much better in my hand.

I loved this slim pen so much that I turned around and ordered another, which is why there are two in the photo.

After a little more time browsing YouTube and the web, I bought two more bent-nib pens. This time I chose the Jinhao X750. They were being sold on Amazon Japan as a pair, probably because they are so cheap at 940 yen each (around nine dollars at the time).

The main reason I chose this model was that several YouTubers said you could easily take these pens apart, and you could even swap in a super flexible Zebra G pen nib which is intended for dip pens only. I already had a super flex vintage fountain pen, but I was curious.

As soon as the pens arrived, I tried to take one apart to insert a G pen nib. In the process I broke two G nibs (probably because they were not Zebra brand) and snapped off part of the plastic nib feed (it's the part marked by the red arrow on an unbroken feed). So I had to order a new plastic nib feed which took over a month to arrive.

The Jinhao X750 is supposed to be very easy to disassemble, so I was surprised that mine broke in the process. Apparently, after wiggling and jiggling and trying to force the nib and feed to come out, and using a lot of force, the whole thing suddenly gave way, but I didn't pull it out straight. It was most likely the mouth of the piston cartridge converter that snapped off the plastic piece.

After the new plastic feed arrived, I attempted this experiment again. This time I removed the converter before attempting to extract the nib and feed, and tried to be a little more gentle. The nib and feed finally did come out with no damage, and I rubbed a little silicone grease inside the nib section with a cotton swab so the process would be easier next time.

The reason I was so insistent on learning how to disassemble this pen was because I wanted to use water-proof Platinum carbon ink in it so I could color my sketches with watercolors. Technically you can use carbon ink in any fountain pen if you flush it out with water occasionally, but it's a hassle and maybe a gamble because carbon ink can leave a dry crust or film on surfaces that are out of sight and out of reach. I like the idea of using a pen until it stops working, and then pulling it apart to give it a good cleaning with an old tooth brush.

Since these pens are so easy to take apart, they have become my care-free "work horse" pens for drawing with carbon ink. I also use carbon ink in my Duke pens, but there's not much I will be able to do if they clog up on me. Maybe an ultrasonic cleaner would do the trick.

The Jinhao X750 is a wonderful sketching pen with its bent nib, and makes a great line just like my other Chinese bent nib pens.

Flexible nib pens and brush pens are valuable tools for rendering ink drawings and illustrations at a desk, but when I'm out sketching on location in ink, especially on a moving train, I have discovered that the bent nib pen beats them both. These pens magically turn my scribbles into interesting sketches, and the results are often unpredictable. I seem to have more freedom to make expressive lines without thinking too much about it.

It has been several years since I sketched regularly with a flexible nib pen. I can't remember why I stopped, but I think it was because I could only get wide lines on the down stroke; I couldn't even get wide lines on horizontal strokes, which was too limiting and resulted in less line variation than I would have wanted. The bent nib pen can get wide lines in any direction. Also, a flex nib will lay down a huge wet line of ink that takes forever to dry while the bent nib pen makes a flat line that dries relatively quickly.

The brush pen is capable of getting line variation in any direction, but it is very hard to control or get any consistency especially if you are standing and holding a sketchbook. A bent pen has a solid nib which can rest on the surface of paper as you draw. This gives you tactile feedback; you can feel what you are drawing. This pen can get a series of hatch strokes with a consistent uniform length and width, as well as the width of the gap between the strokes. This is very difficult to do with a real brush, especially when you are out sketching with a sketchbook.

Although most of my ink sketches in the past have been done with a flexible nib pen or brush, I now think that the bent nib pen is the ultimate ink sketching tool, at least for traditional non-digital sketching, at least for me.

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