Matte Black Forest Fountain Pen Extra Fine Nib Classic Design with Converter and Metal Box Set by Hongdian

Reviewing the fude pen, i.e. bent nib, which I use for drawing, I like the pen and would recommend it. It is a little heavy compared to some, but balances nicely, even with the top on, and allows quite loose and expressive drawing. It is very good quality, with a resilient looking metal build. I have only used it thus far with water soluble ink, and the flow is excellent. The wide range of drawing marks is very impressive. The pen can be used upside down for very fine iines, contrary to some reviews of it. All these fude pens have different qualities, hence artists often having quite a few of them, and this one is among my favourites, as a new artistic convert to fude pens. I don't know yet how it manages with waterproof inks, but with a non-shellac ink I'd have thought quite well. I usually paint fairly impressionistically with watercolour, then draw on top when dry, and in such use this pen is extremely likeable. On its own, without watercolour, the pen is superb and capable of very expressive and fluent work.

A fabulous pen!I am so glad that I read the reviews and ordered this pen, it's perfect!I hadn't heard of the brand before and would have skimmed past, but there were so many positive reviews that I gave it a go.On a more superficial level the colour is gorgeous, it looks lovely. Not garish, but a bit different.It arrives in a silver metal tin which is useful for storage.The pen is very comfortable to hold and to write with - I have damaged hands so this is really important. The ink flows smoothly, for the first use I gave the cartridge a gentle squeeze and a shake (over scrap paper) and from then on it's been great to use.I ordered the ink cartridges from the same brand, and there are sets with mixed colours and sets with different sized nibs.As you can tell I'm delighted with it!Thanks for reading, I hope you find this review helpful.

As much as anything, I purchased this pen because of being intrigued as to what a "Long Blade Nib" is .... not being able to find any reference to it in any of the reviews.Apparently it is a loose translation from Chinese - loosely translated to Chinese from the Japanese - and describes what we would call a "architects" nib ... ie one which produces a narrow vertical but broad horizontal strokes whilst writing. I sometimes use this effect by the slightly awkward technique of using a standard italic nib held at 90 degrees to the normal with a widely crooked arm - so have been looking for a reasonable-priced solution.Nice as the pen is, I am afraid that - although under a loupe I can see the shaping is there, there isn't very much of it. The difference in line width is very small, but I can produce it in a writing test, using block capitals. In any meaningful writing - anything more than a word long and involving lower as well as upper case characters - I just cannot hit the "sweet spot" and it ends up somewhere between a fine and medium standard nib (depending on the angle of inclination to the paper).Disappointing nib then ...The pen itself is a joy to use though - comfortable, just the right degree of heft to it, very nice ink flow and the feed seems more than adequate with the ink used (Herbin "Cafe des Iles"). I like the plain brass finish and look forward to it developing a bit of patina as it is used.I will simply use it as if a standard medium nib (not that I use them very often) until I have time to explore the nib more fully and see if there is enough meat there to do a regrind...

I had a lovely Cross fountain pen given to me as a work leaving present, but it's medium nib didn't suit the narrow style of my letters. Shame! I tried a few cheapo Chinese pens bought from a well known auction site but the were rubbish with poor ink flow and scratchy nibs.This pen, while its Chinese origin did give me pause, seemed like it might offer and superior writing experience without the heavy cost of another Cross or similar. And it did. Firstly, the pen looks nice (in black) and feels solid and weighty in the hand. Writing with it is very pleasant, the nob flowing smoothly over the page and the fine nib leaving a consistent line. Very nice!

I know close to nothing about fountain pens, but I decided to get this for note writing and exams at Uni. The idea of buying bottles of ink and refilling appealed over the plastic throwaway gel pens I had been buying (which were fantastic in every other respect). One warning - it's a gateway drug. You may find yourself watching fountain pen reviews on YT and wondering about investing in a gold nibbed Montblanc when you graduate - something that would never have crossed your mind a month ago. You might start actually thinking about penmanship, instead of just being satisfied with barely legible chicken-scratch handwriting. It's a slippery slope, kids. Like, who knew that handmade blown glass dipping pens were a thing. I didn't need to know that, but I blame this pen for the fact that I now do.As for the pen, when the ink cartridge has ink in it, it writes smoothly and the ink flows well. I bought the Waterman ink, which seems decent. It's solid without being too heavy. There isn't much flex in the nib, but it's smooth and writes well - no blotches or smears to speak of. I expect the paper and ink has something to do with that as much as the pen. If you leave it uncapped for a few minutes without writing, the ink can take a little persuasion to start again - something which isn't a thing with disposable gel pens, but I fairly quickly got into the habbit of capping it when I wasn't writing, which is not a bad thing since I have a lot of gel pens without their caps since I forget to replace them after use and they part company. See - this pen will make you a responsible adult.As far as criticisms, the edge where the lid and body join is a little bit of a sharp edge and can get slightly uncomfortable after a long period of writing. 2 hours in exam conditions is fine. Much longer and it gets a bit sore where that part rubs against your finger.