It's actually a pretty cool, meditative process that can focus your mind and body on the task at hand and the art you are about to create. Also, buy a bottle of ink and no inkwell. As you grind the stick against the suzuri, particles from the stick will fall into the water and dissolve to create sumi ink. If you use calligraphy or drawing ink, you have to learn to use pen cleaner. The suzuri has a little well where you can pour a small amount of distilled water. If you use the stick form of sumi ink, you will need to rub the ink stick against a grinding stone called a suzuri. Both can be diluted with distilled water. Sumi ink, also known as Chinese ink, comes in both liquid form and stick form.Of course, read all labels carefully to ensure you are using compatible supplies and follow recommended cleaning procedures to ensure the life of your pen. For instance, on Winsor & Newton's website, they state that their calligraphy ink can be used in fountain pens and dip pens ( ), although some calligraphers recommend using cheap fountain pens with this type of W&N ink rather than expensive or vintage fountain pens. If you use calligraphy ink or fountain pen ink, read the label on the ink bottle to see what type of pen it requires (dip pen, calligraphy fountain pen, etc) because these inks are not compatible with all types of pens. Calligraphers who use bottled calligraphy ink can squirt the right amount of ink and water into another bottle or a small dish or cup. Calligraphers using cartridge pens achieve this by injecting the little calligraphy ink cartridge with a carefully measured squirt of distilled water. The most common formula is mixing 2 parts ink to 1 part distilled water. When the ink is diluted with water, the drying time is also quicker. Two types of inks that are often diluted are fountain pen ink, calligraphy ink and Sumi-e ink:Īrtists who use calligraphy ink or fountain pen ink commonly dilute the ink to increase the ink's fluidity. In this case, adding water will help return the ink to a more useful state. Iro-Utsushi is a dip pen type writing instrument that allows you to write while dipping the nib into fountain pen ink. If you've had a bottle of ink for awhile, some of the moisture in the ink may have evaporated, making it thicker and harder to manage.

Here's one more reason why you might want to dilute your ink:

Distilled water is inexpensive and can be easily picked up from the grocery store, so it's worth picking up a jug, because it will go a long way! Tap water is not good for ink, because the minerals and fluoride in typical tap water can disturb the ink's chemistry and cause it to separate. It is highly recommended that you dilute your ink in distilled water, rather than tap water, especially if you are using India ink or fountain pen ink (also known as calligraphy ink).

India ink dip pen