With the inability to put any decent individual/self drawn picture or painting to paper, it is an interesting experience to use these nibs……and dream of being able to use one with decent outcomes. Produce something fit for purpose. When you have the lines and squiggles drawn and produced in front of the eyes, it is interesting to try to envisage something unique to apply the results to.
Please tap on the smaller photograph images to enlarge.
Got no idea of what to personally use them for actually. Not large ‘poster’ calligraphy. Not for myself as an artist. I’m no free expression artist! Believe me. I have tried. My Aphantasia condition (https://graysummerstwo.com/2021/06/17/aphantasia/) allows me no production of imagery. No self produced visual inherent pictorial imagination. And these are certainly not for writing. The obvious volume and resulting wetness of the ink on first presentation/application of the larger nibs to paper is based on the fact that there is an ink reservoir on top of the nib. It collects a decent amount of this shellac based ink. The nib gets all over zealous and rushes to show what it can do. Basically, it tries to show off, but fails in it’s over exuberant nature by producing a volume that could spread on the paper and make a mess. On drying, this wetter ink gives a nice satin sheen though. As the ink becomes lesser on the nib, a dryness produces dull results.
The smaller nibs are easier to control. So in artwork, I suppose the larger nibs would be excellent washes and the finer used for the detail work. Tilting and using for line thickness could be applied for decent results in these examples of art here above in the ‘Chinese Folk Designs’ book by W. M. Hawley. However, on past use of various nibs, the Rotring and Pelikan Graphos nibs had a nicer control to them. See link below. More ‘fountain pen’ in nature with a controlled inherent ink delivery. Filled into a chamber within the pen’s barrel. They have a variety of art and italic nib designs with double nib layer that means drawing on the ‘open edge’ of the nib to allow ink release. The thickness of lines produced by angle presentation to paper and not pressure……as produced with fountain pen flex nibs.
Here above then, in the photographs, is a simple routine example of the nibs. This may be if help to someone out there who is an artist and not seen these before.
Gray Summers 
Hey Gray, the nibs you have are used for drawing. The rounded fute nibs can be used for journaling. Their primary advantage is the line they lay has an arched shape to start. Another common nib is a square fute. It writes similarly to the rounded fute nib except the line start is squared. You are correct in your assumption about the other nibs, they are for shading.
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Thanks for that information. I was going to look further into their proper use so have a good idea what to look for now. I really like the smaller ones. I was writing a bunch of shapes and nonsense for an hour last night with the two smallest round and square ended nibs. As you say…nice shapes. Then I tried a few smaller Mitchell italic dip nibs too. I’ve got a tin of those. Some are used for poster writing. Huge sized ends. I’ll explore this a bit more. Cheers Danny.
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