Jim P.

Father, geek, serial hobbyist.

Continuing my trend toward “inks that do weird things”, here is Banmi Neutron 90° BP (Blue & Purple). The ink itself is black, but it’s crammed full of multi-color shimmer particles that shift from blue to purple depending on the angle of the light. Some other brands call this “chameleon” shimmer.

There are two more inks in the Neutron 90° series: Green/Purple and Red/Green. I have them, but haven’t swatched them yet.

If for some reason you can’t get Colorverse Milky Way, this may scratch a similar itch.

Take care when using shimmer inks! Using them in the wrong pen or in the wrong way can lead to a clog. Use a pen that seals very well and has high “wet” flow, such as a TWSBI Diamond 580, or a TWSBI ECO. If the pen can be completely disassembled for cleaning, that’s even better. Always gently agitate the pen before writing and after every few words. This ensures the shimmer particles are mixed well with the ink and don’t settle on the feed and clog.

Videos

Video is the best way to see the color-shifting effect in the shimmer.

In this first video, the card stays still and the light source is moving.

Video on Col-o-Ring with a moving light source

In this second video, the light source is static but the card is tilting.

Video on MD paper tilting

Shimmer Comparison

These photos are grouped by the color of shimmer showing on different paper types.

Photo of an ink swatch on a col-o-ring swatch card. Text on the left reads "Banmi Neutron 90° BP" with an "x" and two loops next to it. On the right is a large ink blob made with a glass dip pen. The base ink is dark, black or extremely dark gray. The ink contains many tiny reflective particles of blue glitter which catch the light. Photo on Iroful paper with mostly blue shimmer showing Photo on MD paper with mostly blue shimmer showing
Photos with blue shimmer. Click to enlarge.
Photo of an ink swatch on a col-o-ring swatch card. Text on the left reads "Banmi Neutron 90° BP" with an "x" and two loops next to it. On the right is a large ink blob made with a glass dip pen. The base ink is dark, black or extremely dark gray. The ink contains many tiny reflective particles of purple glitter which catch the light. Photo on Iroful paper with mostly purple shimmer showin Photo on MD paper with mostly purple shimmer showing
Photos with purple shimmer. Click to enlarge.

I think it looks best on MD, but Iroful is also quite good.

Scans

The scans don’t show as much of the shimmer, so you mostly see the base color.

Scan of an ink swatch card made from Col-o-ring paper Scan of an ink swatch card made from Iroful paper Scan of an ink swatch card made from MD paper
Swatch Card Scans. Click to enlarge.

Without the shimmer, it’s a fairly saturated black with some shading.

Chromatography

A lot of “black” dye-based inks seem to be very dark blue or purple, so it’s not a huge surprise to see this separated out into mostly gray and dark cyan.

Photo of chromatography paper under UV light.
Chromatography strip photo under UV light

There is a slight purple glow near the end and a slight blue halo past the leading edge.

Verdict

The multi-color shimmer is really cool, especially these two colors together. The black base color really lets the shimmer stand out like stars in a night sky. There are two other inks in this series I still need to swatch, and I’m looking forward to it.

I haven’t used it in a pen yet, but it will definitely need to be used in a pen that can easily be disassembled for thorough cleaning.

Based on a Mastodon Post

Updated:

Questions or comments? Contact me on Mastodon

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