Nemosine- Solar Storm 1859

Nemosine pens first started to make an appearance around 2015/16 with the inks first appearing in 2017.  The pens are assembled in the US but are made of components from around the word e.g. German nibs.  The inks are made in Slovenia, there are 10 colours available and are all named after something astronomical.  I bought my inks from Birmingham pens where they cost $USD7.99 for 35ml (22.8c / ml) making them very reasonably priced even with conversion rates and postage to NZ.  I haven’t found the inks for sale anywhere in Australasia and as per my comments in a previous post customer service etc from Birmingham pens was excellent.

Pictures of solar flares held a lot of promise for what this ink would be likeI bought two inks a red and an orangey red colour.  I was trying to get away from my usual purples and thought they would be different, the red (Aeolis Palus) might even be useful for work.  However, my first review is Solar Storm 1859 and I could find something out about the name.
The solar storm of 1859 is also known as the Carrington event.  It was a  powerful geomagnetic solar storm i.e. a temporary disturbance of the Earth's magnetosphere (the region of space surrounding the earth in which charged particles are affected by the Earth’s magnetic field).  
In 1859 it was caused by a solar coronal mass ejection (a significant release of plasma and accompanying magnetic field from the solar corona) hitting the Earth's magnetosphere, inducing one of the largest geomagnetic storms on record over September 1–2, 1859.  The now-standard unique InternationalAstronomical Union identifier for this flare is SOL1859-09-01.
The associated "white light flare" in the solar photosphere (the Sun’s outer shell from which light is radiated) was observed and recorded by British astronomers Richard C. Carrington (1826–1875) and Richard Hodgson (1804–1872).   It is not clear though why if it was reported by two astronomers it is only named after one.
The auroras from the storm could be seen around the world and telegraph systems failed.  A solar storm of this magnitude occurring today would cause widespread electrical disruptions, blackouts and damage due to extended outages of the electrical grid. 
Pictures of solar flares held a lot of promise for what this ink would be like. I had high hopes for a bright orange with a lot of shading.

​The bottles come in plain black boxes, with the actual bottle being very simply labelled.  The label does have a small swatch of what the ink colour inside should be like and it seems to be close to the pictures above.

Then I opened the bottle and it looked a little boring, thought the drops inside the cap were quite bright.

Unfortunately I then swatched the ink on my col-o-ring and it was not so good.   It looked dull dull dull!

I had expected it to be a little more like Apache sunset and putting it up against a swatch of that did not help.

I do find that some inks appear dull on the col-o-ring so Tomoe river was next and solar storm started to hold  more promise.  In fact it and Apache sunset were becoming quite similar though Apache sunset is more yellow and solar storm more Orange based.

Solar storm (top) Apache sunset (bottom)

Putting the ink on absorbent paper it was suddenly so bright.  I still wasn’t seeing much that suggested there would be a lot of shading when writing but it was looking more and more vibrant with each test.  I was not however seeing the vibrant red tones others had demonstrated when they reviewed the ink.  I keep reiterating - the light source is the same for all the photos.

When it came to using the ink things did not start out that well and then it just got better and better.  For me Apache sunset now has some serious competition.
The first test was cheap paper using a dip pen.  Everything started out great with some excellent shading and then the ink just ran.  Capillary action through the paper was so significant calling it feathering is an understatement.  The show and bleed through was also a major problem.

There went my brilliant idea to test all my inks using a dip pen.  Clearly I needed to get the ink into a proper pen and try again.   I inked up my Franklin Christoph 66 and was not impressed with having to prime the feed to get anything to happen.  I had the same problem the last time I used this pen, maybe I am just too impatient for things to start happening.  Anyway once underway the ink performed much better on the cheap paper.  There was a little feathering but the bleed and show through had virtually disappeared. Also despite the poor quality of the paper the promised shading had started to appear.

​Cheap paper followed by Rhodia

​And then Tomoe river and the shading was fantastic which is odd because other reviewers have said it doesn’t shade. 

​By this time I was really enjoying this ink so unlike my last post I did my water test.  These inks are not sold as waterproof but this ink held up pretty well under running water.

I love Apache sunset and I now love this ink.  I can’t see either being my choice for the  #emptyinkbottle2019 challenge as I can’t choose one over the other.