Our friends at Vinta Inks sent me bottles of their new Christmas collection. This collection has two colors in it: Karol 1990 (Carol Red) and Parol 1908 (Jewel Green). I’m happy that they came out with a Christmas collection, we could all use more sheeny, shimmery goodness. The sheen on these inks can be quite pronounced in certain lights, especially if you use a wet nib or glass pen. The parol in the photo below looks like it’s drawn with gold foil.
In indirect light, the inks can appear a bit dark but the red and green still show through. The red shading on the Parol ink in particular can make it look darker sometimes, depending on the pen and paper you use.
VINTA CAROL 1990 (Carol Red)
The name is based on the year that Jose Mari Chan released his iconic album “Christmas in our Hearts”. This ink reminds me of the color of poinsettias. It is vibrant red, which darkens in certain spots where the ink pools thicker. It starts out a bit lighter and then darkens as it dries on paper. I would say the flow is moderate, so it’s best to put this in a pen with a medium nib or wet writers. The drying time is a bit longer than Parol, at about almost 20 seconds. Below are a few close up photos of the writing sample.
PAROL 1908 (Jewel Green)
The name is based on the year that Francisco Estaneslao created a parol, a star-shaped Christmas lantern. This ink has a wonderful dark green color that really reminds me of Christmas trees or leaves of holly. I think the red shading and sheen suits it too. Like Karol, it’s dark enough to make it a perfect base color for the gold shimmer. It dries slightly faster than Karol at about 15 seconds and also has a moderate flow. Below are more photos of the writing sample.
Since these are shimmer inks, I would recommend using pens that are easy to clean and take apart, and please don’t leave the ink in your pen over long periods of time. It would be really hard to clean out dried shimmer ink. I would also not use Karol in a demonstrator ink, just to avoid the danger of staining. Overall, I love the base colors of these two inks and I find the sheen and shimmer very festive.
As mentioned earlier, it’s pretty hard to capture the shimmer of the ink on photos, but here’s a video below that helps a bit.
The Serial Doodler 
As someone who lives in the christmas capital of the philippines for our giant lanterns (~20 ft),, I feel like I gotta get some heheheh
LikeLike