B.I.BLOG

Three more markers from Andres’ marker stash. If yr ever at his spot, ask him to hit the switches on his drawing table.

SANFORDS MARKER KING SIZE - I believe this is the earlier version of the Sanford King Size that I have in my collection. It’s a classic metal jacket marker that has evolved throughout the years, still retaining this original silhouette and cap style. This one features the Sanford wordmark in script form. The KING SIZE text is smaller pt size. Labelling features stripe pattern all up the sides. Upon closer inspection, this marker was made by Sanfords in Bellwood, Illinois. Good to see that they are still based there.
This marker is a true classic. Simple, sleek and well designed. It smells like a black marker should smell. I’m taking a buncho huffs right now and I feel like i’m being transported back in time to when this thing was first made ! ——————————————————-

MINI WIDE - The classics keep coming. The mini wide refillable. For signs, maps, sketches, posters, background. Made in Japan for WESCOSA INC.

TESTORS GLOSS PAINT MARKER - This thing is supposed to be used for painting plastic models. I used to see the packaging for plastic models and get pretty excited. Then i’d open the box and get less excited. Than try to build the thing, and get even less excited. Than just put the quarter built plastic model car in the box. And sniff the paint. Then play with Lego instead. This is a nice metal barrel marker with a buncho strong paint inside of it. Pretty strong stuff.

IDEAL FELT TIP MARKER

I’ve known about all these types of vintage metal markers from companies like Marsh and Flo-Master, but rather than get them off of ebay or other online sources, I wanted to be able to acquire them hand-to-hand or stumble upon them in person. I always imagine coming across them while on a road trip across the US, finding them in some five-and-dime store or in some old school garage or barn. I know one of these days i’ll stumble upon a vintage marker motherlode. Till then, I get by with a little help from my friends.

Got this marker from Andres when I was at his spot in SF. I know it’s “rude” but I had already scoped out his marker stash way before he brought them out. Note to other lurkers. The first door in the hallway is not a paint closet. It’s someone else’s room. Where they sleep.

This IDEAL marker is from the IDEAL stencil machine company in Belleville, Illinois USA.
Whoah ! Just looked at their website and they got some black marker heat ! Looks like i’ll be doing some direct ordering…anyways….

I wish EVERY single marker came in a nice well designed cardboard box like this. Even if it wasn’t a well designed box, i’m sure each box would have it’s own quirky charm.
This box features a nice black on orange labelling with very nice product illustration on the sides, and clear instructions on usage on the other sides.

Nice solid brushed aluminum metal barrel construction, with nice brand engraving on the top. Hexagonal screw off cap that allows the user to fill with marking ink. Nice thick valve action nib.

On a side note, these things make really crazy ipe-pay ombs-bay.

It’s definitely one of those “holy grail” markers.

That is the question. This is the…

QUESTION MARKER - Got this marker last saturday from DIET ONE. He picked this up at Tokyu Hands 3 years ago. It’s only a matter of time before I scour that place for gems myself. This became an instant TOP 10 of my marker collection as soon as I saw it. Nice box packaging with that rising M in the magic ink wordmark. Nice yellow black white color combo throughout. And that question mark element seals the deal. Because I can’ t read Japanese. So I am like “what?where?when?how?why?” is this marker ? Look top down, side views, all angles of the box packaging, and every detail is meant to there, serves a purpose, and just looks good. Even the cardboard fray amongst the edges. Even the Tokyu Hands price tag.

Then you pop the box open and its a mini glass barrel metal tip marker ? Yikes. Dangerous. I don’t know any other company making glass barrel markers for the current market, so this is definitely a special piece. I am sure i’ll enjoy it just as much, if not more, 50 years from now. Classic.

The obsessive multiples guy in me will probably buy a huge lot of these before the year ends.

Daiso scouring over the weekend + a couple that DIET ONE picked up for me and had on stash.

BOARD PERMANENT MARKER - 25 mm chisel tip nib. Great packaging as per usual. Nice durable construction. Simple and uncluttered design layout with nods to color, type, and placement. Good heavy duty marker. No complaints.

MINI DEKA TWIN TIP - Nice twin tip. Any marker bought at Daiso will always be of better than average quality, design and quality wise. This is no exception. Does the trick, nice little inforgraphic on plastic packaging. Good marker.

SAKURA TWIN TIP - I am bias towards Sakura products. This is a nice thick twin tip. Average design, good quality, but just because it’s a Sakura, I hold it in higher esteem. Think i’ll start seeing if there are any opps to make Sakura collab stuff.

LIQUID TYPE TWIN TIP - This is a no frills no name marker, done Japanese style. Bullet tip. High quality, well presented, good layout design and quality. I like it when basics are designed with consideration. If you have to make something anyways, why NOT do it with a bit of flair and attention to detail.

OILY TWIN - Yeah. Nice basic twin tip. Nothing about it to really knock, but nothing to big-up either. I guess I like the Cooper font. And I wouldn’t mind an OILY TWIN baseball-t shirt, with that lettering done in flock. And a matching hat.

Couple of interesting packaged markers from SF roaming.

YUPAI 700 - This thing is packaged with a wrench and a screwdriver and sold as a “Utility Set”. I think they asked MacGyver what would be the ideal 3 things you would want in a danger situation, and these are the items that he listed. Never know when you’ll need to whip up an instant moustache/beard disguise using the marker pen, as you wrench and screwdrive your way through a hairy predicament. The marker itself is quite good. Nice marks, good quality ink.

TIP TOP - Reminiscent of Artline series of metal markers. These things are plastic. Nice little layout colour combo and overall finish. Tip Top. Yup.

WHITE BOARD MARKER - This marker gets it’s own post. Remember those 4-color click pens that Bic put out sometime in the 80’s ? Them was the days of Trapper Keeper and Finder Binder and World Famous olive/black/khaki school bags with patches and drawn stuff on em.That 4-color click pen was a coveted thing. Pretty expensive for pens in comparison to whatever else they had. I never got one during Back to School shopping trips to the States. And I felt my learning was really impeded by not having one to write with in class. Some other kids had like 3 in their pencil case. And either were nice and lent em out just to be nice. Or leant them out to try and make friends. Or hoard them and give you cut eye if you looked at them and their click-pens. All you would hear in class in those days was CLICKCLICKCLICKCLICK.Them 4-click kids had an edge. They could write a story in blue, than underline it with red, than draw some grass on the border, and thrown in some black ink doodles on the side, all with one pen. I had all those color pens, but had them bundled with a rubber band. and tried to use it like as one pen. But it didn’t work too good. To this day, I have never had one of those 4-click markers. And I guess I turned out okay.

….so then I saw this marker and thought, redemption at last !!! This is a 3-color jumbo click white board marker. It doesnt work as smoothly as CLICKCLICKCLICK but it is still ok I guess. Just for the idea. The package says NEW on it. And I can only imagine that the inventor of this marker style grew up in awe of that Bic pen as well. Then waited and waited and waited. Then finally developed this. Way to go guy ! All this wonky technology for only $1.49.

The back instructions are also good life instructions. At least warning 1 is.

Not to suck, daub or orally take it.

Bunch more markers from SF.

SUPER MON AMI - DIET ONE got me this one as well. First time I bought one of these was around 2005 in some older stationary shop in Gerrard Chinatown Toronto. This is the first time I have seen another Mon Ami product since. Great unique silhouette and cap for this marker/marker brand. Screened on label looks good. The SUPER lettering got a nice outline, drop shadow and gradient red to black fade. Style points. That lettering angles upwards and rides on top of this gold text box of sorts. Clean chisel tip, on the thin side, good for making precise lines. Average quality ink. No bleed. Low odor. A good marker.

HONGSHUI REUSE - This looks familiar. I have something similar that says RE-USE, but I’m pretty sure it isnt made by Hongshui. This is a twin tip bullet/chisel combo. Nice green silver color combo going on. It does look quite sleek, attractive design, and good for environment. But once you take off the cap, you know this is just a bootleg chinese marker and the fumes from this thing probably erode the greenhouse layer if cap is left off for any amount of time.

BAZIC 4x4 - I call this the 4x4 because I instantly recognized the shape and pattern and silhouette as copied from a BIC 4x4 marker that came out in the market around 2004 ish. I bought the OG Bic version from a Staples. The rubber grip on the side is supposed to emulate tire treads. For gripping the marker better. The larger overall size is supposed to give you an SUV feel. Like look out smaller markers, I got this SUV 4x4 marker and i’m gonna mark up a storm. So yeah, another Bazic bootleg. BOO to BOOtlegs. But I do like ‘em.

PARAMAXX DUAL POINT - A nice no frill twin tip. They call it a Dual-Point. Nice copy change. Better than average construction and detailing to cap and body. Works well. A good marker.

More marker finds from SF.

BAZIC WASHABLE - Yeah Bazic is pretty much a bootleg marker brand. But they bootleg a wide variety of brands and silhouettes and shapes so at least you could say they are an ambitious lot. This is their version of the crayola multipack. It came in a box and as usual, I copped the box, took the black one out and tossed the rest of the colored ones in the bin. Exact same silhouette and stylings of Crayola. And they got this zigzag border instead of Crayola’s wavy line border, so they manage to bite Charlie Brown at the same time. Wow. Someone at Bazic did their homework. Wide stub conical nib and that off blue-ish tint of ink found in Crayolas is somewhat replicated. The nib is spot on, but the ink is on the greyer side, instead of that Crayola black-blue. Peep the rest of what these people are faking…um…making online BAZIC PRODUCTS

BAZIC WASHABLE MINI - Same as above, ‘cept it’s a snub.

FAMILY MAID - A no frills dollar store marker brand. From a company that specializes in making products for the dollar store shop. Common shape amongst lower quality marker brands. White hull, simple black lettering and logo. Pretty bad company name though. Doesn’t project the most aspirational connotation. If you are gonna call your company Family Maid though, at least make the labeling and graphics of your marker look like a French Maid outfit.

PERMANENT MARKER - Dollar store quality black marker. Plastic hull with sticker label. Designer kinda gets wild out with the layout a bit though. Which is good to see that he or she is flexing some design ideas on something that isn’t probably expected. Got this black wave, then this medieval type font, and where they intersect, you see the negative space inverse. Oh. Also the package it comes in has a picture of the S.S Enterprise flying through space.

BOARD MARKER - Same shape and silhouette as the marker above. Same sticker label. Just different label graphics. Bullet tip. Yeah it’s supposed to have light ink as it’s a dry erase, but it shouldn’t be this watery and runny. Good for drawing if you like these qualities though.

BLACK IS BEAUTIFUL ALLISTER LEE

STUSSY SF 1409 HAIGHT STREET

ARTIST RECEPTION SATURDAY MARCH 13 20108 PM - 11 PM

 CURATED BY GUERRERO GALLERY

Back in SF and as per usual, hitting up spots looking for new markers for the collection. And as per usual, the dollar shop spots had bootleg super sharpies in effect. Here’s a little rundown of what the Mission had on offer.

KONA FIORE - This one came in a pink package and is advertised as being from the Fiore fashion collection. I can see that. Kona Fiore does sound like a designer name/italian porn star. Which is a great combination of professions. Super sharpie silhouette, but plastic hull has this off putty grey coloring and softness prevalent amongst low quality bootleg Sharpies. As a marker though, it works pretty good. Little bleed, nice thick lines. Which is surprising because most of these fakes run light ink that bleeds a ton.

KONA FIORE - This one my friend DIET ONE gave me. I thought I had this one already from earlier in the day, but I looked again and it is a variation. The hull is a lighter shade of grey, the lettering is set differently and different font size and applied in a darker gloss. Is this a bootleg of a bootleg or just poor quality control. Drama at the House of Kona Fiore.

PROFFICE - Basic boring bootleg. But this thing reeks up a storm. Cap off and i’m already getting spins. That’s how I would deal with working at the office 9-5. 7 days a week.

NO NAME BOLD POINT - This is actually quite good. That off putty grey hull color, gloss finish text, but there is no label or brand name on the side. Only the descriptions and qualities like “BOLD POINT” “QUICK DRYING” “RECAP WHEN NOT IN USE” “PERMANENT MARKER”. These guys are like, we are tired of getting tracked down and sued by Sharpie for infringement. Let’s just put out these markers without our name on it.

Yeah props to Sanford Sharpie for developing the Super Sharpie silhouette. Somewhat the most popular bootleg shape that I have come across in collecting. It’s great when you can be known for a silhouette or shape, without addition of label branding etc.

A bunch more markers scoured from the streets of Chengdu.

GENVANA PAINT - Basic metal jacket paint marker made by Genvana.

M-01 PERMANENT MARKER - This is a nice square bullet tip marker. Great design. Simple black labelling with smoky grey translucent cap and bottom/translucent white body. Thick ink, marks heavy. English on one side, block chinese font on the other.

SNOWHITE WHITE BOARD PEN - Got this one on a long stroll back from Peter’s Tex Mex Restaurant in Chengdu. It’s pretty much the exact same body and shape as the M-01 reviewed prior, with an all black body and white text and labelling. Yup, same marker.

KNOW TWIN-TIP - This is a nice play on the twin-tip marker genre. It’s a bit more stubby and streamlined than what I am used to seeing on the market. Label has the same double arrow motif as inspired by Zebra Mckee. Cap has grooved notches requiring you to line up cap and marker body when putting cap back on. Nice streamlined grooves and shaping throughout. Overall, a nicely designed and well functioning black marker. Chisel tip on fat side, bullet tip on thin side.

KNOW WHITEBOARD - 4mm bullet tip whiteboard marker. Nice sturdy well designed marker, with good use of picto/infographics on the label. Clear, screw off back segment. I am trying to figure out what that is there for. I think to refill ? You can replace the nib, and it has a recycling logo on it, so I guess it can be recycled or is made from recycled materials. Know makes good stuffs !

I’m not sure if these are double posts. Well, I’m sure the top one is a new one. I’ll have to double check and see what’s up.

YONGLI WHITE BOARD - Nice simple bullet point white board marker. BLACK/RED/GREEN color scheme, kinda peppery. That’s what I thought when I picked this one up while in Chengdu. According to label, you can “add ink to apply again and again”.

BAOKE TWIN TIP - Chisel Tip on the broad side, thing bullet tip on the other. Pretty straight forward marker, this one. It works well. Baoke makes a good marking product.

TOYO ERASING WB528 - 2.8 MM bullet tip whiteboard marker. That’s a peculiar size. Usually it’ll be 2.5 mm or 3.0 mm. According to label, “Easy Erasing, Bright Marking, Without Ghost…” I’d prefer this marker WITH ghost. That would be pretty good. Made by the fine folks at Creative Wealth Stationary Co, Ltd. That’s a front if I ever heard of one. Launder that $$$ !!!

Well I guess this is the equivalent of a victory lap of sorts. Broke the 500 marker milestone of my collection to begin the new year, and new markers keep rolling in. These are a bunch of new ones I got while working in Chengdu.

UFS SNOOPY AND WOODSTOCK MARKER - Snoopy. AKA Joe Cool, The Red Baron. And his trusty sidekick Woodstock. On a black marker. For sentimental reasons, this marker becomes one of my favourites in the collection. I’m not nor ever have been a SUPER Snoopy fan, but I do appreciate the guy whenever I see him pop up here and there. Was passing through a building while looking for a Antiques Market in Chengdu, and found this gem in a stationary store. It was part of a marker set, but I told the guy I only wanted the Black one, and he gave it to me for 1 RMB. Nice bullet tip, if a bit on the thin side. Scout leader Snoopy is pictured on the label, walking with his buddy Woodstock. Perhaps in search of black markers.

MATE-IST ST 502 MARKER - Simple bullet tip black marker, resembling an Artline silhouette. Nice silver finish side label.

These came as part of a shipment from Markers and Beyond. Let’s get to it.

DALO - This is a strange marker. It has an oversize barrel capacity and rubber bulb base to pressurize container so you can make marks. You would think that it should have a nice wide nib by the looks of it BUT the nib is a super small metal ball. Making marks, and even getting the pressure system right, takes practice, but once you get the hang of it, the handstyle and marks or effects you can make are very unique. The paint itself is super paint-like. Like sludge at times. For art and other non industrial purposes, this marker is probably not for everyone. It’s a bit quirky. Made by Dykem.

BLEED THRU IM-14 - Nice heavy duty metal jacket valve-action ink marker. The marks bleed-thru oil based paints. Hence the name.

MIGHTY X PM-47 - Jumbo size industrial grade valve action marker. Environmentally safe and friendly offering from the folks at Arro-Mark, who make a whole slew of nasty for the environment inks and products some of which are known in the state of California to cause cancer. Nice marker though. Great fibrous nib.

MIGHTY MARKER PM-23 - My favorite of this little bunch. The last 3 all have the same silhouette and cap, but this one has the labelling applied directly to the aluminum barrel. The label has the MIGHTY MARKER wordmark is rendered in some 3-D perspective, and there is an outline of a strong muscle man on there as well. The outline is pretty good. It even shows a buzzcut. Good thinking graphic designer guy. There is even a toll free number on the label.1-888-440-ARRO.

The second package of markers I ordered online arrived the other day via Markers and Beyond. All industrial grade metal jackets. Nice.

ARRO MARKER IM-17 - Cone-tip valve action industrial grade ink marker. Most times a clear sticker is used on a marker label, it looks really bad. In this case, the method is really effective. Nice label graphic of a marker scrawling a lower case “a”, followed by clear letters and labelling. Heavy duty metal barrel, and heavy duty dense plastic used for the matte black cap as well. A great product.

MARKAL VALVE ACTION - It is what it says it is. A black valve action paint marker. To me, it seems like the Sharpie of the valve action paint marker world; understated but highly effective.

MIGHTY X MARKER PM-15 - An environmentally safe & friendly alcohol based xylene free valve action paint marker. It is made by Arro-Mark company, who have trademarked the slogan “The House of Marking Pens”, along with a logo of a house on a marker and the chimney is on. Nice gree white black color combination throughout the design. Bullet tip.

PERMALL IM-18 - Same body and specs as the IM-17 by Arromark. This is a valve controlled ink marker. That seems to be the key difference between the IM-17 and IM-18. I guess Permall is a combination of the words permanent and all. I don’t have anything else to say I guess.

MIGHTY MARKER PM-19 - Nice black and silver labelling and design. Double sided nib for bullet and chisel effects. This is a clean simple marker that should be in everyone’s stash box.

HIGH TEMP MIGHTY MARKER PM-19 - Same as above but resistant to high temperatures up to 426C-482C. For glass metal and ceramics.

…king me check checkmate props like the microchip founder neck to neck stocks with Bill Gates now…

EDDING FOR FANS - This is the same metal body marker as other eddings, just marketed towards “autograph seekers” like this lady. When autograph seeking, you NEED the right marker for the job, and I guess this was designed for that purpose. Maybe edding saw all the press and photo opps Sharpie was getting by providing sponsored autograph areas and/or markers for events, and decided to follow suit. It’s a good marker in the sense that it works well. But it is redundant as a product within their line.

Loomis art store pickups. Keep up the good fight all art store workers. It’s gotta be tough to work on shop floor and half-heartedly doodle all day when all you wanna do is make your own stuff full time, do shows and shine.

BISTRO CHALK MARKER - Made by the Marvy Uchida people, who are probably best known for putting out all those Decocolor paint markers that mysteriously migrated from Arts and Craft store shelves to our pockets from 1993 onwards. Shaped more like a Zig, without the clip on the cap. It’s a good quality paint marker that is marketed towards Bistro owners to decorate their marker boards to let people know the daily specials and soups of the day. The label has a halloweenish black orange color combo going on, with some bunches of purple grapes in there for good measure. 6mm bullet tip. It’s always interesting to see random restaurant workers with good handstyles on those marker boards. Sometimes it’s the moonlighting artist/waiter/waitress’ only creative outlet of the day, so you’ll see a good variety of fonts and food related monikers on the board, along with some semi-catchy saying or pun.

EDDING 21 - This is somehow a “planet-friendly” permanent marker. Approx. 80% of total plastic used is from recycled material. There is a picture of a tree overlay on the edding logo. The background label colour is some parchmentish earth tone. It still smells like high times though, couldn’t they have made it smell like patchouilli ? It’a a good quality marker, just not a fan of the overt green marketing thing. Just make ALL your plastic markers out of the same recyclable material, stick the tree logo small on all the labels, and let that be that.

Zig and Posca makes the best “these type” of paint markers I have used for drawing and making stuff. I consider the two brands interchangeable.

Really good straightforward product. Designed well and ink gives good consistency and coverage.

Way better than any of the Sharpie Paint series.

I saw a Krylon marker advertisement the other day in some advert. That company could do big things in the paint and paint marker business if they embraced their graf heritage rather than the craft mom side.

ZIG BIGGIE 30 -

ZIG BIGGIE 50 -

The W is the last Wu album I listened to listened to. Hollow Bones Ghost was some off the hook Ghost. They sampled Syl Johnson’s “Is it Because I’m Black ? “. Listen to the song while you read over these entries.

HUA JIE - Went to Chinatown Dollar Store on Dundas on the way to friend’s birthday dinner. The basement one. It’s still pretty great down there. Had a few new markers for my collection in there. This is one of them. Average quality bullet tip white board marker. I use these things in drawing to get warmer black tones. Borderline brown. They shade nicely when the nib is well worn in.

CHANGLI 70 - From the Chinatown Dollar Store. A great Artline knockoff, made from plastic. Even in a similar shade of yellow. Great wordmark. Features fibre tip of toughness. Fading-proof. New & Special.

CHANGLI 989 - Also from the Chinatown Dollar Store. I don’t think this is the same CHANGLI as the other CHANGLI. This one is made at the Hongbo pen factory. This is a common low quality Chinese marker plastic body. I pop the backs off and let them air out. Then I take out the ink sponge, slice it open at the top to let it fan out, than use it for a brush marker to make certain effects when I draw stuff. I buy these things in bulk and let them air out a bunch at a time. Kinda like a black marker incense.

EXPO CLICK - Expo jumps awkwardly from their standard overly plain body type, to this funny looking thing. The click is not fun to click. Awkward push and release system. Makes a weirdo noise when clicked. More like a pucker. Even the CLICK wordmark is poorly designed. Chisel Tip. Works equally as well as other Expo dry erases.

REMARX - Got this marker and the one above at Staples. Their marker section is very small. Sanford (Sharpie, Expo) and Staples brand are all they carry. This is a Staples brand chisel-tip dry erase marker . It works adequately. When I saw this marker, the Remarx reminded me, unfortunately, of Richard Marx. Fortunately I didn’t remember a specific song then nor do I now, so I don’t have annoying Richard Marx songs in my head.

CENTER STAGE - Where did this gem come from ? Was in the basement looking in the soup can pencil holder for a fineliner, and saw this inside. I don’t remember buying it, but I don’t remember drawing or recording it. So here it is. A basic dry erase marker. But a really great name and hokey wordmark. It has a subliminal pep talk thing going on, which I like.

Ordered this selection of markers from Nashville based Durable Supply Company. “Distributor of Paint Markers and Fabric Markers”. They sell Uni, Posca, Marvy, Zig, Dalo, Dykem and Sakura, amongst other industrial marker brands. Good company to deal with.

DYKEM STRIKE-MARK - Nice metal body fast dry paint marker. Bullet tip. Works well. Got a monster truckish black and silver lightning motif on the label. When Thor needs a marker, he uses the Strike Mark…

DYKEM ACTION MARKER 44 - Metal body with screw off cap system. Threaded base. Bullet tip. Good quality permanent paint marker.

DYKEM BLEED-THRU - Same body specs as previous. Marks bleed through oil-based paints and primers. Chisel tip. It does what it says.

DYKEM TUFF GUY - Heavy duty permanent marker. It’s the TUFF GUY !

DYKEM RINZ OFF - Water removable temporary ink industrial black marker.

DYKEM SUDZ OFF - Detergent removable temporary ink industrial black marker. Shampoo is better than conditioner.

DYKEM HIGH PURITY - Laboratory certified ink. For writing on things that need to be super clean. An analysis of the ink is available upon request. From them. Not me. There’s a pretty neat picture of a nuclear atom on the label.