WHITEBORED

I only started including whiteboard markers in my marker collection within the last year and a half. I never really find their design that inspiring. I don’t have one whiteboard marker in my collection that I am extremely proud of. Perhaps I just see the whiteboard marker as an allusion to cubicle culture, and all the mundanity that goes along with it. Their one redeeming factor; they produce a nice brown hue on paper that plays well off of the darker hues of black.

All of these whiteboard markers are from Shanghai and Hong Kong.

UNI INKVIEW - Made by the Mitsubishi Pencil Company in Japan. Its got this loop thing on the cap that i’m guessing is to attach to a lanyard. Remember pens on a string ? I never worked at an office when they were big, but I do remember seeing them around the way at my dad’s office. With the Inkview technology, you can see if the ink is running out of this marker so you can get a new one. I usually get the hint when the marker doesn’t produce lines…Way to go Mitsubishi design team !

X-101 WHITEBOARD - Well, it says this is the push button -type, but I don’t see how this is supposed to work. The label says “place tonto end of barrel and press several times”. The barrel end is just some piece of solid plastic and doesn’t push down. The label also says “Keep pen horiantal when not in use”. So maybe I shouldn’t pay too close attention to the labelling. But then they spell “horizontal” the correct way somewhere else on the label. So when it says “organic pigments ” I really don’t know what to believe. Well, it smells pretty markery. And makes makes nice lines, if a bit watery towards the end when you fade it. And it does have a pretty good white/silver/yellow/black color scheme going. So I give it a good rating.

PILOT WYTEBORD MARKER - Is the awkward spelling some sort of equivalent to some women spelling “women”, “womyn” ? Do the makers of this black marker not want to succumb to the oppressive titling of the “wyte” man ? This is actually a nice marker design. Classic metal jacket Pilot design, with some nice yellow/orange striping detail running down the side. Smells classic whiteboard marker smell ! Heavy ink funk right here ! Zoom !

CRAYOLA WIPEOFFS - Same Crayola plastic jacket construction and design used in most of their markers. They do make a really nice chisel tip though. Nice ink for a Crayola. Still has the familiar blue tinge to it. This is described as “Coal Black”. Like kids even know what Coal is these days. They’re better off calling it “Start Up Screen Black”

POWER LINE - I’m looking at this thing. It’s pretty plain. It makes nice thick ink lines. ZZZZ…

KEVIN AND LUNA

Got both of these from my friend Suzette when I was in HK. The night prior I had seen this amazing Zebra stuffed marker pillow in a window. That morning, as I walked from Sheung Wan to Central, I passed by the window of that same sales office. From then on, I had markers on the brain and made it a mission to get as many markers that day. Trawled around TST and got a bunch of good ones. The ones below are both excellent quality markers. Metal jacket construction, with strong dark inks and good quality nibs.

uniMARKER 580B- Bold chisel.

uniMARKER 520F- Bullet point.

This is a picture of Kevin. He reminded me of Luna. I told this to Suzette and she was like

“You mean THIS Luna ?” , and pointed to a zipper pull on her bag. You can get a bunch of Luna stuff here !

PROCKEY !

I got my first uniPROCKEY from some Japanese kid who was over here visiting. He had a red one and a bunch of black ones. I dunno why, but I really like the sound of that word. PROCKEY. Anyways, found the North American version sometime later in another friends marker stash. Picked up the stubby PROCKEY from, wow I wish I could remember. These are my favorite markers ever.

JAPANESE UNI PROCKEY – All dried up from using it tons. Made really nice smooth lines. Twin tip, chisel and bullet. Design wise, really clean lines with ridges on both sides of the caps. Kind of reminds me of the look of sci fi laser guns. This is my absolute favorite marker to use, and one of my Top 5 favorite markers in my entire collection. I wish I had boxes and boxes of them.

NORTH AMERICAN UNI PROCKEY – Same design as the Japanese version, but the label is on a sticker, than applied to the marker.

UNI PROCKEY – Stubby Chisel tip, makes bold lines of heavy black ink. This is a durable, dependable top quality marker.