Choosing paper and pen

The perfect combination of paper and pen is a very personal thing. But there are two crucial things to think about when looking for yours. For everyday practice, the trick is to find materials cheap and ubiquitous enough that you don’t care about using them up quickly. You also want a pen and paper combination that doesn’t let the ink bleed (unless you’re going for that effect). This is what we recommend.

Pens that don’t bleed:

• Pigma Graphic Black 1.00mm.

• Pentel Black Original Sign Pen S520 Fibre Tip Marker Pens Colour Fineliner (cheaper, and one of Dan’s everyday favourites).

• Tombow Dual Brush Pen, which gives you a couple of mark-making options (also cheaper, and one of Dan’s everyday favourites).

Other good pens:

• In the studio, we often use a Berol Broad Fibre Tip for a nice thick and fluid line. However, if you’re using thin paper (eg, less than 90gsm), this is a risky choice if you’re avoiding bleed-through.

• For a similar effect with a thinner tip, we use a Sharpie Fine Point. This can also bleed through thin paper.

Notebooks and sketchbooks for everyday use:

• We often use plain office printer paper as a fallback for practising and experimenting with ideas.

Paper with a light dotted grid is a good option for notetaking, analysing and planning. Rhodia plain and dotted pads are great. Similarly the Clairefontaine GraF it 90g notepad has dotted pages that are just thick enough for the Berol broad tip and Sharpie fine tip not to show through on the other side.