Diamine - Firestorm Red

Diamine Firestorm Red - a shimmery true red

This is Firestorm Red from Diamine, and it’s one of their Shimmering inks. I’m not sure how well the name really matches, as the red lacks the yellow and orange influences that make me think of fire, but it’s a beautiful, bright red with lots of sparkle and shine.

Diamine Firestorm Red’s range of shades

Visually, this is not a terribly complex red, but it is quite pure. I’d call it a candy red or a tomato red. It’s bright, with a plastic-type of appearance. There’s a little shading, which occasionally adds light accents to stroke ends. A nice, darkened stroke edge does add definition on coated papers, however, and this really makes the ink jump. The real star is the lovely silver shimmer, which adds a lot of flash against the red backdrop, and gives the ink a bold, metallic look.

Diamine Firestorm Red - rich darks and edges

Diamine makes nice quality inks, and the writing performance with Firestorm Red is quite high. This is a reliable, clean writing ink. It’s decently wet, and comfortable on the page, too. The shimmer didn’t cause me any problems, but with shimmer inks, you always need to expect a little extra effort to fully rinse feeds. Strokes were very clean on all six test papers. Shading was mild at best, but edge halo was consistent across premiums. Drying was a quick 10-15 seconds on most premiums, and under 5 seconds on office copy.

Diamine Firestorm Red - light to dark

I tend to go for more complex, moodier, shading inks these days, and this definitely isn’t one of those. However, this ink is really good at what it does. It’s really clean and direct, and beautifully uncomplicated. If you’re looking for a candy red, I don’t think I’ve seen a better choice!

Diamine Firestorm Red - ink swatch card