Van Dieman’s - Macleay’s Swallowtail Butterfly

Van Dieman’s - Macleay’s Swallowtail Butterfly - Ink drop

Macleay’s Swallowtail Butterfly (Spring Butterfly) is from Australia’s Van Dieman’s inks based in Tasmania. It’s part of their fifth series, Tassie Seasons. These are inks based on the changing colors of Tasmania’s seasons. This is a spring ink. Each spring, the brilliant green wings of the Macleay’s swallowtail butterfly can be seen throughout Tasmania’s wilderness. This ink matches the green of its wings.

Visually, this is a very light, almost fluorescent, lime green. In a paragraph, it’s much lighter in places, and spottier, than shown in my images. Van Dieman’s website says, “this ink is excellent in brushwork and ink washing, but also creates a light, near fluorescent line in medium and broad nibbed pens”.

Van Dieman’s - Macleay’s Swallowtail… - Ink Swatch Card

As a writing ink, Spring Butterfly is extremely low in viscosity, with an almost watery, inconsistent flow. However, strokes were well-defined on all premiums, and also quite sharp on office copy paper. There was some nice shading on Rhodia and Mnemosyne, but less on other papers. Fabriano showed a fair halo, but on all others it was minimal. This is not a sheening ink. Drying times were quite nice. All five premium papers dried in 10-20 seconds. Office copy was fastest at 5 seconds. On Fabriano, it was more defined in terms of coloration, and showed the most halo.

Technically, Macleay’s Swallowtail Butterfly performed fairly well, and it is indeed an attractive lime green. However, it’s far too light and inconsistent for long-form writing, and the wateriness can create an odd, unpredictable flow. Van Dieman’s says that it ‘s excellent for brushwork and ink washing, and I can easily imagine that to be true. I’ll stick to Van Dieman’s many other wonderful writing inks and leave this one for art projects.