Sunday 23 July 2017

Use Black or Blue ink?

Black Ink v Blue Ink?

Going back to the 23rd Century BC the Chinese were making inks from plant dyes and using animal fats and other oils as mediums to apply the ink.

Today things are a little easier for us, all you have to do now is slip a new ink refill into your pen and away you go. But do you use a Black or Blue ink refill?

I suppose it was the introduction of technology into the office and its use by government to speed up the process of recording and processing documents that started pushing us to using Black ink over Blue, why?  because the black ink was easier for first generation copiers / scanners / FAX machines (Do you remember how big they were and basic the functionality was?) to copy. Have you tried to copy a document written in blue ink, the copy came out in those days blotchy with parts of the sentence or words missing. If you sent a blue ink FAX, the person the other end got normally a blank page!! Black ink was much easier for the machines to see and hence we all started the move to black ink.

Most all official forms required by government departments state you must fill them in in Black ink using a rollerball pen. The roller ball lays down more ink (than a ballpoint) when you use it and that again helps the electronic scanner pick up more clearly what you have written.

So always check what ink to use on the form you are filling in but if unsure use a rollerball pen with black ink and you should be OK

Irish, US, UK and Indian passport applications all state you must use Black ink to fill then out, the HSE in Ireland state that all official forms must be fill in using only Black Ink.

I still like taking my notes and write in general with blue ink, for modern copiers and scanners this does not provide any coping challenges. Legal documents are in the main signed in blue ink as it is harder to copy than black ink and the blue denotes the document as the original.


So, whether you use Black or blue just make sure it’s a high-quality refill in your handmade pen, no point in have a great car with a poor engine!

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