PH PandaHallPH PandaHall Chinese Calligraphy Inkstone with Ink Stick Traditional Chinese Ink Stones Sumi Drawing Ink Dish Ink Well Ink Tray for Chinese New Year Couplets Traditional Calligraphy Practice Painting

I've never used any other Sumi stick but the pigment was very easy to disperse in water with no clumps and made using it like a watercolor paint incredibly easy. It moves to wherever you put it and goes down evenly even if you dilute it to a light gray.

Works. Ideally bigger surface areas.

feels real, and has a nice ink.

They are tiny. I used to have 10x5 inch stone when I did calligraphy a lot. Maybe that's too much for most of people but if you look to use the ink quite a bit, this will disappoint you. BUt if you just do a bit of calligraphy once in a while with less than, say, 100 letters, this is actually better than much bigger ink stone and stick.The downside of the stick is also the size. First day, I was fully fine with it as it was brand new. But I can see that as it wears out, It'll be pretty hard to grind it w/o dirtying my hand.Some complain it's too hard or too difficult to produce ink. It's because they don't know how to grind it properly. It is very easy for me to use the stick. Just like cutting steak, you need to know how to. It's not about brute force but optimal force.

If you're a watercolor artist, I insist you try this for your black work. The ink dries quickly, layers well, and you can deepen it easily for refined detail work. One of my favorite tools! This arrived quickly, and in good condition. High quality/

So far so good. But grinding the ink stick to get sticky ink seems tough.

Everything works fine but I was surprised with the mold in the ink stick and had to clean it off but the ink stone works well.