Look up, "The making" that's what just brought me here from the recommended tab. (One episode about making gold leaf) It follows the same formula as this. It's like, "How it's made" except it's Japanese and it shows each and every step along with the worker's, etc. Also damn you're cute as hell
@@vigisbigtm Brother I am unaware, but he too must be getting on in age, hopefully he was able to apprentice someone. It's a shame that the wealth stolen from India and other Commonwealth countries to pay for England's Industrial revolution was the trumpet all the way back then for the fast, cheap and nasty products we have today, unlike Mr Keizo fountain pen, he even had some for sale for $100 usd - unbelievable !!
@@tco13v only 100? That's actually an amazing price, most fully custom pens like this go for much more, particularly in Japan. Praise to him for having such good value in business too!
@@knightghost534 Pricing goes up with gold nibs, The cheapest 14k gold nib model I found was over 500 USD, and it was used. The less expensive models (300 USD and lower) have gold plated steel nibs. Nothing wrong with steel nibs, but they don't have the flexibility to allow much variation in line width if one wants to exert their calligraphic skills-
Love the lathe with the wooden collet body and the clamping rings. The sound of the flat belt and splice going across the pulleys made a wonderful sound.
So you can one day tell your grandchildren that one day a long time ago, you watched a video on 'the internet' about an old person making something 'by hand'. And they will be awed.
I love everything about this video. The craftsmanship, the unique tools, the love, the spending time with our elders, the fact that at age 97 they are as youthful as a child.
I sold pens for 4 years , all types but this was the first time i ever saw them being made , i have even repaired some of his pens , new nibs etc. It is becoming a lost art but writing with a fountain pen is an experience .
Not sure how I got here, but this is inspiring. I'd love to work on being exceptionally good at one specific thing. I'm pulled in a million different directions every day at work, which has made me a jack of all trades but master of none. It's frustrating.
Mr. Kato appears to have passed in 2010, unfortunately. Mr. Onishi (also in the vid) took over the shop from what I understand. global.rakuten.com/en/store/penroom/item/20807/?s-id=borderless_browsehist_en
For the first time I feel sad that I got my beautiful Jinhao X750 off ebay for $3.50 I hope there are still people who will buy these wonderful works of craft made by such skilled craftsmen It would be a shame to lose these skills for ever
Despite the barrel and cap being made of turned enameled brass, the X750 weighs only 36 grams with the cap on, and 23 grams without (filled with ink). Until you brought it to my attention, I never thought the weight was an issue
Yeah, I'm remembering the 450 which is 42 grams and can be used as a weapon if thrown at someone. lol. My TWSBI Eco is 21 grams by caparison. I have a full custom pen similar to the one in the video made by WriteTurnz, and it weighs in at 24 grams. I find that the heavier a pen is the more tired my hand gets with longer writing sessions.
That was awesome....skilled craftsmen like him all over the world...put their heart and soul into their work alot by hand and probably get paid a pitence. Yet they still care and craft every item they turn out. Something that would be lost on ALOT of people these days! In todays day of wanting everything cheap and NOW and lots of it...a handcrafted item would mean nothing to too many people. I recently heard of a master watchmaker sad because he had no one to pass down his skills too. Some things cant be taught...some things you need to feel and just know.
Vaya, un trabajo muy duro para hacer una pluma fuente, y las hacen muy bien además de todo. Muchas gracias a Michael T Shue Studios por publicar este maravilloso video
Dudes like 100 years old shaping and rolling threads with his hands, eyes and feet. In America we use a die not and a c.n.c. lathe. Crazy! Old timer is a bad ass STRAIGHT UP.
Kiyoshi Kato I bow my head in respect.I am an ardent ink pen writer and do have few Ebonite pens of India local hand made pens.I always love the handcrafted pens.I am passionately interested to use your pens ,please let me know where can I buy these pens please?.Once again kudos to you and if and when you visit Hyderabad ,on demand I owe you a best food of Hyderabad as dinner! Thank You Vijay
I know the mystique of something hand-made is fascinating to watch. I'd not pay extra for such a thing and would rather have the same thing made by a robot since there is more consistency and accuracy with a machine that is standardized and will probably last longer. I know, I know, he's a craftsman, it's an art-form, blah, blah, blah. I guarantee you if you examine them under a microscope or jewelers glass you'll see flaws and variations that you wouldn't get with a properly set up machine/assembly apparatus. Mechanized products are far superior unless you want to start your own museum.
Thats sort of the rub when it comes to making art in a utilitarian form. I used to make bowls, which are also mass produced. So a lot of people expected very different prices. Even though it wasn't hard to see how different a handmade bowl from a single piece of green wood is from a laminated flat bottom but i still had a lot of people who would get personally offended by the fact they wanted one because "its so much prettier than the ones at the store" but it wasn't the same price. No I make hollow forms which are far harder to make, and the people that are buying them are buying them for the art so they understand its a luxury good. For me, the art I own is made by people I personally know, people I love and people I admire, so the actual substance of a piece is only a part of how or why I appreciate it.
so no testing is done like ink flow and so on ? and the nibs seem to be bought somewhere else and not manufactured there ? kinda disappointing considering the price
When he was alive, the pens cost less than $200 and utilized a Sailor nib (if my memory serves only having seen them at pen shows). Many of the similar small manufacturers today (NewtonPens, Scriptorium, Hooligan, etc.) sell in the same range with Jowo nibs.
the internal of the pen is mass produced...only the outside of the pen is hand made.. so writing with the pen is not the same as a real hand made fountain pen...
Meh. When you have some processes that literally only need a body to operate and no experience, does that really count as entirely handmade? (Not saying it discounts its other qualities, more posing the question of at what point does something stop being hand made?
Calling Celluloid a plastic is like calling a 1962 Ferrari 250 GTO a car. Yes, you are technically correct, but it doesn't look or feel like any other plastic. It has a warmth to the touch and a depth in the colors. Celluloid takes over a year to make and cure properly (why it fell out of favor with most production companies, oh and its extremely flammable) , yet is still used on some of the high end pens from Montegrappa and others.
61% of Japanese are over 65 so with only 26% of the population able to pay pensions they will have to work in their old age or of course starve in the streets to indifferent onlookers too buy rushing to their office jobs to actually imagine that one day they too will be OLD.
This is awesome! My sister studied in Japan for 7 years and had been given one of these pens as a present. I never knew there was so much work involved to make one of these. Thank you for the video.
For real. Wish somebody would get Mr. Kato a taller workbench to give his back/neck some relief! I wonder that's the only position he can really work in, though. Well, in any case, he is a legend.
Jason Yang - Mass production is excellent for TV's, DVD's, cars or fridges BUT with something as personal as a special fountain pen (the kind of pen that is given as a gift) it's still better to have something that was hand-made with care by a master craftsman. It is a real pleasure to watch people working who take real care and pride in a job well done.
Jason Yang Something handmade, by a craftsman, is almost always better than something mass produced. Better quality, better for & finish, better wearing, better looking, better feeling, better....
Edit: Good to hear the work continues. Please tell me the guy that was there in the first part of the video has been apprenticing and can continue this when Mr Kato goes on to his next life and that beautiful, little shop will be making pens for many many more years to come.
Who will want to do this in future? It's wonderful to watch and imagine being next to him to really see what he does (but I'm wearing goggles!). Incredible craftsmanship.
It's hard to beat a quality fountain pen. I had used one when I went to an engineering school. I had to be able to write as fast as a professor talked during a lecture. It was nearly impossible to write fast with a regular ball pen. I resorted to a fountain pen with a gold plated end. It worked amazingly well.
The oil based BIC ballpoint has killed cursive. People revert to print to save muscle fatigue, and this slows down answer response during exams. Less time is available for thought.
I lost count HOW many times I have watched this video!!! How awesome would be to hang around and learn from this guy! I wonder where does he get his lathes 🤔
Another video that strikes my heart. Every inch of this video is a sacred grail of work, expertise and excellence. Our love for work pays a tribute to our past. This is the type of video that I put in a pedestal as the raw valuable production of the internet. We achieved something with Google and RU-vid. We rescued all these people from obscurity. We place them in high regards, respect, duty and traditions. If this is the future, I want more of it.
3:05 wow! What a simple yet so effective and efficient way to tighten the chuck!! Just a wooden cylinder split into 3 or 4 sections towards the bit end and then you just slide the ring up until its snug from the chuck expanding where its grabbing the object. Really cool to see that
Fantastic display of skills that are dying out. But at 8:20 he's not adjusting the internal dimensions, as the caption says, but putting an internal thread in. I use a Mont Blanc fountain pen, but after watching this, I decided to search one of these out. Wonderful to watch.
