I wandered into my local art supply store recently to get a couple very specific pencils. But of course I had to browse. I wandered down the watercolor aisle muttering to myself, “I do not need anymore watercolor palettes.” So of course, I bought a new palette. But it’s different!!!! It’s the Derwent Inktense Paint Palette Set ($25). The set includes 12 small pans of color, a sponge along one edge and a portable waterbrush. The waterbrush is too long to be assembled. The top brush section cannot be screwed into the water reservoir bottom section and then still fit into the space at the bottom of the palette. Weird. I didn’t bother filling the waterbrush and instead used a watercolor brush but it seems like an odd choice. If the sponge section had been made smaller, I think the brush would have fit. Anyway…

If you are not familiar with the Derwent Inktense line, the line started with a variety of water-soluble colored pencils. The interesting thing about the Inktense pencils is that after water is added to create a watercolor effect, once dry, the color is no longer water soluble. So, its water color, until it dries and then it sticks where it is. For multimedia artists, art journalists and collagists, this is a very cool feature. Inktense pencils, and now the Paint Pan Sets, can be used like watercolors then dry and other water soluble art supplies can be used over the color.

The set includes a range of colors including an opaque white. Many watercolor sets will include an opaque white gouache pan but the Derwent Inktense set has a waterproof-when-dry “watercolor” white. This pan is particularly interesting for adding highlights, eye lights, and other touches of white over color.

The other colors include a cool yellow (sherbet lemon), bright orange, cherry (warm red), fuchsia, violet, turquoise, ionian green (forest green), Hooker’s Green (spring green), red oxide, Payne’s Grey (cool grey) and antique white.

Some of the colors show a lot of granulating when applied directly from the pan. I did begin to blend colors and add more water and the granulation wasn’t as apparent.

The swatch above is the opaque antique white which is slightly visible on white paper.

I played around with colors both blended and straight from the palette. I really like the turquoise shade, it is quite dark and really pretty.

Shown above is a close-up of the shadow which was added under the apple after the paint was dry so you can see how the colors can be layered without the previous color moving or changing. I really like this!

The above image shows the orange I painted with added Payne’s Grey and Antique White after the original orange color had dried. In previous efforts, I would have had to use a gel pen to create the white highlights which may or may not have stayed in place because gel pens are water-based as well.

Overall, I think the Inktense Paint Pan Set is a very cool addition to anyone’s art supply kit. I look forward to experimenting my layering these colors with a wider range of supplies. I do wish the pans of color were larger and that Derwent just skipped trying to squeeze a water brush into the kit as its a waste of space.

DISCLAIMER: Some items included in this review were purchased with funds from our amazing Patrons. You can help support this blog by joining our Patreon. Please see the About page for more details.

Finally, I acquired a new iPhone last week and with its new fancy camera, I am trying to determine if its now higher quality than my Canon that I’ve been using for the last few years. Can you tell which photo below was taken with the iPhone and which was taken with the Canon?

The post Art Supply Review: Derwent Inktense Paint Pan Set appeared first on The Well-Appointed Desk.

I always say (to myself and others) that I’m not a sheeny, shiny, glittery gal (I’ve only ever purchased one bottle of shimmery ink, and I gave it away soon after). Obviously a liar, I recently found myself craving some sheeny, shiny, glittery watercolors. The Boku-Undo Gansai Watercolor Palette in the Aurora colors (6/$14.75) looked mouth-watering.

Before I plant my face into the sheen, I thought I’d mention that I’m already a fan of the Boku-Undo mini palettes of unique watercolors. The E-Sumi palette I reviewed a few years ago are a lot of fun to use when I’m in a dark mood. While the e-sumi palette is subdued, the Aurora set is on the opposite end of the scale: It’s all about the dazzling light.

The set includes (from left) gold, silver, red, green, blue and purple. I used both my scanner and my phone to photograph swatches in direct daylight on black and white papers. Each time, the swatches look very different! 

On white paper, the shimmer is apparent in direct light, but the hues are difficult to differentiate and even seem to change. I’m not sure they are worth using on white paper. 

On dark paper, however, the effect is entirely different. The sparkly, metallic particles glow on black paper. I rubbed a finger across the dried swatches, and some sparkly flecks smeared a bit like powder.

It was obvious that I had to make a test sketch on black paper, so I used a black Stillman & Birn Nova sketchbook. And I had just the right reference photo to use! During the summer months when the sun doesn’t go down until 8 or 9 p.m., my spouse guy and I take after-dinner walks through the neighborhood to enjoy the light. The gorgeous “golden hour” is too brief to sketch on location, so I snap a lot of reference photos to sketch from later (like the long, dismal winters when the sun goes down at 4). The photo I used wasn’t as dark as my sketch appears, but the low, warm light gave everything a lovely glow. 

Whatever gives these paints their sparkle also makes them thicker than typical watercolors. I applied them fairly thick to retain as much concentrated shimmer as possible, and they felt a bit creamy rather than watery.

Oooh, these paints are fun on black paper! I have fully embraced my inner glitter gal.

Tina Koyama is an urban sketcher in Seattle. Her blog is Fueled by Clouds & Coffee, and you can follow her on Instagram as Miatagrrl.

The post Watercolor Review: Boku-Undo Gansai Aurora Palette appeared first on The Well-Appointed Desk.

The most interesting aspect of this pen is that hex shape of the barrel and cap. It’s comfortable to hold and doesn’t roll away.

In order to activate the marker, you need to push the tip down until it goes into the barrel to prime the ink. It should only be necessary to do this when its new or if you have used a lot of paint.

For a bullet tip paint pen, the color is pretty opaque and the flow was good.

I would compare the pen and color to a Sharpie water-based paint pen. Most artists have one or two paint pens in their toolbox. I think the Pilot Juice Paint is a good option when you need to replace your existing stash.

DISCLAIMER: The items included in this review were provided free of charge by JetPens for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

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I took a watercolor class a few months ago that left me frustrated. Using a limited palette of pigments, I wanted to learn to mix colors. As I tried to achieve the hues I was looking for, my paint mixes would become increasingly diluted. I’d add more paint to get a thicker concentration, but then I’d have to adjust the mix again, over and over. With practice and help from my instructor, I got better at it eventually, but I started to see the benefit of having lots of pigments easily accessible, all on one palette – without mixing!

Ana had reviewed 36 of the Kuretake Gansai Tambi Watercolors a few years ago, and I liked the range of colors I saw. Kuretake now offers a total of 48 colors, sold as a single set or in two sets of 24 colors each. I decided to try color set A (24/$29.50; color set B is 24/$38).

Just as I was thinking about all this, I suddenly remembered that I had a set of 24 Akashiya Gansai Watercolors ($37) that I had purchased years ago but hadn’t used much. My product reviewer’s mind clicked into gear: Wouldn’t it be fun to compare these two sets!

Their presentations are very similar: Unlike what I think of as a typical watercolor set, with paint pans fitting solidly together in a box, both Akashiya and Kuretake sets are made of loose, individual pans that can be removed easily from their cardboard box and rearranged or replaced (JetPens sells open stock pans for both lines). This form factor makes them impractical for field use, as it would be more than easy to drop the box in transport and see the paint pans go flying. (Kuretake does offer a version of its Gansai paints in a portable palette.)

The upside of this form factor is that the pans are larger than standard (Western style) full-size pans, so it’s possible to use large, flat brushes to make wide washes without a mixing tray. (I also have a Sakura Koi Watercolor Field Sketch Box, but without mixing, the tiny pans can only be used with small brushes.) The Akashiya pans are 1 3/8-inch squares, while the Kuretake pans are 1-by-1 ¾ inches.

Both products consist of artist-quality, lightfast, non-toxic paints. They are made in a traditional Japanese way that can give the result a slightly glossy, opaque finish when heavily applied. Like watercolors, some pigments are more opaque than others, but I wouldn’t say any are as opaque as gouache.

My Akashiya set is more than 10 years old, and some paints have cracked and shrunk so that they are now loose and rattling around in their pans. I don’t think the paint quality has degraded, however. I’ve sometimes seen aged gouache pans shrink in the same way, so perhaps these watercolors contain some of the same binders as gouache.

Akashiya helpfully puts the color number and name on the side of the pan for easy viewing (but unhelpfully in Japanese only).

Kuretake includes the same information in both Japanese and English on the less accessible bottom of the pan. It also includes the number and Japanese color name on the box tray itself. This feature I find less useful, since I might want to rearrange the colors to suit the way I work.

Next I’ll show the color ranges. Each set includes a blank color chart on the inside of the box lid for making swatches. Unfortunately, in both cases, the cardboard lid’s paper doesn’t show the colors to best effect, so I made additional swatch charts in a Hahnemühle watercolor sketchbook. The black grid lines are intended to show opacity (and apparently, I can’t count when I’m drawing lines).

Akashiya colors:

Kuretake colors:

In general, this Akashiya palette is more muted, while the Kuretake set is more saturated. (Kuretake’s Set B looks like a more muted range.) Interestingly, the Akashiya set includes metallic gold and silver, which are unusual in any watercolor set.

With basic comparisons done, it was time to put the pedal to the metal. I had just purchased a bright bouquet of peonies from a family of flower growers who have a weekend kiosk at our neighborhood gas station. Despite my initial impressions from swatches that the Akashiya paints were less vibrant, I had no problem achieving intense hues in this sketch (the rough lines and marks you see on some flowers were made with watercolor pencils). My method was to dip a Kuretake water brush into the paints and apply them directly to a Stillman & Birn Beta sketchbook page with no mixing or blending except as it occurred on the paper. Looking at my swatch sheet as a color guide, it was fun not to otherwise test the colors first to see if they were “right” (which I am constantly doing when I mix in a separate mixing tray). Aside from my enthusiasm resulting in a bit of overworking, I was happy with this test sketch.

The following weekend, I bought another bouquet, this time to take to the cemetery on Memorial Day. Using the same methods and the same water brush and sketchbook, I painted the bouquet with the Kuretake set. This bouquet had lighter pink blossoms than the first one and a challenging white peony, too. I was thrilled by the hues I was able to achieve with no laborious mixing. And even though the paints look intense in my swatches, giving my water brush a squeeze as I dipped into the paints gave me nice pale tints for the lavender and pink blossoms. Again, it was great fun being able to simply dip and paint without all that mixing fuss! In fact, I know now why I like to paint this way – it’s more like using colored pencils!

Looking at the two sets together, the palettes complement each other well. I like the selection of greens better in the Kuretake set, but the Akashiya set includes some lovely muted tones (not to mention gold and silver). I don’t think I can say one is better than the other in terms of quality, so the choice is more a matter of colors included in the sets. In terms of packaging, I prefer the Kuretake’s tray, which may be slightly more secure than the Akashiya box, which has nothing but the box itself holding the pans together.

Some would point out that it’s more economical to buy tube paints and fill my own empty palette. But what’s the fun in that? Both of these Gansai (which means “vibrance”) sets are the colored pencils of paints: An instantly gratifying rainbow in a box. Get yourself one for the next time you feel compelled to paint a bouquet (which I heartily recommend for an immediate lift in your spirits).

DISCLAIMER: Some items included in this review were provided free of charge by JetPens for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

Tina Koyama is an urban sketcher in Seattle. Her blog is Fueled by Clouds & Coffee, and you can follow her on Instagram as Miatagrrl.

The post Watercolor Review: Akashiya Gansai and Kuretake Gansai Tambi appeared first on The Well-Appointed Desk.

Overall the packaging was in great condition and while some of the crayons were broken in half, the only crayon that was missing was the black. There was only two small pieces of the black.

The shape of these crayons is a flat rectangular shape so there are lots of edges to use for drawing and coloring.

The two images above show the full range of colors. There is actually a great range of colors in this set. When testing these, they definitely felt like a traditional wax crayon but the color deposit seemed a little better than a Crayola but its been years since I used a classic Crayola crayon so I’m just guessing here based on my memory. The big sticks of crayon is really fun to use and allows for a nice shading option.

Using the side of the crayon allowed me to shade in color and then used the corners or edges to create lines. Because of the shapes, its sometimes a little less precise then a round or pointed tool but it was sort of fun to be a little more loose and free with these.

While I don’t expect to use these a lot its so fun to see the quality of materials produced decades ago.

I did find a box of these crayons on Ebay at $7 right now in much better shape than the set I got.

Do you ever pick up old art or office supplies at thrift stores or yard sales? What was your best score? Share with us in the comments!

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Although I’m mostly a colored and graphite pencil sketcher, sometimes I get into a painty mood. If I haven’t used paints in a while, though, I get a bit overwhelmed by choosing and mixing colors; I just want to grab a brush and hit the page with it. That’s what I love about a watercolor set like the Kuretake Gansai Tambi Graphite Colors (palette of 6/$16.50). The neutral, near-black hues require no mixing to have fun with.

The set comes in a cardboard palette of six pans that are larger than traditional watercolor full pans (though a bit shallower). The color name (in English and Japanese) and color number appear on the underside of the pan, and the number also appears on the palette. I find the color name on the pan to be especially handy because the subtle, dark hues can be difficult to identify when dry. (Apparently, these paints are not available individually at JetPens.)

When swatched, the hues become more distinct. The lightfast colors recall the Boku-Undo E-Sumi Watercolor Palette that I reviewed a while back. While that set evokes the rich blackness of ink, the Kuretake set is more subtle and matte like graphite. (I love having both pen- and pencil-like watercolor sets!)

According to the JetPens product description, “the surface of the paint can be polished to reveal a metallic luster.” That statement piqued my curiosity, so I took a paper towel and rubbed the concentrated ends of my swatches. It was difficult to photograph to show the luster, but with light reflected directly, the paints do show a subtle, graphite-like sheen.

To make test sketches, I first used green and red to sketch a portrait (reference photo by Earthsworld).

Then I sketched my friend Skully (inspired by the X-Files character, of course) twice in a gray Stillman & Birn Nova sketchbook – once with blue and once with violet. (The white highlights were made with an East Hill Tombstone white brush pen that Ana and I both reviewed several years ago.)

I used a standard-size East Hill Kumadori water brush to make these sketches. With a finer brush (and a finer hand), I think these graphite-inspired paints would be lovely for calligraphy as well as painting.

DISCLAIMER: The items included in this review were provided free of charge by JetPens for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

Tina Koyama is an urban sketcher in Seattle. Her blog is Fueled by Clouds & Coffee, and you can follow her on Instagram as Miatagrrl.

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The set also include stickers to label the tubes as well as a piece of double sided tape to use to connect multiple sets together.

This set of stamp pads are designed to be little caps that you can slip on to the end of your finger and then tamp the color onto your stamps. So they will work with any size stamp and you could even potentially mix colors on your stamp to create a rainbow or other effect.

The inks in the pads are pigment based and water washable.

The colors could also be applied to paper as dots or color blocking the way some people use other stamp pads, just on a smaller scale.

The colors in this set are similar to cyan, magenta, yellow and black. It’s a fun set and I am looking forward to testing it out with my stamps. Have you ever tried this little stamp pads?

DISCLAIMER: Some items included in this review were provided free of charge for the purpose of review. Some items were purchased with funds from our amazing Patrons. You can help support this blog by joining our Patreon. Please see the About page for more details.

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I should start by saying that my speciality is needle arts, so I know next to nothing about paint pens. This is a set of 10 water based acrylic markers – 8 colors (Cool Fall), plus a white pen and a “blending pen.” While I’m a bit of a dunce at figuring out how to blend (and it looks like Ana didn’t have a lot of success) I did have fun seeing what the colors are.

They don’t come named, but I think they correspond to all the colors of fall leaves – red and orange, green and brown. And there are a few cool blues thrown in there for good measure. In fact, the collection reminds me quite a bit of a crocheted blanket I made last year in an autumn palette.

While these markers worked just fine on my Maruman Mnemosyne paper, I also tried them on black and kraft paper in my Night Sky journal (also from Archer & Olive) with mixed success. Some colors showed up super brightly, while others were paler. Maybe I didn’t press hard enough on the tip to get enough ink flow?

I would say these pens were a middling success, but they were fun to try out!

DISCLAIMER: Some items included in this review were provided free of charge by JetPens for the purpose of review. The Acrylograph pens were purchased with Ana’s own funds, and Laura purchased the Night Sky Journal with her own funds. Please see the About page for more details.

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Once the stickers are removed from the cover, the aged look and gold trim is much more evident. I like that it already looks weather beaten. Even with the gold, it feels less precious. And the scuff hide the kitten scratch on the lower edge of the spine. Those kittens still aren’t very graceful.

The sketchbook features matte touch hardcovers with metallic gold foil details. The book measures 8¼” x 11¾” so its a bit taller than US Letter paper. This is the only sketchbook size that Paperblanks sells and is a bit larger than I like but I let myself pull out wider brushes, big markers and other tools I don’t often use in my smaller, daintier sketchbooks.

Sketchbook Features:

Like other Paperblanks notebooks, the sketchbooks include a gusseted pocket in the back and TWO ribbon bookmarks!

The bookmarks are folded into the book when it arrives, one gold and one red.

When unfolded, the ends are trimmed at an angle and unlikely to fray. Such a delightful addition. I cna’t think of any other sketchbook with these details.

The Paper:

The paper is 200gsm bright white and the sketchbook includes 112 pages. This paper is THICK! It’s a very smooth paper. Not as slick as Rhodia paper but there is very little tooth or texture. The smoothness of the paper won’t shred your felt tip and foam brush pens. Pencils lay down a smooth even line as well.

I immediately went for all my multi-media supplies: gesso, brush pens, ink, markers, watercolor brushes, etc. The butterflies doodled above is a smudge of unbleached titanium gesso over some previous pen tests so that I could “re-use” the page with brush pen and watercolor.

The above sketch was a doodle created from ink splats and a Zig Clean Color DOT marker. I love the dual tips on the DOT marker to create random sized dots, thick lines and extra fine lines.

On this sketch, which is on the other side of the butterfly doodle, is collage, stickers, washi and brush pens.

This experiment combined Sailor Shikiori Brush Pens Caran d’Ache Neoclor II crayons, brush markers and some collage. As written, its a bit of a hodge-podge. I could gesso over the whole mess and “start over” or….

I took advantage of the perforation of the pages and removed the offending sketch. This perforation will also allow you to remove a page if you create a masterpiece and want to frame or scan your work.

General Pen Tests:

I had great luck with a wide variety of tools ranging from felt tip, gel, rollerball and marker. Rubber stamping ink and even alcohol markers seem to do fine on the paper as well. The shimmer and sheen in fountain pen inks was visible too.

However, my Platinum Carbon Desk Pen feathered. I was using the 14K nib which behaves a little differently from the standard steel nib but the feathering surprised me. I am not sure if the nib is so fine that it was tearing whatever sizing is on the paper allowing the ink to soak into the fibers.

From the reverse side of my test page, there is NO showthrough at all. Not in person or on camera. This is definitely a sketchbook where you can easily use both sides of the paper without any issues.

Final Impressions:

Overall, I really like this sketchbook and I was tickled to play on this larger size. The feathering of the fountain pen ink was a bit distressing but the fact that fountain pen ink in markers or splattered on the page performed better definitely makes me think that the fine sharp tip was slicing through the sizing on the paper. So, I will continue to experiment and play with this big book and since the paper is thick enough, if the fountain pens make a mess, I’ll just gesso over it and do something else. It feels strangely liberating to just be laissez faire about this sketchbook.

DISCLAIMER: Paperblanks  Sketchbook was purchased with funds from our Patrons.  If you would like to support this site,  join our Patreon. Thank you!

Other items included in this review were provided free of charge by JetPens for the purpose of review. The other items in the review were purchased by myself. Please see the About page for more details

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As a lefty, smearing my writing is a fact of life. As an adult without a critical teacher looking over my shoulder, it doesn’t don’t bother me much. The only time I get annoyed is when I’m working on a graphite drawing, and I see the mess I’m making – both on my drawing and on my hand. 

With drawing, though, it’s not even a lefty issue, is it? Righty artists make smudgy graphite messes as much as lefties do. I found an easy solution for all of us, whether writing or drawing – the SmudgeGuard Glove.

Wanting to minimize hand coverage, I chose the one-finger style ($14.99). It’s also available in a two-finger style ($16.99), which was apparently requested by tablet users. Both styles can be worn on either hand.

Mine is “cool black,” but it’s also available in “sweet lavender,” which is pretty, but there’s no way I want a color that would instantly show graphite and ink dirt. My black one will look new indefinitely (want to guess how many black items of clothing I own?). Even if it starts to look grungy, the product description says it’s hand-washable.

When I first saw this product, I was skeptical about how comfortable it would be to wear as I draw, but I was pleasantly surprised. I have worn mine many times for a couple of hours at a time, and have not found it uncomfortable, even on a hot day. I think an accurate fit is important, though. Following the product description’s recommendation to “use an actual ruler” (instead of a screen image of the size guide) to measure my hand, the XS fits me (ahem) like a glove. The nylon/spandex fabric is plenty stretchy, but I think baggy fabric of a too-large size might impede comfort and maybe effectiveness. 

The SmudgeGuard Glove is working out much better for me than traditional solutions I’ve tried, like a piece of tissue under my hand (which never seems to be in the right place as I move around). It keeps my hand clean and also prevents transfer of graphite from my hand to the paper. The glove works equally well for writing, too. 

(On warm summer days, I like to take my drawing easel and pencils out on our shady back deck, where these photos were taken.)

DISCLAIMER: Some items included in this review were provided free of charge by JetPens for the purpose of review. Please see the About page for more details.

Tina Koyama is an urban sketcher in Seattle. Her blog is Fueled by Clouds & Coffee, and you can follow her on Instagram as Miatagrrl.

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