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?

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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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The Faber-Castell PITT Set includes four different sizes of markers: B (Brush), C (Chisel/Calligraphy), 1.5 (1.5 mm Bullet), and 2.5 (2.5 mm Bullet). I was hoping that the largest size would be useful for posters but its not quite that chonky. Overall, the Faber-Castell PITT set has a nice range of sizes if you’re not sure what will work best for your project.

The photo above shows the tip sizes. From left to right: chisel/calligraphy, brush, 1.5 mm and 2.5 mm. The 2.5 mm barrel is much larger than the other three pens so its a big pen for me to hold in my tiny, little hands.

The other pen I got was the Pentel Milky Brush pen in white. There is a push button on the end that can be pushed to force more ink into the brush tip.

Oh, that brush tip! Its a nylon bristle brush tip not a molded foam tip like the brush in the Faber-Castell PITT set. I love the brushes that have real bristles because the point is often so much finer. The bristles are soft and flex easily for a great range of stroke widths. Pumping the end will add more ink as needed.

I tested these pens on kraft and grey paper stock. They all performed much better on the kraft stock. The grey paper was a bit too light to show them in their best light (or should I say, best white?)

On the Kraft stock, it was easy to get good results with all the markers though I do find that the Pentel Milky Brush was more opaque overall. The PITT markers worked well and could be applied with multiple layers for a more opaque coverage/

Despite the grey paper being a bit light, it does quickly show that the Pentel Milky Brush is much more opaque with one pass of color compared to the PITT white markers.

Further testing is needed to determine how well these markers will work with mixed media drawings when combined with colored pencils, other pens and markers and paint. The PITT pens are India ink so they are lightfast, permanent, and archival. That is definitely an advantage if you are using these with other tools. The Pentel Milky Brush is listed as being water-resistant but there are no additional specifications though with white inks, they are likely to be lightfast.

Depending on your comfort with a real brush pen, I would recommend giving the Pentel Milky Brush a try. If you prefer a bullet tip or chisel tip or need the archival or guaranteed permanent quality, then I think the PITT Brush Set is a good option though I prefer the Pentel Milky Brush overall.

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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(There is also a 36-color set ($59.50, $1.65 per pencil) that contains a selection of 28 colors from the original Color Dictionary sets plus eight additional colors. )

The name Irojiten means “Color Dictionary”. Iro means “color” and Jiten means “dictionary”. Pretty clever.

While I love the packaging and aesthetic of the Irotijen sets, I could never rationalize buying another set of colored pencils. Then curiosity got the best of me and I finally caved. The packaging alone is a thing of beauty. I don’t usually like excessive packaging but Tombow did this beautifully. Each set of 10 pencils comes in a paperboard box that opens like a book and is held closed with an elastic band. Then all three boxes slide into a slipcase that keeps everything organized and contained and ready for your bookshelf or desktop. For as lovely as the packaging is, all the boxes are uncoated paperboard so its recyclable (just snip off the elastics) if you are a “store all your pencils in a cup” person like me.

I only purchased the first set which contains volumes 1, 2, and 3 — Pale I,  Vivid I, Deep I. If I end up being madly in love with these pencils, I can purchase the others but I decided to err on the side of frugality.

Pricewise, this set of Irojiten seemed most comparable to a Prismacolor or Polychromos sets with a similar number of pencils. Both Prismacolor ($o.85-0.88 per pencil in set, $1.39 individually) and Polychromos (about $1.24 per pencil in set, $2.65 individually) pencils come is sets of 24 or 36, and work out to be only slightly cheaper than the Irojiten sets per pencil (according to my quick peek at the Blick web site).

The pencils come pre-sharpened but the ends are pretty blunt. The advantage of having pre-sharpened pencils is you can just jump right in and start using them. I did find that after I did my first swatches, I really wanted to sharpen these.

The color swatches above were organized by set: Vol. 1 Pale Tone 1, Vol. 2 Vivid Tone 1 and Vol. 3 Deep Tone 1. My first experience with the pencils felt a bit harder than the colored pencils I usually lean towards. The colors were well-pigmented but felt like they required more effort to get the color onto the paper.

Once I did these color swatches, I realized that my brain doesn’t work like this — organized by saturation level. I tend to sort my colored pencils into warm colors and cool colors and like having all my yellows (or blues or purples) out and available at the same time. So, as much as I appreciate the aesthetics of the packaging, I am not inclined to keep the pencils in the boxes. My pencils ALWAYS end up living in cups and jars because they are quick and easy to access.

I sharpened the Irojtien pencils with my Dahle 133 Pencil Tabletop Manual Sharpener ($19.99) dialed to a medium-sharp point. I also wanted to see if sharpening the pencils might also help with the hardness. Sometimes, c0l0red pencils can feel a bit dry if they’ve been sharpened for a long time (I think the oil or wax dries out a bit) so I thought sharpening them would be worth a try. Also, since the pencils seemed harder, a sharper point would be easier to accomplish.

The Irojiten pencils did sharpen very well but did not feel any softer after being sharpened. This would make these pencils good for detail work and small drawings. I also re-swatched the colors, organized by hue. What I think is most notable about the set is that there is really only one red pencil. The Crimson (D-1) felt more like a warm brown than a red to me. There also seemed to be a surprising number of green colors (6 or 7, depending on whether you think Ice Green P-6 is more green or more blue).

My last round of tests was to verify if the Irojiten pencils were really harder than my beloved Prismacolors. The short answer is yes. It did not require as much pressure to apply a rich layer of the Prismacolor pencils. I know a lot of people have issues with the Prismacolors for being too soft, breaking easily, uncentered cores, etc. they pay dividends in sheer pigment load and range of colors available for the price.

My final impression of the Irojiten colored pencils is that it is a lovely set with pencils that are harder than other pencils. If you have a heavy hand or are looking for a colored pencil set for detail work, the Irojiten is a good option. If you are looking for colored pencils that are creamy and have a dense pigment load, then I recommend trying Prismacolors instead. The packaging is not as cool but if you’re like me, your colored pencils will end up in a cup anyway so the packaging doesn’t really matter.

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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The Tropical Set ($13.50) was an impulse purchase. The colors seemed like they had been selected just for me. The set includes the four mechanical pencils and a set of replacement leads in a white plastic desktop holder. The pencils and the lead holder snap into the display holder making if a lovely set to keep on your desk.

In drawing, I noticed that the pink and green colors were softer and went down on the paper more easily than the orange and purple which felt like they were harder cores. It did make me curious if, in the other sets, some of the colors would be smoother and softer while others harder. I prefer a softer, creamier core in my colored pencils.

In most mechanical pencils, because the cores are so much thinner than in a wood-cased pencil, the leads do tend to be much harder. That said, I was delighted with some of the Emott pencils having softer cores.

I tested the erasability and I would have to say my results were poor. Though, normally speaking, most colored pencils are not erasable so its not a make-or-break for me. The colors are describe as water resistant which is more in keeping with most colored pencils and should work well when combined with watercolor or water soluble inks and markers. Way more fun than erasable, IMHO.

Overall, the set is a bit more expensive than a simple set of wood-cased pencils. Most wood-cased pencils sets of 12 -24 pencils start at about $20 (and go up to about $40) from brands like Prismacolor, Blackwing, Faber-Castell and Tombow Irotijen. If cost/value is a priority, I would recommend sticking to classic wood-cased colored pencils. If novelty and cute packaging (and mechanical pencil option) is more your speed, than the Emott pencils might be appealing. As curious as I am about the softness of the other colors from the Emott line, I am not sure its worth spending $13.50 for four pencils when I have literally hundreds of wood-case pencils I could use instead. Final opinion: cute but spendy.

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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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 chose the non-stick, fluorine-coated pink pair. It’s available in several other colors, with basic stainless steel blades ($7.25) and with titanium-coated blades ($10.50). The pair comes with a safety cap.

The packaging information is all in Japanese, but according to JetPens’ product description, the scissors feature “a distinctive curved upper blade similar to those found in pruning shears. This lets you cut more cleanly while exerting about a quarter of the force you would need to use a pair of conventional scissors. Because the curved edge is longer than the straight edge, it pulls along the surface of what you’re cutting.”

I didn’t really understand the benefits of this feature when I first read it, but the package shows an illustration of a kitchen knife’s curved blade, and suddenly it all made sense. Not that I know anything about cooking (my culinary expertise ends at avocado toast and the same artichoke dip I’ve been making since the ‘80s), but all the chefs on TV advise using a “rocking motion” with a curved blade, which does make it easier to chop vegetables quickly and efficiently.

In action, the Sakutto Cut Hikigiri scissors do cut very smoothly and comfortably. I don’t know how to measure whether I’m using only a quarter of the force I use with my conventional Scotch brand scissors (purchased years ago at Costco, I think), but the Sakutto pair definitely feels like it requires less effort.

Where the Sakutto scissors really shine compared to my old Scotch pair is the non-stick fluorine coating. They cut through a piece of masking tape as if it were ordinary paper (the same tape stuck badly to the Scotch pair’s titanium blades).

My only complaint about the Sakutto scissors is that the handles are not as ergonomically comfortable as they seem like they should be, given the emphasis on comfort otherwise. I think the handles on my old Scotch pair are more comfortable, with appropriate shaped holes for the thumb and fingers. The Sakutto handles are the same shape for both.

Nonetheless, I’m happy to replace my old scissors with the Sakutto Hikigiri (which means “cutting while pulling” in Japanese). They may be over-engineered by big-box scissors standards, but they do the job better, and that’s good enough for me.

By the way, if you’re wondering why a lefty like me is using scissors for righties, it’s because when I was learning to cut, all scissors were made for right-handed people. Now it’s fairly easy to get lefty scissors, and I’ve tried some, but like the time I tried a left-handed pencil sharpener, after a lifetime of using righty scissors, it felt too weird and unnatural to use my “correct” hand. I gave them up quickly. (I wonder if Ana and Laura feel that way about using lefty scissors? — Ed. Note: Yes, I use right handed scissors because lefty ones are weird.) If nothing else, lefties are the most adaptable people in the world because they have to use all these instruments that have been made for their wrong hand.

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

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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