Colored pencils review

I am an artist as well as a colorist for adult coloring books, when KJColors offered this set of colored pencils to me for free in exchange for my honest opinion/review, I jumped at the opportunity. I received 48 colored pencils in a canvas roll up wrap pencil holder, it also contained a cheap paint brush, a cheap pencil sharpener and a Faber-Castell brand blue eraser, all of this was inside a retail box. The pencils were pre-sharpened and arrived intact, no leads were broken.

The first thing I did was take out all of the pencils and arrange them in a more pleasing arrangement for me, by color family, they were close but I have different ideas as to how my colors should be arranged 😊. They come with a good assortment of colors, the only colors that might be considered to fall short are the yellows, there are only 2 yellows, but if you are clever you can get past that.

I was a bit perplexed by the eraser, being a premium name brand, Faber-Castell, I wondered about how well these colors might erase, I was pleasantly surprised to discover they erase quite nicely, kudos to KJColors!

The pencils are hexagonal in shape so they will not roll around, I like that,. The barrels are nice and straight, they are painted with the color of the lead and match up for the most part, there are a few that aren't even close, so a color chart swatch should be done, something I recommend anyhow.

Now down to the important business, how it colors. I'd say they were midrange, they aren't premium high end but you aren't paying premium prices for these. They are definitely higher quality than what you would get in your local dollar store. I colored a page in a coloring book, the colors lay down smoothly and layer & blend nicely. They are a medium hardness/softness, allowing you to get different looks based on how hard you press. None of them broke while I used them, they didn't wear down any faster than I expected them to.

The pencil case is a nice touch, the pencils fit one to a slot and will not fall out, there is also a spot to hold the paintbrush, sharpener and eraser. There is a faux leather flap that covers the sharpened end of the pencils to protect the leads. This wrap rolls up and has a snap fastener so you can take your pencils securely on the road.

The pencil sharpener and paintbrush are really cheap, but they work.

My wish list for future versions:
1. Put color names on the pencils, or at least put numbers on them that correspond with the colors

That's it, that is the only thing I can find wrong. 😊
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CRE8365 day 18 - Winnie the Pooh

Now I'm catching up, yesterday was a busy day for me, I had church in the morning, then went to work in the afternoon, it was after 9pm before I got home and still had to write 2 articles for a site where I write and make dinner, so now I'm just complaining, when in reality it was a really good day, I got to go to church, the sermon was fantastic! I got to sing a new song at church and it went over really well, and work, well I haven't been doing much working lately, it was good to get back into doing something I love to do and get paid for it, plus I got to hang out with my work partner and friend, and writing, well I love to write. :)

OK, now to my daily CRE8, the prompt for the day was Winnie the Pooh, a cartoon character I grew up watching and loving. Several other artists on CRE8365 drew some really nice renditions of WtP, so I became inspired to try my hand.

I decided to do a side by side of the newer Disney'esk style and the older, original WtP. I will say right off the bat that I prefer drawing the older style. The newer WtP has more detail, the red shirt, but it's flat, no shading. The old school WtP has less detail, no red shirt, but the coloring is more delicate and has some subtle shading in the fur.

I sketched this in pencil, then did the line work using a Nano-Liner in 05 size, then I colored it using Cra-Z-Art colored pencils. I was reminded why I don't like Nano-Liners, the ink is "heavy", it bleeds through the paper, this paper is made for pen and ink work, yet the ink still bled through, it also has a chemical odor, I suppose that's why I found this pen in the clearance section of Hobby Lobby. :)

The colored pencils are cheap, but they work pretty well, they are not in the same league as Prismacolor pencils, but they work just fine, especially for doing something like this.

http://cre8365.com

Christmas cards 2013 (Doodle # 17-35)

Alrighty, been super busy but wanted to make some Christmas cards, since leading the zendoodle class a few months ago, and learning that at least one of the ladies in the class were going to be making cards, I felt like I really needed to make these cards... besides, it was so fun! Any excuse to get to doodle, right?

When I started I had no idea how many I would make, it ended up being 19 (plus one that didn't get scanned, I'll explain later), I just sat down several times over a few days and got them done. First I sketched them in pencil, then inked, then some got colored pencil, or colored marker, and/or shading with pencil. I used a gold pen, a silver pen, white pen and silver sharpie marker, on the scans the silver ink comes out looking grey, that's just the nature of the beast.

I did a combination of ZIA and cutesy bears, and one cutesy dog, the dog card went to my neighbor who gave us a rescue dog (Zoe). Turned out that I had almost exactly the number of cards I needed to give to everyone, I still need to make 2 more then I'll be done. The one I didn't scan went to a friend who just lost her husband, I made that card last (of this batch) and didn't have time to scan it.

All the cards with the exception of one are 100% hand done, including the lettering, the only one that I used Photoshop on was the Noel card (on the circles and letters only), I wanted to make the letters look like they were on a spherical surface, after doing the all the hand lettering on the other cards, I know I could have done that as well. All images can be clicked on if you wish to see it larger.

  This is the only dog, and it went to my neighbor up the road who gave us Zoe.

 The lettering was colored with silver Sharpie marker, the bears are shaded with pencil.

 The inside of this card says "A Very Beary Christmas".

 The circles of the balls and the letters were done in Photoshop, all the rest of this card is hand done. I used gold and silver ink on this one.

 I had a good time doing the lettering on this one, when it's first done, it looks so messy, then when I started adding the designs and color, it really came together.

 This one I thought I would be my least favorite, and it turned out to be one of my favorites once I added color.

 I incorporated a ZIA and a realistic leaf design.

 I tried something new by putting in the scrolls, wasn't sure if I would like it or not, but it turned out just fine.

 This was my most intricate design.

 I was running out of ideas, but this still turned out pretty good.

 PB didn't get this one until I colored in the black around the bear. The letters on this are colored with silver Sharpie marker.

 I began adding doves to my designs, I like it.

 I added more doves, I shaded around the doves to make them "pop".

 Some of the letters are done in silver Sharpie marker.

 Silver Sharpie marker...

 I had a good time drawing the bears :)

 Didn't like this one until I added color, then it looked just fine.

 This is the only one I did with colored pencil, it came out OK, it is actually brighter than the scan appears to be.

Another one with silver Sharpie marker.













Altogether, I used:
White cardstock 8.5x11 folded in half
Micron liner pens, black
colored markers
silver Sharpie marker
gold, silver and white ink pen
Ticonderoga pencil

Doodle # 14

This is from the Diva Weekly Challenge #136 
this one was a wide open challenge, the only requirements were to use color, we could use any design we chose...

I tried using color a bit in some of my earlier designs but I wasn't happy with them, so I had essentially put color on hold, this challenge made me rethink using color with doodles. This one has subtle color, I picked mostly greens and the yellow, with a hint of purples and pink. The dominant tangle design is called Leaflet,  the Zendala was from the Zendala dare #73 on The Bright Owl's page. I had a great time with this challenge.

I used:
Micron black liner 01, 03
CraZart colored pencils
standard printer paper

Doodle #5

This was a strange one for me, it's the eye in the middle, I used to draw eyes all the time, all different sorts of eyes, human, animal and other... I need to work on incorporating eyes into my doodles better, this one is just right there in your face...

The birds and the sun are whimsical and take some of the edginess away from the eye. I don't know why or how I ended up with the squiggle going out of the square on the bottom, but I like the effect.

I like this one, colorwise, better than the previous colored one. I did this with a 005 and a 01 Micron Liner pen and colored it with Crayola colored pencils.

Doodle #4

I played around with color on this one, I drew a string then did the large pineapple looking thing, I added the hills, the houses and the circles on the bottom. I used a 01 Micron pen to do the doodles and Crayola colored pencils to do the color. I didn't color the circles at the bottom, I might go back in and do that sometime, for now though, they will remain B&W.

The houses are supposed to represent a song called "Little Boxes", it's about all of us living in little boxes made of ticky tacky, all doing the same thing... I chose to make all the houses red instead of all the colors mentioned in the song...