It’s that time of month! Well, a little late, honestly, because the box always comes the first week. I blame the holidays.
You guys get both my actual drawing and my practice scribbles, because I did them on the same page.
What’s nice this month is that the colors all kind of go together. They’re all kind of vintage-y. Don’t know that I needed two different reds, but maybe! I drew an ornament for festive reasons.
Let’s go through the pickings, shall we?
Graph’It Alcohol-Based Twin Tip Marker
This is the kind of turquoise-y blue one. It is double-sided, with a fine tip side and a brush side (as you can see in the scribbles, and I used both in the ornament, though less obviously). Like the purple marker last month, this one bled through my paper. Other than that, though, it’s nice. Flows well, nice colors.
Kuretake-ZIG Clean Color f Double-Ended Marker
This is the red (not the one next to the “ahh”). As you can see from the scribbles, both ends are relatively fine. (The marker says .5mm on one end and 1.2mm on the other.) I used it for the bottom of the ornament. It’s nice, does not bleed through. Not great for coloring large areas for obvious reasons, but could be good for outlining or adding pops of color.
Derwent Paint Pens
I have two, red and a vaguely-green yellow. These are the paint splotches in the scribbles, because the instructions on the side of the paint pens say to shake and then depress for 10 seconds, and I must have misunderstood the depress-ing part, cuz I got gobs of paint. Once primed, however, the inks spreads really nicely and are good to fine details. I used them for the top and bottom of the ornament, and the red decorations on the ornament itself. Take a little bit to dry.
Royal Talens Ecoline Brush Pens
I love brush pens almost as much as I love Sakura Micron pens, honestly. I got two, the pink and the gold in the picture above. The description of them that came in the box say they’re liquid watercolors, which I’d believe, since the color is a little bit transparent (more obvious on the pink than the gold). They spread really nice, though they do change color on multiple coats, as you would expect from a marker or watercolors. Makes shading easier, but do need to be aware of it.
I’m actually really happy with this month’s box. When I first opened it I was kind of meh, especially with the overlaps in color (two reds, two kind of golds), but now that I’ve worked with them a bit I’m feeling pretty good.
I used my gift certificate that I won last month to buy a set of 24 markers. They’re double-sided, fine and brush tips, so I’m interested to see how that goes. As you guys know, I’m a little unconfident in my coloring, which is why I tend to stick to colored pencils, but it’s good to try out new things, and using markers should be faster. They’re not here yet, but hopefully they’ll get here soon.
Anyway! How are you, squider? Any thoughts on markers? Favorite type? Read any good books? I’m on my usual Christmas mystery kick. Currently reading one called Twelve Slays of Christmas which is an excellent pun.
