So Arrtx sent me a bunch of art supplies
and there was some really interesting stuff here that I can't wait
to explore in future videos.
But the item I am most excited about today, are the new Arrtx colored pencils.
But before I open these pencils, I
wanted to see what else they've sent.
And I definitely wasn't expecting to find this insane collection of Paul Rubens oil paints
After I recently tried to learn
acrylic painting in a day,
many of you said you wanted to
see me learn oil painting next.
So I think we are all set
to make that happen soon with this huge range.
What else is here?
So we have two sketch mixed media pads.
Both are designed to lay flat so.
That you can easily paint on both sides without worrying about damaging the spine.
This paper is really nice and thick,
it'd be interesting to see how nicely the pencils and markers work on this.
We have Banana sketching sponge for making
a hazy and rendered effect on the picture when painting.
Arrtx have also sent me a range
of watercolor paints from some of the
other brands owned by the same company
and some very interesting sparkling watercolor paper.
So I might try one of these on our coloring page later in this
video and save the rest to explore
in more depth in the future.
But this is really what I'm here for today.
The markers and the Arrtx colored pencils.
I've never used the Arrtx alcohol markers
so I've been eager to try these
out for a while and they've sent
me some of the ALP and the
OROS range today, and even just the
packaging already really stands out as a
great giftable option compared to other art
supplies I've tried. Ooh Stickers!
The ALP markers have a bullet and
a chisel nib, and the OROS markers have a chisel and a brush nib.
So for me personally, the OROS markers
are a little more exciting because I use a brush nib
more than anything.
Sets of markers come in a range
of over 200 colors that you can
buy across multiple sets.
If you want the full color range
the best option is to buy the
80 and 90 sets.
And then there's the skin tone set.
Or if you're someone who uses a
specific set of colors more than the
rest, you can buy one of these
smaller sets of 24 to 40 colors
from a particular color range like I've done today with the ALP markers.
So I'm really liking these OROS markers.
They lay down so nicely,
they have really good saturation, and the color range here in the set of
90 I've got, is great.
At first I wasn't sure about the
difference between the set of 80
and the set of 90, but it turns out these offer completely different colors, so
you can buy both without duplicates except
the colorless blender,
which I often use for other things like blending my pencils.
And working on other projects anyway, so
I like having lots of spares.
I do feel like some of the
colors are very similar and this could
be improved to allow for a bit more variety, but overall there's a good
range here with a mix of light and dark colors, pastels, brights and grays
and then there's the skin tone set.
The skin tone set has no duplicates
again with the 80 or 90 markers, which is not always the case when
buying markers at this price point.
I like that there are a good
amount of really light tones that you
can build up, but I do think
this set lacks the darker skin tones
completely, although I have read in a
review on Lindsay the Frugalcrafter's website that
Arrtx are planning to release a range
of darker skin colors in the future.
For now, pairing this skin tone set
with the larger sets does give you
a good overall range that makes up for a lot of those color gaps.
I tested the OROS alcohol markers
on bleed proof marker paper and the Nina Bristol Vellum cardstock that I like
to use for most of my artwork.
And they perform similar to my other markers on all three.
Personally, I'm finding that I prefer the
results on the Nina paper even more
than the marker paper, although this does
absorb a lot more ink, I just
feel it offers a smoother final result
and it will be much easier to layer pencils if I'm wanting to work
with mixedmedia, which is something that I
do a lot in my coloring pages.
These markers do bleed quite a lot
on cheap printer paper, but the same
happens when you're using any alcohol marker, even Copic markers.
They also blend really well, and when
it comes to price, these markers are
under one dollars each in US dollars
making them a much more affordable option than Copic.
I think we might need to do a marker comparison video soon, so let
me know if that's something that you'd find useful.
I think it's time.
Arrtx have just released their first ever set of colored pencils.
There are 72 pencils in this set and they
are advertised as artist grade and light resistant.
At a first impression,
these pencils feel really nice to hold, they have a good weight to them
and they feel high quality.
The barrel color wraps around the base and it just looks good.
The box itself is beautiful too,
it's something I can see people keeping
on their desk to easily grab the pencils.
There's padding in the bottoms, they are
well protected, and I wonder
they move
even less if you sit them the other way, although just don't stab yourself.
But the real question is, how well do they color?
As I start swatching these pencils, I'm
actually surprised at how nice they feel.
I mean, it's hard to judge a
pencil from just swatching, so we'll use
them more thoroughly in a moment and
color a page, but my first impressions, I'm impressed.
I was not expecting these pencils to be so nice to use,
they seem to layer really well, but
also have that buttery feel almost like
a Prismacolor, but not quite as soft or waxy.
Wait... what's going on here?
This pencil is like multiple colors.
Okay, so this is obviously just a manufacturing glitch and a strange one.
If you ever find a pencil like this
with any company, just write in and they will replace it. As I continue swatching,
I do think this set has a
good color range overall, except that there
are a lot of yellows here, and
in a larger set, this would make
sense, but in a set of 72, I would have preferred to see a
few of these yellows, maybe swapped to
some other colors to offer a better
range, maybe something like a light blue.
Other than that, they seem to have
a pretty good variety of colors.
I wanted to see how these pencils blend,
so I've been making a lot of use of my Swatch Kit today.
And I'm really surprised at how many layers I seem to be able to
build up with these pencils.
So many mid range or budget pencils
don't layer much at all, but these
seem to be able to layer at
least five to six layers.
And interestingly, these don't seem to have as much of a waxy build up
as a Prismacolor pencil.
Even on the cheap printer paper that
I usually avoid, I'm still able to
layer and blend these pencils enough to
create completely new colors.
And when it comes to layering over
markers, these just work.
So I think that's what I'm going
to do for my coloring page today.
I've chosen a coloring page from my 2022 Planner, but I'll also make this
available in the One Dollar section on my website if you'd like to color along.
I've chosen a sky color palette from
the color catalog that I wouldn't usually
think to try, and I found the pencils and markers to match.
After starting on the clouds here, I
quickly realized that I didn't have a
plan for how to approach this, so
I've decided I should start with the background instead.
This will give me a light source
that I can use to hopefully shade
my clouds with a bit more guidance
and while I start on this, I think I might need to address the
elephant in the room.
This is a sponsored video, so, from
a viewer perspective, I can see the
dilemma of trying to work out what's
my true opinion or whether I've been paid off to say only nice things.
And honestly, I didn't expect these pencils
to be as good as they've been.
I'm trying not to say that these
are the best mid-range pencils that I've come across, because that's a big claim.
But I wouldn't be surprised if they end up ranking as the best or
one of the best at their price point when I next do a pencil
comparison with all the different brands.
So I wouldn't usually say this, but
given how much that I am, kind
of, bragging about these pencils right now,
I do feel that this clarification was needed.
I say no to a lot of brands and I am very
selective in who I like to sponsor these videos.
Beyond that, I will never agree to
a sponsorship that doesn't allow me to
have the creative control or to say
what I think about a product.
The good and the bad.
You're trusting my reviews means more
to me than any compensation or free pencils, and I want you to know that,
and be confident in knowing that I won't
recommend things to you that I wouldn't use myself.
You will see these markers on my shelf
and in my videos after today and you'll see these pencils again because
I am genuinely impressed.
I do have some areas that I
think they can improve, which I'll talk
about shortly, and if you're still unsure,
I'll link to some other reviews from
other trustworthy creators in my blog post,
in the description, so that you can
research them further for yourself.
As I continue working on my page,
I'm really enjoying using both the pencils and the markers.
The markers blend quite well,
I might not even need the layer
of pencils, but I enjoy working with
markers and pencils together and do this
often because the markers fill all the
white gaps in the paper and are quick to use, and then the pencils
can really get into the details, build
up the lighting and shading,
and fix any areas of the marker that didn't blend well.
The clouds have been an interesting challenge
so it helped me a lot to
determine my light direction
first. I was originally planning on more
of a sunset with the light coming
from the bottom of the scene, but
because I'd already made a start on
the two clouds in the middle, I
had to make a change, and I
think I like it.
I've roughly sketched out some shadows on
the edges of the clouds that are
the furthest away from the light source on each cloud.
For the clouds at the top, this is on the top side of the
clouds, and for the clouds at the
bottom, this is along the bottom edge.
I am guessing a lot here, but
these clouds are pretty forgiving, and because
there are a lot of them, the
overall effect works even if I don't
get every single one perfect.
As I come in with my pencils, I'm following the same shading, but just
building up the shading and mid tones
of each cloud further, leaving a highlighted edge
that follows the curved shape of the cloud.
My main goal has been to keep
thinking in round shapes for each part of the cloud, and this seems to
be working no matter whether I choose
to lighten or darken each area.
When it comes to midrange colored pencils,
I think these are the closest I've
seen a pencil come to Prismacolor's
performance, but without the Prismacolor's breakage.
From what I've heard, they have glued
the pencil core along the entire barrel,
making them far more resistant to breakage,
while still keeping that soft blendability that makes them wonderful to use.
If I had some areas I'd like to see improved in these pencils, it
would be matching the barrel color to the core.
These aren't matched very well, and so
you'll need to swatch them out to know
what the colors are instead of relying on the colors of the outside of the pencils.
And I would like to see the
size of the font in the barrel made much bigger.
It's quite hard to read the numbers and names of the colors with this small
font, especially since it's written in silver.
I reached out to Arrtx to ask if they had any plans to make
these changes in the future, and they were already onto it.
They said they were planning to make
the words on the pencils easier to
read, improve the color matching of the cores, and check the range of yellows.
So they are listening to the feedback
from other customers and reviews as well.
They are also considering releasing
a larger range of pencils and open stock options
in the future, so these are all great
news for what is a really enjoyable
pencil to use. At the moment,
These pencils are cheaper than Prismacolor and are priced similar to a 72 set
of Castle Art or Arteza pencils on Amazon,
At around $30 to $40 US.
I decided to add a wide highlight along
the lightest edge of my clouds.
I started with the Faber Castell Pit Artist pen, which is more opaque and
has a large tip, so I'm not totally happy with how this looks, but
for consistency's sake, I'm going to keep
going. And then I'm coming back with a finer point white paint pen
to remove those black lines and hopefully make
the white edge look a little better.
It's time to color my hot air
balloons and I don't want to totally
change my color palette, but I do
want these balloons to feel colorful, so
this is where I'll really be stretching these pencils.
I'm going to go with a straight
color layer of the marker and rely on these pencils to bring this back
into my color palette with lighting
and shading that matches the rest of the scene.
I don't know if this will work
but there's only one way to find out!
And this is finished... Well... Maybe.
I actually really want to try some of the metallic or pearlescent watercolor paints,
to add some whimsical touches to this,
but I'm not sure if it will
ruin it or make it more interesting
and it's a risk. And I really
like this page right now, but I
also like taking creative risks - so we're doing it.
I've chosen the Super Vision pearlescent watercolor paints
but I don't want to add too much water because I have no idea
how that will react to my alcohol
markers or the pencils.
Instead, I'm going in fairly dry and I'm just kind of dabbling.
By the way, if you want to
watch a longer version of this drawing
process, I'll be putting up the full
process on my second channel where you
can find a bunch of my other
drawings and coloring pages too.
And this kind of looks cool,
but if I'm being totally honest, I think I preferred it before, but that's okay.
I tried something new and I'm still
really happy with the end result.
I'm really excited to add both these
markers and these pencils to my collection.
And I want to thank Arrtx again
for sponsoring this video and sending me these supplies to try.
I am definitely eager to try these
oil paint soon but if you'd
like to see my first painting attempts
with the acrylics, you can watch that right now.