Castle Arts Soft Touch: 5 Pros, 5 Cons, 1 Hex Chart, and a fancy drink

Castle Arts Soft Touch: 5 Pros, 5 Cons, 1 Hex Chart, and a fancy drink

by | Jun 28, 2025 | Colored Pencils

Over the last year or two, I’d heard time and again about how great these pencils were. Since you can get a full set for just under $50US (at the time of this writing), I couldn’t imagine it. 

Then I saw a review from a quite trusted artist, and thought I should just try them. I can’t buy all the sets but this one could be squeezed from my budget.

Tutorial: Castle Arts Soft Touch: 5 Pros, 5 Cons, 1 Hex Chart, and a fancy drink

Watch the video below and scroll to the end to leave comments or questions — or click HERE to watch it on YouTube and leave comments over there. I read both dutifully!

SUPPLIES

Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art

Pencils:

  1. Castle Arts Soft Touch 120 Colored Pencil Set 
  2. Sharpener: Afmat Long Point Pencil Sharpener USB rechargeable 
  3. Copic Acrea Paint Marker white: BLICK AMZ 

Coloring books:

  1. Kanoko Egusa Symphony of Cute animals 
  2. Johanna Basford Rooms of Wonder 

0Castle Arts Soft Touch Hex Chart

And yes, there is a hex chart for this 12o set! It’s possible you can use this chart with other Castle Arts supplies since theyre the same colors!

 

Buy hex chart

Pencil markings, sharpening

For bargain pencils these have a nice big pro in my world: big bold letters and numbers on the barrel. The color end doesn’t often match the pigment, but you can get to know the pencils and that’s not as much trouble. The wood is fairly cheap though. And you can’t eplace just one color so stick to smaller elements to color in this brand or you have to buy a whole box to replace one color.

Blendability, color selecion

Nicely blendable wax based pencils, yet the leads aren’t fragile like Prismacolor. So they’re likePolychromos but usually softer, though smoe individual colors are on the scratchy side. This set is full of brights though! Lots of rainbow colors, few neutrals, so you have to mix complements to create your own desaturated hues.

Performing as usual

On other papers these pencils were pretty typical. Neenah cardstock provides a smooth look but is really hard to get a large flat area; on Stonehenge the texture works great with these pencils.

How to color a fancy drink

Layers! Start light and add deeper color as it gets to the bottom where the strawberries are! 

The neutral colors in the rest of the picture are made from complementary colors, opposite each other on the color wheel.

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Overall assessment

These pencils are good for the price; a great starter set especially for a young artist. And if you’re a marker artist in need of colors to add detail, this would be a great option. 

For a constant pencil user, I can only imagine not being able to replace a single pencil as they wear out. And for a fine artist—be very aware that selling a piece that isn’t lightfast is okay, but you need to price it much lower and be sure the buyer knows what they’re getting.

Closing thoughts and question

text

How to watercolor an ocean (Easy and hard)

How to watercolor an ocean (Easy and hard)

by | Jun 24, 2025 | Watercolor

By popular demand: AN OCEAN! I know it was asked for with the Staedtler pigment pens, likely to see all those blues. But a full background, dense drawing takes up tons of ink, and I’m trying not to use up the marker just for the sake of seeing how much ink can go on the page. After using them for months on a ton of projects some of them are starting to run out a little bit 🙂

Instead – watercolor! Hopefully to help us get excited about World Watercolor Month, which starts in July!

Tutorial: How to watercolor oceans (easy and hard)

Watch the video below and scroll to the end to leave comments or questions — or click HERE to watch it on YouTube and leave comments over there. I read both dutifully!

SUPPLIES

Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art

Paper

  1. Arches Bright White Rough 22×30 sheet BLICK  JACKSONS 

Daniel Smith watercolors:

  1. Yellow Ochre BLICK AMZ JACKSONS 
  2. Transparent Red Oxide BLICK JACKSONS 
  3. French Ultramarine BLICK AMZ JACKSONS
  4. Ultramarine Turquoise BLICK  AMZ  JACKSONS 
  5. Prussian Blue BLICK AMZ JACKSONS 
  6. Paynes Blue Gray BLICK  AMZ  JACKSONS 

Misc

  1. ProConsole Artist tape 1/2” https://amzn.to/4e2153Y
  2. Bookmark sleeves

Brushes

  1. Escoda Joseph Zbucovic #16 mop brush 
  2. DaVinci Silverpoint Quill Brush 

Earliest layers

If you want to be able to lighten a layer to near-white – use lots and lots of water. Whether you lift some off while it’s wet, or after it’s dry, this keeps too much pigment from getting stuck to the paper.

Middle layers

Mix the paint with a little more pigment each time, and if you want blends, paint water first and let the color bleed out into the area.

My Joe Z brush does a fair job at small detail, though not quite as fine as I’d like, but aside from doing some repair on the water’s edge, it’s all this big brush.

 

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Deepest ocean

The deeper the ocean the more darks-in-darks you’ll add; with thin paint they’ll barely show when dry, which is a lovely look for water, but you can also drop in thicker pigment for darker results.

The finished large painting

I want to try this again sometime after all I learned!

Squeeeee! Exciting plans for summer

Squeeeee! Exciting plans for summer

by | Jun 21, 2025 | Vlogs & Misc

Today it’s pretty much just a video explainer – and an invitation to visit my 2025 World Watercolor Month page with all the details!

 

Vlog: An invitation to serve kids who want to make art!

Watch the video below and scroll to the end to leave comments or questions — or click HERE to watch it on YouTube and leave comments over there. I read both dutifully!

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Is this ink good for drawing?

Is this ink good for drawing?

by | Jun 17, 2025 | Pen and Ink

Sometimes there’s a thing you know, and you know you know it, but then for a time, you forget you knew it. Like, that you should really take the 30 seconds to find your umbrella in the closet, because you’ll regret it when the rain starts. Or you forget whether to put the eggs in before the water boils or after it’s rolling to make the perfect peelable egg. (I gotta google that EVERY time, even at my age!)

I re-learned something that I’ve told people before – years ago. I told them that because others I trust told it to me; but this time I might remember it because *I learned it myself.* 

Tutorial: Is this ink good for drawing?

Watch the video below and scroll to the end to leave comments or questions — or click HERE to watch it on YouTube and leave comments over there. I read both dutifully!

SUPPLIES

Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art

Inks

  1. Platinum Carbon Black Fountain Pen Ink
  2. Speedball Super black india ink BLICK  AMZ  JACKSONS 

To clean India Ink from a pen:

  1. Ph Martins Bombay Pen Cleaner BLICK  AMZ 
  2. Or Artisto cleaner at JACKSONS 

Fountain pen

  1. TWSBI Eco fountain pen EF
  2.  TWSBI Eco fountain pen F 
  3. TWSBI Eco fountain pen M  (the one I use most)

Paper

  1. Arches Bright White CP 22×30 sheet BLICK  JACKSONS

Color

  1. Daniel Smith Watercolors

Sheep

The sheep reference shows the sheep from slightly below him – looking up, perhaps at the top of a little hill.

Border Collie

The Border Collie reference has the black dog against a black background, so we have to look closely to work out the body shape and hidden foot.

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My hopes

I’d like to create a bunch of sketches this summer in this loose style for my friend to take with her to the sheep dog trials and see how they sell – and eventually to get brave enough to take wash and ink to my life drawing group. I usually work in pencil or charcoal so I can change the lines and make the head the right size or shorten that leg….drawing people is so intimidating but I keep working at it!

Perspective class coming soon for urban sketchers

The last “long” visit I had with my Mom, about a year before she died, was a special one. I was thinking about teaching the class I’m working on next….perspective for urban sketchers. I spent time with Mom driving around her old town to see the neighborhoods she knew; I was looking for doorways, windows, porches, stairs, etc. She’d sit in the car while I jumped out to take photos and shoot a little footage for the eventual class.

As she became more ill, I was less interested in creating that class, because it just made me so wistful. Once she passed, I couldn’t even look through the footage without crying. But I’ve been looking at it recently, and it’s bringing me back to the trip and the special time I had with her. So it’s underway, hopefully to launch in July.

If you want some other wash and ink classes – there are some fun ones on this page! A few examples: Powellswood Sketches for beginners wanting to do nature sketches with lovely footage from a garden near me; Wash and Ink to learn how to splooge some color then add the ink lines; and for those ready for an architectural deepdive, Market Street Sketches which is based on buildings in my Mom’s town.

Papers for water based markers | Drawing a pelican in 6 steps

Papers for water based markers | Drawing a pelican in 6 steps

by | Jun 13, 2025 | Watercolor Pens/Inks

After the reaction to the last video I posted, I hope you’re ready for some new art with the Staedtler Pigment Pens! The video announces the winner of the giveaway…but I wanted to also talk about papers for these pens.

 

And yes, I did hurt my hand! Walking the pups gets dangerous when the sidewalk jumps up to grab my shoe. My right hand took the brunt, but I saved you from having to look at a wound; when I see any wounded fingers, hands, or limbs on YouTube or any social media, I can’t click away fast enough!

This first drawing was done on Yupo for NAMTA, it’s a synthetic (think plastic) paper. It does some of what you might think would happen on plastic. While those who love watercoloring on yupo seem to be fine with it, I’ve never discovered that love; I like it for pen and ink, and for alcohol inks …but not with water.

That means the pigment brush pens can’t be used easily with water; and with limited success with the blending liquid. Things just stay sticky. However for some subjects this paper can be lovely. This parrot, who I’ve named Alex, looks great from a distance, but it does show that you don’t get much real blending done. Nothing soft edged.

Tutorial: Papers for water based markers | Drawing a pelican in 6 steps

Watch the video below and scroll to the end to leave comments or questions — or click HERE to watch it on YouTube and leave comments over there. I read both dutifully!

SUPPLIES

Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art

Markers

  1. Staedtler Pigment Brush pens (60) 
  2. Staedtler Pigment Brush pens (36): BLICK  AMZ  JACKSONS
  3. Staedtler Mars MultiInk Blending Liquid

Papers

Recommended paper for those who struggle with color not melting out on textured cotton paper:

  1. Canson XL watercolor pad 9×12 BLICK  AMZ  JACKSONS

Recommended paper for those whose subjects require soft, pale blends:

  1. Arches Bright White CP 22×30 sheet (note that pads are Natural White in color) BLICK   JACKSONS

Six steps to drawing a brown pelican

I know, I know, it’s a silly thing to make it seem this easy, but hey – go download the photo and give it a try! You can even trace the outlines if you need to, then take it step by step.

Pelican eye

I need to find out why so many birds and animals have so many eyelids. Should I be jealous as a human? 

Facial skin/eye ring

Which term is more correct? I need my own personal ornithologist to explain all this stuff to me.

Beak and gular pouch

I think I’m really glad this bird didn’t have a caruncle too – or a “nuptial tubercle.” Go look, really. 

Head feathers

A group of very soft feathers contrasts nicely with the hard details elsewhere. Pet a pelican here, for sure. If he lets you.

The mohawk

Google’s AI smacked me down for not calling it a crest. But whatever. Mohawk certainly makes it sound cooler.

Contour feathers

All the outside feathers we see are for decoration/mating as well as to make flights smoother.

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ICAF

The International Child Art Foundation is a group I’ve fundraised for many years now. They just lost their National Endowment for the Arts grant because their work didn’t fit “the president’s priorities”…well even if he doesn’t care about kids, I do. And I’m doubling down on my support!

Class donations

During World Watercolor Month I’ve donated a portion of watercolor class purchases; this year, it’s ANY class. And not just in July – I’m starting today! So go nab a class and help support the kiddos.

Fine art sale donations

I’m also giving a 10% donation from every fine art purchase from now til the end of July! Please help me clear the shop and raise money to do good for kids. They need to know how valuable art is and to get the support at this age that will set them up for a lifetime of creating.

Both birdos in this post are for sale over in my shop – go check them out as well as everything else that’s available! Tap on any photo or button below to shop.

See them all

Shop for swag

Pick up a mug or a zipper pouch or both! Head over to the World Watercolor Month site…get my products or someone else’s. And think about getting one for a Christmas gift! Tap the photo to go shopping.