New penguins in da house! Realistic ones! Mama and babyyyyy! Okay okay I’m just a wee bit excited. LOL.
Supplies for this project are linked at the end of this post. Compensated affiliate links may be used at no cost to you.
Video
Thank you Altenew for making a sweet little pair called Warm Heart ….love me some penguins, PLUS I love realism too! And they’re sized just perfect so I can create all kinds of scenes around them!
The easy version is realistic to what Antarctica looks like – lots of times you can’t tell where the snow ends and sky begins! So a simple blended sky, whether in Copics or inks, is perfect!
But if you’re crazy like me, go find a snowy Antarctica scene on the Googles, and play around with values – darks, midtones, highlights, and bright whites!
Supplies
Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. If you choose to shop using my EH (Ellen Hutson) links, please accept cookies on that site in order to retain the link to my blog, or that compensation does not happen for me. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art
I’ve been asked by a number of folks if I’ve tried some of the other alcohol markers that came on the market in the last year or so….I bought a small set of two of them to play with and see what I thought!
NOTE: In YT comments, I’ve gotten crazy numbers of requests to review all the cheap knockoffs. Please know I’ve tried lots of them over the years and wasted hundreds of dollars on them — they weren’t worth even reviewing. I’m sorry. If you’ve tried using cheap makers to color like I do and aren’t happy with your results, it could well be the supplies, not your skillz. As I always say—get the best you can, cheap supplies will hobble you. ❤️
Supplies for this project are linked at the end of this post. Compensated affiliate links may be used at no cost to you.
First, why bother trying out others when I already own the Copics and refills I need? Well….changes happen! Copic was going to release the new bottles for refills this spring – and of course then Covid happened. I saw one post on one retailer site a few months ago showing the tiny bottles – and mentioning the price was going to be the same as before. Which, as an end result, means doubling the cost of inks, if true. Yikes! I really hope that post was wrong.
However if it’s not wrong, I don’t think Copic will have legs in the craft community after we all run out of the reinkers we now own. I would be REALLY BUMMED, since I really love my Copics. But I also want to be prepared if that does happen, and if prices aren’t adjusted to meet the market’s ability to pay…..so I decided I’d get some other brands to see what they’re like.
Aside from not being able to have a super variety of colors, I was able to get a general rainbow of blends – and I think the ink is the ink – it’s likely that the alcohol ink in alcohol markers is basically blendable with techniques we already know. I suspect the big difference will be in color selection and availability, the delivery system (pens and nibs), and cost.
Graph It Markers
These pens come in a bunch of color collections, and I just tried one little “Essentials” set – which didn’t have much blendable in it (everything blends, but I wanted to have three oof a color to really test that….Imagination International, the US distributor, kindly sent me three pens to try out to blend.) My swatch charts are HERE …..
And I love the price of these – $5.30 with $4 per refill bottle? Yes!
The color selection was the fail when coloring the mermaid from Sweet November Stamps – that poor girl’s skin! ha! So I did have to cheat and repair with some Copics. But The blending worked well enough for not having much for blending colors!
ABT Pro markers
I swatched these as well, just one set of them called Nature Palette; if anyone sees the bright colors like these in nature please do let me know! lol. Yes I suppose there are some florals in these colors – but you know me, I love my rich colors more than brights.
Performance with these was a disappointment. Yes they blend, since they are alcohol markers. The nib is even fine. But not being refillable, and arriving with a bunch that had little ink in them? That was a deal breaker for me. I’m really sad, I love so many of Tombow’s products.
Copic markers
No real review here – just coloring with my Copic marker true loves! I’ll still be sticking with these, at the very least until my refills all run out. (HA!) But I’ll keep my ear to the ground and try some pens occasionally and keep you posted. (Note: I have tried a bunch of the other brands – I haven’t reviewed because I got rid of the pens because they were so useless!)
SUPPLIES
Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. If you choose to shop using my EH (Ellen Hutson) links, please accept cookies on that site in order to retain the link to my blog, or that compensation does not happen for me. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art
There are four different Copic greys – what the heck is the difference? Do I need them all? The short and blessedly happy answer: no!
10/1/2020 NOTE: Copic did NOT stopping making refill inks – they’ve now become much more available.
Supplies for this project are linked at the end of this post. Compensated affiliate links may be used at no cost to you.
On page 2 in the Copic Hex chart (the colored version that comes with the blank pdf)….you may or may not be able to see the visual color differences well, but hopefully in this video you’ll get a clear enough view to make your decisions on what’s needed.
This dust bunny has all four greys in it….and if you just look at the image quickly, the body looks to be about the same basic grey.
The toners and neutrals are pretty close if you arent analyzing it closely.
In the second card, you can visually see the coolness of the bunny compared to the warmth of the bed.
SUPPLIES
Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. If you choose to shop using my EH (Ellen Hutson) links, please accept cookies on that site in order to retain the link to my blog, or that compensation does not happen for me. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art
It’s finnnnnally here……Flower Power 2020!! This is a brand new class that I hope everyone will love….and I hope it inspires you to not only make beautiful things but to make someone else’s day! Watch the promo video and check out the little backstory below.
This class is for two good causes: supporting Ellen Hutson’s small business by using her beautiful flower stamps, and raising money for World Central Kitchen too! You can get this class FREE if you buy either one of the listed stamp sets on the website here, or FREE if you guy $75 worth of anything from Ellen….or you can choose to pay $10 for the class in addition to shopping, so you can help feed hungry people through World Central Kitchen!
A few weeks back, while the end of the StayHomeStaySafe orders looked soooo far away, I was trying to figure out a way I could help do something to assist someone else with my classes website. Not many of us have excess money, so it was going to need to be something special!
One cause I’ve fundraised for before – and give to monthly myself – is World Central Kitchen. So I wanted that to be a beneficiary somehow.
I also was heartbroken for my friend Ellen Hutson, who had to close her business temporarily under governor’s orders. I don’t know much about retail but man do I know it’s a bad time right now! Ellen was able to go in by herself to try to fill orders, but got so backed up as just one person….she’d pack up a ton of orders and was still staring at stacks of more! I wanted to do something to help her get back up and going once she was able to reopen…..and I came up with an idea.
I approached some of my friends from Ellen’s design team, and got takers right away – everyone wanted to help out! We met on Zoom and giggled and planned….what a great time it was to just be together; this was the first Zoom for several of them!
We spent some time putting together our lesson videos and taking our pics, and I spent more time assembling the class and getting everything set up. We were delighted to hear Ellen was open again, and had staff in to help catch up on orders again! Last weekend she had a big sale, so we waited til today once they were caught up from those…..so let’s all inundate her with more orders for this class!
I love trying out different mediums on different papers – and today it’s dark, rich, colored papers! I layered pencil, then Copic marker, than more pencil.
I don’t have brand names for these papers; a few years back I cut up a bunch of papers into card front size and I’m still working through that stack, so I have no idea what it is – but you don’t want anything with a gloss or sheen to it. Heavier papers tend to work better too. Try out colors on scraps so you know what to expect!
Supplies for this project are linked at the end of this post. Compensated affiliate links may be used at no cost to you.
The colors used for the two cards….the G24 was the last color added to the tulip greens.
Hydrangeas in Bloom is a pretty little stamp! The lines are quite delicate and thin, which is what inspired this card design; it was so thin I thought I could get color variance mixing it with white pen.
Tulips, by Waffle Flower, is a Mother’s Day set but can definitely be used year round – there are other sentiments for the women in your life!
Supplies
Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. If you choose to shop using my EH (Ellen Hutson) links, please accept cookies on that site in order to retain the link to my blog, or that compensation does not happen for me. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art
Ok tell me in comments: Which part of the title of this post brought you here? (I’m dying to know how many want to know about the TP or pens! ha!)
I hope you won’t find this a letdown no matter which you came for! The video covers both – a toilet paper craft you can make to gift to your favorite essential workers or neighbors…..and most of the selection of Copic multiliners – and FOUNTAIN PENS! Yep! They exist! (Supplies are compiled at the end of this post.)
Supplies for this project are linked at the end of this post. Compensated affiliate links may be used at no cost to you.
Here’s the video – scroll on down for the pics and more description.
I’ve had multiliners for a long time, and I like having a selection of sizes so I can match it to the line weight of my project or stamp set. These pens can be used for a drawing, then Copic color on top won’t bleed or smudge.
The multiliners come in a variety of packs, depending on where you get them – they can have all the pens or smaller selections, and you can find them in sepias or greys too.
My suspicion on the Copic fountain pens is that they’ve been around a long while and I’m only learning about them belatedly – because they aren’t widely available. Blick carries F01 and F02 … but Amazon only carries the F02 — sooooo that might well mean they’re on the way out rather than in.
My thoughts: they aren’t a necessity, just a fun thing! They’re disposable, which means they aren’t refillable, so they’re just going to sit in a landfill someday. They don’t have the “flow” of a regular fountain pen either….they’re nice but not a must-have. But they are nice if you’re a doodler who mixes your drawing with Copic!
My crazy toilet paper project was SO fun to create, and soo easy – thank you Google for having African fabrics that I could search through for ideas and a simple design like this!
Supplies
Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. If you choose to shop using my EH (Ellen Hutson) links, please accept cookies on that site in order to retain the link to my blog, or that compensation does not happen for me. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art
