I tried to do a conversion chart for some of my most used
Promarkers to Everblends, but there aren’t close enough matches for that to
work with the colour combos I use so I’m just going to have to come up with new
colour combos, this is going to be an ongoing process I think but these conversion charts for the colours I use most might be of interest to you and I used it as a starting point.
The markers blend a little differently to the promarkers
and flexmarkers that I’m used to and I’m learning to use them a little
differently because of this. If you’ve watched any of my tutorials you’ll know
that I tend to work from dark to light, starting with the darkest shade,
blending it out with the next lightest shade and so on. This method doesn’t
work so well with the Everblend markers – at least not for me. I’ve found that
I get better results by first laying down the palest shade as a base, then
going back to the dark to light method. I’m not sure why, but that seems to work best
for me. The markers are juicy, but not overly so, so there's a good flow of ink and they dry quite quickly. There's a great range of colours so it's easy to find colours that blend well together.
Conclusion
So in conclusion.... I like the Everblend markers and I would certainly recommend them, they are a good price, I like the feel of them in my hand, they're sturdy and comfortable to hold, they're juicy without being overly so. There's a good range of colours in the 120 set which includes 3 neons and a blender pen, the skin-tones pack is well worth investing in and has a fantastic selection of colours that suit pretty much any skin tone you care to think of.
I'll continue to put them through their paces and will share the results on my blog as I go.
You can buy Everblend markers and other products here.
Additional colours and sets
So, in addition to the 120 set, Arteza also have a 60 set, a 36 grey set, a 36 skin tone set and they also sell individual colours in packs of 4. I found this last offering a little strange, I’m not sure of the thinking behind that. I can see the benefit of it if I were either a retailer or an educator – if I were to do classes then it would be a great idea to be able to buy 4/8/12 or more of each colour, but to the individual artist/crafter it wouldn’t be terribly cost effective.
The Arteza site has a great chat facility so I was able to ask a few questions about the other sets. None of the 60 set are unique colours, so if you buy the 120 set there’s no reason to buy the 60 set, you’d just be duplicating half your markers. Of the 36 grey colours there are only 11 unique colours, personally I didn’t think this warranted the extra expenditure, however of the 36 skin tones, 32 are unique colours so this was definitely work it.
In total there seems to be 162 colours in the Everblend range, but trying to get all of those without unnecessary duplicates is going to prove a little difficult.
I have to admit to being a little like a kid at Christmas when they arrived and initially thought I’d integrate the colours into my existing colour chart. However once I had sampled all the colours and also realised that there aren’t enough slots in my carry case for them all, I decided to make up a skin tone colour chart as a separate entity, you can download it here. I think it will actually be more helpful to me to keep the skin tones separate – time will tell. I may integrate the brown shades at some point as I use those for lots of other things besides skin, but at the moment I’ll just keep the whole set separate. The 36 packs come in a plastic case with 3 plastic trays of 12 markers, not as practical as the marker case and I may have to invest in an empty case at some point but it’s fine for now. Another side note, that’s another plus, Arteza also sell the empty carry cases both for the thicker markers like Everblend that would also accommodate other brands, but also for the thinner barrelled watercolour markers and pens.
Part 4 to follow/
Markers
My initial thoughts about the markers; they appear to be really good quality, the barrel is a good sturdy size and being triangular it offers a good, comfortable grip with the added advantage of not rolling away when you place them down – unless you’re on a decent slope obviously :S The white barrel and caps are streamlined and don’t feel cheap or budget in any way, the printing both on the barrel and caps are clear and well done, no smudging and I don’t think they’d be easily removed through normal wear and tear. The ends of the caps are coloured to match the colour of the marker and when they are on the marker there is a narrow line of the marker colour at the bullet nib end – which I think is a great detail, so when the marker is lying flat you get an idea of the colour without having to pick it up needlessly.
As I touched on there, these markers are double ended with one end being a bullet nib and the other a chisel nib – both incidentally can be replaced easily. Being totally honest here, with the type of colouring that I and many other crafters do, I’d prefer a brush nib where the chisel nib is, because I very rarely do use the chisel nib. But I do understand that I’d use that end more if I did more graphic work.
Both types of nibs are replaceable and can be purchased separately.
Colour
The next thing I did was look for a printable colour chart – unfortunately at the time of doing this review Arteza don’t have this, blank or complete, they have advised that its something theyre working on though. A quick search online, and I found one which I printed off and promptly coloured in – then quickly realised it didn’t suit my needs. So I set about creating my own. This process takes a bit of time and trial and error, but I decided to set the colours out in an order that makes sense to me and roughly follows the format of the colour charts I’ve produced for Promarkers and Flexmarkers in the past. I also set them out in rows of 18 as there are 18 slots in each row of the carry case – yeh, I know, I’m quite anal lol!
Colouring the colour chart gave me a good feel for the range of colours, which will blend with which etc. I played around with a few different caucasian skin tones but they all seemed a little peachy for me, so I had to hop back onto the internet and do a little more research.
Part 3 to follow/
These aren’t the cheapest markers on the market, but they’re far from being the most expensive, they are at, what I would call, an
affordable level.
So I decided to treat myself to the 120 set which comes
complete with a carry case, so here goes my review……
I initially ordered the 120 set – mainly so that I would have as many of the colours as possible in one go.
Carry Case
They arrived in a custom made carry case that is sturdy
and practical and not at all bulky.
The case has a Velcro and buckle closure so there’s no
chance of this popping open by accident, it also has a carry handle as well as
a shoulder strap so a lot of thought has been put into the design of the case
clearly.
Once the case is opened up you find that the sides have Velcro too so you can open these up for easier access to the markers which all have their own elasticated ‘slot’. There are a few other marker brands that have a similar holding system, but this seems to be far superior and better thought out. So as you can see from the photos you can have everything very neatly held together or opened out depending on the situation. There are also an extra few empty slots – I’d imagine for you to expand your collection of everblend markers or even to add in your favourites from other brands. I thought about adding in the colours I use for white skin from my promarkers as initially I couldn’t find a suitable colour combo in the Everblend markers, but I’ll get to that later in my review.
The section that holds the markers can also be removed
from the body of the case, it’s all held in with heavy duty Velcro – I have to
say, I really can’t fault the case at all.
thanks for visiting,
it's always nice to hear what you think so feel free to leave me a comment
There are so
many brands of markers aimed specifically at the craft market these days! 
Another brand I dismissed pretty much instantly was Spectrum
Noir, I tried these years ago when they first came on the market and they
were dreadful (again, my opinion), however, I do believe they changed the pens,
including the formulation of ink. Which is a good job as the originals were
pretty much an exact copy of the ShinHan Touch markers – to look at, such a
shame they didn’t copy the quality while they were at it!. But the main reason
I didn’t entertain this brand is because I refuse to buy from the company that
owns it, on principal.
Anyway, I digress, so what other brands to consider? Well
there’s a plethora of off-brand markers on eBay and Wish but I’m just not keen
on buying something like this without some kind of warranty or guarantee.
I have a little experience with the ShinHan Touch
markers, and I love them, both the brush markers and the ones with the bullet
nibs – great quality and easy to use but difficult to get hold of in the UK.
Another brand I tried, and I really wanted to like these,
were the Chameleon pens. I get the theory, you don’t need a handful of shades
of one colour because you can get a massive range from just one pen, but they
are not easy for the kind of colouring I do. They’re great for fairly simple
colouring, where the object goes from light to dark, but I have no idea how you
would colour a face and hair without it taking hours and hours. They are lovely
markers, albeit a little on the long side and I love the idea of the colour
tops so you can get a seamless blend from one colour to another but for me, they’re really not much more than a novelty.
I’ll be honest, I was quite sceptical about them, if they
were any good then surely I’d have heard about them, wouldn’t I?
So I did a bit of research online and they seemed to get pretty consistent good reviews. You'll have to read my next post to find out what happened next.
My boss at work, and friend Charlotte recently had her first baby so I had a few baby cards to make, on for Charlotte and her husband James,...
