A few days ago I started swatching my 36 count WHSMith colouring pencils. I was pleasantly surprised! Here's a review of these pencils.
- The pencils come in a glossy cardboard box with a plastic holder. I can see myself discarding this in the future as I tend to keep smaller sets of pens/pencils in clear containers. The design is lovely, with a dark grey pencil and colour indicators on the top. The hexagonal pencils are comfortable to hold and have a matt finish.
- The colour selection is really nice. You get all your usual primaries and secondaries that you usually see in a set of this size, and there are also some lovely and unique shades with a surprisingly good neutral palette. For example the dark teal one (last one in the third row) is one I see myself using a lot. The magenta and the brick colour are my other favourites in the set. The only shades I'm not crazy about are the two brightest yellows. They are not really pigmented and the next two yellow shades would be fully enough. But I've never been a fan of light, cool yellows, I'm more of a saffron yellow kind of person.
- The pigmentation is a pleasant surprise. These pencils are more affordable than the Staedtler Noris Club ones (at least in our currency that is the case) but lay down such a nicer pigment. You can get a vibrant colour almost instantly with very little pressure. The pencils are layerable and blend very well with each other. Compared to the Polychromos they lay down a bit more streaky colour and feel a bit more scratchy against the paper, but this can be corrected using a bit of layering.
- The pencils came in the mail and although they were very well wrapped, it's not unusual for the leads to be damaged during transport. I haven't notice any broken leads and the pencils sharpen easily to a very fine point which they keep for a reasonable amount of time. As they are rather soft, I expect they will spend a fair amount of time in the sharpener, but this is the price for soft, pigmented pencils that lay down a creamy colour.
- I tried blending using two tools: a paper stump and a blender pencil. The paper stump easily gave the best result with these pencils. The gradient came out smoky and perfect, whereas the blender pencil mostly made a streaky, blotchy mess of the swatch. I can see myself using the blender pencil on very small areas but for anything of even the size of these swatches, a fine paper stump would be the more ideal blending tool of the two.
Conclusion: If you can get your hands on these pencils, go for it! If you already have a selection of pencils these will be great for a smaller set to take with you on the road or to add some new shades to your palette. If you're new to colouring, you may use these for a long time before feeling the need to graduate to a larger set or more prestigious brand.
PS. When I started Lost Ocean a few days ago, I was going to use the 24-count Noris Club pencils for the whole book. But shortly after finishing the title page my hands started aching from the pressure I had to use and I was frustrated by the weak pigmentation. So I'm switching to this set of WHSmith pencils for the whole of Lost Ocean. Wish me luck!
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