Watercolor Review: Viviva Colorsheets

Review by Tina Koyama Concentrated watercolor paint stored on paper has intrigued me for a long time: Thin and lightweight, it seems like the ultimate portable paint kit! Several years ago when I first began urban sketching, I bought a booklet of Nicholson’s Peerless Water Colors with that thought in mind. Around the same time,…

Tag Team Pen Review: East Hill Tombstone White Brush Pen

Review by Tina Koyama (and Ana Reinert, with art from Hannah Carey and Cory Say) Here at the Desk, we love brush pens, and we also have a penchant for white ink. Imagine our excitement when a white brush pen appeared on the market! By way of explaining the product’s unusual name, JetPens describes the…

Notebook Review: Clairefontaine A6 Graf’book

Notebook Review: Clairefontaine A6 Graf’book

The Clairefontaine Graf’Book is a simple, blank notebook with black card stock cover and an exposed thread binding. The Graf’Book is made up of 100 pages of 100gsm bright white paper. I got the A6 size but the Graf’Book is also available in A4 and A5 size with portrait or landscape binding options. The exposed…

Colored Pencil Review: Tombow Irojiten (36-color set) Colored Pencils

Colored Pencil Review: Tombow Irojiten (36-color set) Colored Pencils

Review by Tina Koyama I have been known to look askance at and even mildly mock packaging that seems gratuitously fancy. And yet I’m the first to admit that I bought the entire original nine-volume (90-pencil) slipcased set of Tombow Irojiten Color Dictionary colored pencils for packaging alone. With most colored pencils, I like to…

Inkmas Day 3: DeAtramentis Document White

  Review by Tina Koyama I had two main reasons for wanting to try White in the DeAtramentis Document waterproof ink series (available in 19 colors). Holiday cards often come with red or green envelopes, so I thought it would be fun to try addressing some of mine with white ink. That was my holiday…

Fashionable Friday Flashback: Inktober Challenge!

(find links to products shown above here) Inktober is just around the corner. I mean JUST around the corner. If you are not familiar with this draw-along event, check out our previous post. I have enjoyed creating my own rules and prompts each year and challenging myself to learn new skills and stick to specific…