7.12.2011

Prismacolor Premier Colored Pencils Are Wonderful!

Smooth, buttery, creamy, velvety, blendable, pigment rich, versatile, professional, & ohhhh sooooo soft

I realize that the above description could easily be confused with Red Velvet Cake... HOWEVER, these words describe what the experience is like to use these artist quality colored pencils. Soft & smooth from the first moment their waxy pigments make contact on untouched paper, they actually become creamier with each subsequent layer! Tonal layering is also a pleasure. On the right surface, you can build up to 20 layers of rich, vibrant, translucent color! Layering adds vibrance & a 'glow' to your work. This is a most satisfying reason to use Prismacolor Premiers. Because of their buttery consistency, Prismacolors blend effortlessly on the paper &, if desired, burnish these layers to give your piece a shiny, painterly look. Another nice feature is their excellent dissolvability with the use of solvent.  Prismacolor’s coupling with solvent can produce a watercolor look, or help you block in color fast for a glowing underpainting. Add this to their easy portability, & you have a very simple, mess-free supply kit to pack for a day out Plein Air painting.

With 132 available colors, Prismacolor Premier wax-based colored pencils take the cake for the widest variety of colors among all colored pencil brands. And get this – if you visit Prismacolor’s website, you will find a Digital Color Coordinator which takes CMYK & RGB values and matches you to the closest match they have out of their 132 colors! 


PROS
  • Incredibly soft which allows for maximum blendability.  At times seem to be pastel-like!
  • 132 Pigment Rich colors – largest assortment of any colored pencil brand
  • Excellent gray scale
  • Great dissolvability with solvents
  • Can be used with heat for even more blendability
  • Great for tonal layering
  • Colors match Prismacolor Verithin for fine detail work
  • Colors match Prismacolor Art Stix for covering larger areas
  • Thick, 3.8mm core
  • Can be used with Prismacolor Colorless Blender
  • Lightfastness is in accordance with ASTM-D6901-06 Standards
  • Colors match Pantone Matching System Colors
  • Sold open stock to replace colors as you need them


CONS
  • Softness means they're fragile, & if you’re not careful the lead can break very easily
  • Wax Bloom due to their high wax content.  This can easily be remedied by gently
    wiping with a paper towel
  • They can leave ‘crumbs’ behind.  Be sure to use a soft brush to light sweep away to avoid smudges on the paper
  • They wear down quickly if using heavy pressure
  • If dropped or not treated with care, the lead will break inside the pencil causing the lead to keep ‘falling out’ each time you sharpen resulting in a wasted pencil and wasted money

Here are a few of the many paintings I've done with Prismacolor Premier Colored Pencils:




 



3 comments:

  1. Wow those colored pencils sound very cool - I like the fact that layering enhances the look of the drawing! I'd use anything that can make me draw like you!!

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  2. You can sort of erase with colored pencils by using a kneaded rubber eraser and punching the surface of the paper. It works well when you have so many layers built up that the paper won't take any more colored pencil.--Margie

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  3. Thank you so much, Margie! Definitely adding that to the pros list ;)

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