Water-Soluble Media Showdown

 

Water-solubility comparison in Hahnemuhle 100% cotton sketchbook
(Top row: dry activated with water; bottom row: dry applied on wet paper)

“Them’s fightin’ words.”

That was my response to Roy when he said he thought Stabilo Woodys were more water-soluble than Caran d’Ache Neocolor II crayons. Whaaat?? Woodys are great, but they aren’t more soluble than Neo IIs! And that was all I needed to hear to pack all my favorite water-soluble products for a showdown at our next play date!

Since both Roy and Mary Jean had missed the recent USk outing at US Bank Centre, we thought it would be an ideal spot to spread out our sketch kits. Most of the products I compared – Woodys, Neocolor IIs, Derwent Inktense Pencils and Caran d’Ache Museum Aquarelle Pencils – were roughly equal in solubility when applied dry and activated with a waterbrush (upper row), so maybe Roy’s opinion wasn’t as provocative as I had initially taken it. However, it’s interesting to see that Inktense Blocks blow all of them out of the water in terms of both solubility and intensity. The lower row was made dry-into-wet: I wet the paper first, then scribbled the dry media onto the wet paper. That’s where both the Blocks and Woodys appear more soluble. I admit, I was surprised that the Woodys were more intense than the Neo IIs when activated this way.

(For the record, although I had just given away my larger set of Woodys at the Gab & Grab, I do still like them a lot, especially their softness. But because their barrels are so thick and chunky, they are too bulky to carry, so I just wasn’t using them much. Luckily for me, Mary Jean got the Woodys, so I can still play with them on our play dates. And I did keep my small set of Woody Duo Pencils because – bicolors.)

While I was having the showdown, muttering to myself that Roy may have been right about the Woodys in some applications, he and Mary Jean were happily sketching and ignoring my geeking. I felt silly having a showdown alone, so I followed suit. (Sketches in tomorrow’s post.)

Vintage Colored Pencils: “Triple Stripe” Caran d’Ache Supracolor II

A grail from an unexpected place!

 

If you’re surprised to see a new post from me about vintage colored pencils, believe me, I’m equally surprised – not to mention thrilled!

My St. Bernard tin of Prismalo II

Since you’re geeky enough to care (and if you’re not, you’re following the wrong blog 😉), this would be a good time to review the Caran d’Ache watercolor pencil history post that I began in 2019 and last updated in 2023. Toward the end of that post, you’ll see a small tin of Prismalo II Soft pencils with an image of a St. Bernard. I purchased that tin on eBay containing a mishmash of well-used pencils. The ones imprinted with “Prismalo II Soft” notably include three gold stripes near the white end cap. Since the inexpensive “set” was such an incomplete mess, I didn’t think it was reliable in terms of determining without doubt what kind of pencils came in the St. Bernard tin. However, other specimen images I had examined on eBay led me to believe that the “triple stripe” pencils did belong to the St. Bernard era.

As my historical post surmises, the softer form of Caran d’Ache’s water-soluble colored pencils during this era was called Prismalo II Soft, and that name would morph into the current product name, Supracolor II Soft (and eventually just Supracolor II). I’d seen other Prismalo II sets on eBay with variations of the St. Bernard image, and I’d also seen Supracolor II tins with a mostly solid red lid. All of these sets seemed to contain pencils with the triple stripes. Based purely on eBay sightings, I surmised that the triple-stripe era had been somewhat shorter (and therefore rarer) than other designs.

The stripe pattern changed a bit also: The Prismalo’s stripe pattern was thin/thick/thin. In its Supracolor II form, the pattern had changed to three stripes of equal width. It seemed to be of historical significance (if only in my brain) that the triple-stripe design marked the transition between the Prismalo II name and the Supracolor II name. (If, by this point, your eyes are glazing over, don’t say I didn’t warn you! 🤓)

Triple-striped pattern of Prismalo II

I got a bee in my collector’s bonnet to hunt down a complete set of triple-striped Supracolor II pencils, preferably with the St. Bernard image on the tin (the latter just because it’s adorable). It was still on my “hunting” list early last year when I made the commitment to downsize and, therefore, to stop collecting. Although I had not added any new vintage specimens to my collection since then, it’s hard to delete the list from my mind.

That’s why you could have pushed me down with a feather at last week’s Gab & Grab when I spotted this tin: A complete set of Supracolor II with a whole family of St. Bernards! And – gasp! – three gold stripes on the barrel! The Urban Sketchers G & G is just not the kind of place I would expect to find a grail, and yet there it was – and the owner was my good sketching buddy, Roy! Neither he nor I had known that my grail had been in his studio all that time!

Slightly different triple-stripe pattern on the Supracolor II set I recently acquired.

Price sticker on the tin

He had purchased the set at a store called Amsterdam Art (for $16.56 on sale!) in the Bay Area where he had been living from 1977 to 1982. Now I have a definitive date marker for this set’s design and the era when Caran d’Ache made the name transition from Prismalo II to Supracolor II.

What a score! The only item I took home from the Gab & Grab, the St. Bernard family will now have a happy home in my new studio. Thanks, Roy!

Incidentally, I have plans to display my vintage collection properly once my furniture is in place. Back in 2018 when I first began collecting, my entire collection fit beautifully on a few bookshelves. That era certainly didn’t last long! I want to get back to that type of collection display – small enough to see and appreciate everything, not just stacks and stacks that I have to move around just to find what I’m looking for. It may take a while to get there, but I will certainly photograph the results when I arrive.

(While digging through my blog for that post, I also came across this one in early 2018 about my resolution to de-stash! I’m happy that I had documented that event – it makes me realize how much re-stashing had occurred in seven years!)

Walking with a Chance of Sunshine

1/14/25 Cloudy (but the trees were still wearing
their cheerful holiday lights)

1/13/25 Foggy

Our typical fog and overcast skies this time of year gave way to several days of sunshine last week – what a treat! Although I don’t suffer from clinical SAD, I have friends who do, and I know that this unseasonal sunlight is more than just a treat for them – it’s therapeutic. Even without SAD and even when it’s cold, I feel uplifted walking in sunshine. Here are some recent weather reports.

1/20/25 The Brothers in sunshine

1/25/25 Sunny

1/26/25 Sunny

Getting Longer

 

1/19/25 sunset

1/12/25 sunset

Both sunrises and sunsets have been coming at convenient sketching times for me. We’ve had an unusually dry January (funny how every weather report lately has been about rare and unusual weather patterns everywhere – actually not funny at all) and (uncommonly) mostly clear skies.

On these cloudless days, I daresay the days are getting longer.

1/20/25 sunrise

1/26/25 sunrise

My Gab & Grab De-Stash

Two rows of tables for our Gab & Grab! I took up most of one row for my stash.

 Although I rarely make blog posts without including sketches, I’m making an exception here to follow up on my stated intention a couple of days ago. Seattle USk had a super-successful, well-attended Gab & Grab on Saturday, and I remembered to take photos of the stash I unstashed there!

The other admins and I had intended to take anything remaining at the end to Seattle ReCreative, the fantastic nonprofit organization that takes donations of art and craft materials to resell and give to schools. Better yet, we discovered that one of our members teaches elementary school and gratefully took all the remainders! It saved us a trip to ReCreative, and we’re all happy knowing that her students will make use of our stuff. Win-win!

Unexpected, exciting bonus: Given that the purpose of my huge de-stashing was to downsize, not make room for more, I was committed to keeping my hands off the goodies that others brought. Of course, I still looked at everything, and imagine how gobsmacked I was to spot something I had been looking for on eBay for years! And imagine learning that a sketcher friend had had it in his studio all this time – and that it is now mine! (You can’t blame me for grabbing that one, right?) Stay tuned for the reveal and full report!

A few happy grabbers!

Haiku Portraits

 

1/12/25 Aegis staff and resident

1/11/25 Light rail commuters

When I shared one of these sketches recently, a friend’s comment was, “That’s a haiku sketch.” Not only is that the highest of compliments; it’s also my goal: Draw as little as possible and still tell the story.

1/21/25 Aegis resident

1/24/25 Fellow patient at a dental waiting room

Narcissus

1/23/25 Paperwhite narcissus

The friend who has often given me amaryllis plants for Christmas gave me a paperwhite narcissus “kit” this time. Unlike the rapidly growing amaryllis, which is so much fun to sketch because it visibly changes every day, the narcissus has been sluggish. After following the planting instructions, it changed so little for so long that I thought for sure I had already killed it (this kit is supposed to be foolproof for black thumbs like mine . . . we’ll see). Onion-like sprouts did start coming up eventually, though very slowly.

Impatient for blossoms, I thought I’d sketch it now at the onion stage to encourage it to bloom. If I don’t kill it before that happens, I’ll sketch it again when it does! 

Downsizing, Phase 2: The Last Mile

 

1/22/25 Caffe Ladro, Roosevelt neighborhood

“Seeing the light at the end of the tunnel” should be the appropriate cliché for the current stage of my downsizing project: I really am near the end of Phase 2 (moving into my new studio/office). But in the back of my mind is some other kind of adage, or maybe it’s a parable, math story problem, logic trick or some other such nonsense that I’ve heard but can’t quite remember or articulate. It’s something about how you divide the distance between here and there in half. When you get to the middle, you divide the remaining distance again by half. Repeat and continue, and you get closer and closer to your destination but never arrive. Or perhaps the cliché I’m really looking for is “the last mile is the longest.”

Ready for the Gab & Grab!

Nonetheless, I managed to fill six cartons with art materials for USk Seattle’s annual Gab & Grab (we had a special Black Friday edition last year, but typically we do only one each winter). I probably could have filled more, but I ran out of time, and I was satisfied that I had at least purged every category once. When I put everything out for the Grab tomorrow, I will try to remember to take photos!

Since at least one reader has expressed interest in hearing my criteria for purging, I’ll try to articulate that now. The first pass was easy: Anything I knew was of poor quality or a duplicate, out it went. (If the quality was so bad that I would be embarrassed to give it to a friend, it went into the Goodwill box.) Also easy were lots of materials I had used once to review for the Well-Appointed Desk but knew I would not use again.

That’s as far as I went for smaller categories. For my largest categories – colored and graphite pencils and related erasers, sharpeners and other accessories – I had to take a second pass, which was harder. I have a vast accumulation of “OK” products that I might use again with varying degrees of satisfaction. But given how many superior products I also have (the ones much better than “OK”), would I ever really choose to use those that are simply OK? Do I ever reach for them now? The answer was clear (but it was painful because I had so many in that category).

Finally, I have quite a few pencils and pencil sets that I would put in the “novelty” category. They had no purpose beyond initially amusing me, and much as I hated to admit it, the amusement was short-lived (I suppose that’s the definition of novelty). If it no longer brings joy or purpose, out it went.

Though it was a painful, tedious process, I’m happy to say that most of what I’m left with are products of the highest quality or simply products that both give me joy and have purpose. Some items, of course, are beyond purpose yet still bring joy – certain “collectible” pencils. Although I purged many of those, too (such as pencils that other people decided I needed to have in my collection but that I didn’t actually collect myself, or duplicates), I kept many favorites.

When I eventually move out of this house, I’ll have to make yet another cut, which will be more severe still. But I’m optimistic that I’ve made a deep enough cut this time that it won’t be too bad in terms of volume (as long as I don’t add to the accumulation during the years in between!).

In my Jan. 15 sketch journal page (below), there’s a reference to the hall cabinets. Although technically not part of downsizing, I had a new cabinet built to fill a large hole that had been in the hallway the past 20 years (details in the photo cutlines below). It was much harder than I had expected to find a cabinetmaker who would custom-build it to match the original cabinet above it – everyone wants to plug and play! The new cabinet doubles my space for linens and sundries, so I no longer have to go upstairs for some of those items.

1/15/25 Third Place Commons

Before filling the new cabinet, I took everything out of the old cabinet, tossed some old linens and especially a ton of sundries I have no intention of using. I mean stuff like old shampoos and soaps (tried but didn’t like them), expired medications, hair clips and ties from when I had long hair, on and on and on! I found a whole box of different colors of shoe polish and leather-treating products that Greg must have used decades ago when he wore shoes that could be polished! Clearing all that junk out and organizing the stuff I actually do use was almost as satisfying as clearing out my studio. Imagine opening a cabinet and being able to grab a fresh toothbrush or spool of floss without digging!

AFTER: 20 years later, "someday" finally came!
I had a cabinet built to match the original. 
Since we had saved the original drawers,
I was able to reuse the knobs. Now they all match.

BEFORE: Drawers in the lower space had to be
destroyed 20 years ago to gain access to 
plumbing for the adjacent bathroom. We just
covered the hole with a sheet of MDF until 
"someday" when we would fix it.

Happy Meal

 

1/21/25 My Happy Meal

Speaking of burgers, by an amusing coincidence, this vegetarian had another burger encounter the next day. A Canadian friend had texted me a few days prior, asking for a favor: McDonald’s was about to begin a promotion including Pokemon cards inside Happy Meals. Some of the rare, collectible cards are known to be worth five and even six digits. The promotion would be available only in the US.

A collector of the cards, the friend warned me that some past Pokemon promotions have caused competitive riots in Target and Walmart stores (in the US, of course). Now that I’ve stopped collecting vintage colored pencils, I’ve been missing the hunt for rare or unusual specimens on eBay. It would be fun, possibly even competitive! I was in!

I marked the promotion date on my calendar and geared myself up for the race. First, I had to Google for my nearest McDonald’s – a couple were nearly within walking distance. Perhaps there would be a line of crazed Pokemon card collectors out the door . . . how exciting! (Obviously, I don’t get out enough.)

Then I received another text from my friend: She had learned that the same promotion would be available in Canada after all, so I was off the hook. I was disappointed; I had been hoping to be able to share the one good thing going on in the US. Well, no matter: I decided I would go get a Happy Meal and send her the cards anyway!

First I arrived at 8 a.m. in case they ran out before lunch time, only to learn that Happy Meal service didn’t begin until 10:30 a.m. After an appointment, I couldn’t go back until 11:30 a.m. No line out the door? Plenty of parking? Had they run out already?! Inside, only two people were present; neither ordered a Happy Meal. Confirming that my Happy Meal included Pokemon cards, I beamed at the counter person. Score!

Although my triumph was somewhat anticlimactic (where was the rioting?!), I scarfed down the fries for lunch and even took a bite of the burger. Like Proust’s madeleine, that taste (my first beef in probably several decades) immediately brought me back to high school dates. Mediocre as ever but happily nostalgic.

The Original Burgermaster

 

1/20/25 Burgermaster near University Village

Although I haven’t eaten a burger since I was in my early 20s, I’m aware that the original Burgermaster (part of a local chain) is a long-time Seattle institution. More than a fast food stand, it has served as a community center since 1952. Like a neighborhood diner, regulars know that when they go there, they will likely see friends. It is a community “third place.”

I learned a few days ago that it will close next month to make way for yet another humongous apartment complex near University Village. I don’t know if it is always crowded or if fans were flocking to pay homage and say good-bye, but the large parking lot was jam-packed around 2:30 p.m. when I sketched this. I don’t have any personal connection to this Burgermaster, but I can imagine the loss to its community.

More than 10 years ago, I sketched another Burgermaster – one of few remaining drive-in restaurants in the Seattle area. It’s probably only a matter of time before that one gets replaced by an apartment building, too, since that seems to be the way everything is going.

I Smelled Something

 

1/5/25 Autobiographical comics from imagination

Here’s an autobiographical comics page I drafted a couple of weeks ago. Although they look rudimentary, making all these sketches from imagination took some doing. My intention was to eventually redraw the strip in ink and maybe add color afterwards, but by the time I finished, I ran out of steam. I never went back to it, and I’ve decided to call it good.

I think what happened here is the main reason I am a sketchbook sketcher and not a maker of “finished” works (the kind intended to be framed and hung on a wall). Some painters see all of their sketches as nothing more than preparatory studies for future works. Not me: Done is done. Once the fresh spontaneity and immediacy of a sketch (or first draft) are achieved, I lose whatever motivation I might have had initially to see it through to a more finished state.

My only regret with this strip is that I didn’t draw directly with ink the way I always do on location. I don’t have the same confidence when drawing from my head as I do from observation, so I feel like I need to be able to erase. Developing comics from imagination also takes more planning so that the strip follows a logical story arc. I could probably accomplish that step with a storyboard of small thumbnails instead of making complete drawings as I did here. Drewscape, my autobiographical comics hero, draws from his imagination directly with ink. Someday I hope to have enough experience under my belt that I’ll feel confident enough to do that, too.

“Do Something”: The People’s March

 

1/18/25 Pre-march rally at Cal Anderson Park, Capitol Hill neighborhood

A sea of pink hats and human solidarity: That was my lasting impression of the 2017 Women’s March in Seattle. On Saturday the vibe was very different at the (more inclusively named) People’s March, which was much smaller and quieter. Recalling vividly the logistical difficulties of taking public transportation that day eight years ago, I almost hesitated, but I needn’t have worried; participation this time was a small fraction of the 130,000 who turned out in 2017.

A few women broke into song as we all waited for the march to get under way.

No pink hats anywhere to be seen on my light rail ride.

I also missed the strong symbolism of pink pussy hats so many women (and even some men) donned back then. When I got on the light rail Saturday morning, expecting to see at least a few other pink hats besides my own, I saw none. Although that discouraged me, I felt better by the time I met two friends for the pre-march rally at Cal Anderson Park. There, we saw lots of signs and enough pink hats to feel some of the solidarity we had all remembered in 2017.

The march is finally under way down Pine Street from Capitol Hill toward Seattle Center.

While some people say that participating in protest demonstrations is a waste of energy that could be applied more productively, I kept hearing Michelle Obama’s voice in my head to “do something.” Sketching as we marched, I suddenly became aware that I probably would not have come if it hadn’t been a sketch reportage opportunity. For me, the “doing something” is not just showing up for the march; it’s documenting that it occurred. Many people have deep concerns about our country and the man who takes office today. The ones who turned out for the march were expressing those concerns with their presence. I, in turn, sketched their presence. It is never a waste of energy to use art to express our views. 

The march continues through downtown Seattle.

The two-mile march ends at the Space Needle.

Before the march began, I made a journal page at Elliott Bay Book Company's cafe.

Marching Tools

Searching my blog for the post I did in 2017, I also found this one about the tools I used and what I learned from sketching during a march. As I prepped for Saturday, I didn’t remember exactly which materials I had brought then, but I knew they were simple. I chose simplicity again: A brush pen containing water-soluble ink for easy tonal washes and two pink brush markers.

Simple materials: From top, Kuretake Zig Clean Color brush marker, Akashiya Sai watercolor marker, Pilot brush pen

Picking out the pens was easy. Slightly more difficult was the sketchbook. I wanted something very slim and lightweight, yet in a slightly larger format than my usual Uglybook. And I wanted white paper so that the pink would pop. I dug through my stash and found a 6-inch-square signature that I had stitched years ago, probably to sample some new watercolor papers.

Doing something!

The format was an ideal choice: I had 50 percent more real estate than in an Uglybook, and whatever the paper is has excellent sizing. In fact, the heavy sizing turned out to be a problem for the water-soluble brush pen ink, which took a bit of time to dry completely, and I kept smudging it, especially when I tried to write. Writing while walking is way harder than drawing! I wanted to record some of the signs, but I gave up after a couple of messy attempts. 

Thankfully, rain was not in the forecast as it had been in 2017. On Saturday, my usual convertible mittens enabled me to keep sketching even though the temps were in the low 30s!

Museum of Flight’s Great Gallery

1/17/25 Museum of Flight (Most of the aircraft were sketched from the upper level. I glued in a piece of my wristband to fill the long, horizontal space at the bottom of this page -- an ideal spot for a bit of collage. )

I made this small page to catch a couple of sketchers.

As I walked into the Great Gallery, it felt like it had been ages since I last sketched at the Museum of Flight. Indeed, I missed last year’s USk outing there, so the last time for me was in 2019. I had skipped sketching in the Great Gallery altogether that time, so on Friday I spent the whole USk outing there. The largest gallery, it’s also the most intimidating – lots and lots of planes and other aircraft covering the floor and hanging from the ceiling.

Instead of making portraits of individual aircraft as I’ve always done before, I made small vignettes to tell the wider story of the museum atmosphere. Truth be told, it was also much easier to make thumbnail-size sketches rather than page spreads trying to get a whole jet’s wingspan to fit. Lazy or smart? You decide. In any case, I had a ball!

Many thanks to Kate, a long-time volunteer, for offering Urban Sketchers free guest passes to the museum.

The larger and more intimidating the space, the smaller I sketch!