Review: Uni Posca Colored Pencils

Uni Posca colored pencils

The Uni Posca name might be best known among sketchers for its line of opaque paint markers. I reviewed them a couple of years ago at the Well-Appointed Desk, and they are especially fun to use on black or other dark colored papers. (I did a sketch of koi at the Japanese Garden with Posca paint markers a while back.) I discovered recently that Uni Posca is now in the colored pencil game, too: A set and open-stock pencils are available at Blick for about $2 each. Although I’d be reluctant to buy a set of 36 as a trial (the only set size available at Blick), their availability as open stock made my decision easy. I bought one each of red (15), lemon yellow (28) and blue (33). (My recent experiments with triads have convinced me that three primaries are an ideal number for testing application and blending properties.)

 

The 3 colors I tried

First, let’s look at the pencil’s exterior: Posca pencils, made by Mitsubishi (I don’t have the packaging to know whether they are made in Japan), have matte black, round barrels that feel very smooth and comfortable to hold. (I have been known to repeatedly run my fingers along that lovely, pleasant finish.) Uni Posca’s primary colored logo, which also appears on its markers and other products, gives the design a whimsical look.

 

Smooth matte finish and rounded end caps

Color numbers on the ends

Rounded end caps indicating the pencils’ colors have the same matte finish. Color numbers are on the ends – a nice touch for people like me who store pencils in cups instead of in boxes. Unfortunately, color names are not on the barrels.

Look at that thick core – the first sign that these pencils might be pleasant to use. According to Blick, the oil-based cores are “fade-resistant, highly opaque, and blendable.” A close look at the collar gives an interesting clue: Instead of dipping the end cap color onto the painted pencil, the end cap color is painted first, and the black coat is added afterwards.

Thick core and a telltale collar.

1/8/20 Uni Posca pencils in Stillman & Birn Epsilon sketchbook

Using a Stillman & Birn Epsilon sketchbook, I started sketching an apple with the Uni Posca pencils, and I was immediately struck by how creamy and smooth the super-soft cores are. Among the softest I’ve used, they apply like a dream and blend beautifully without feeling waxy. In fact, the feeling was familiar. . .

1/8/20 Uni Pericia pencils in S&B Epsilon

I reviewed Uni Pericia colored pencils for the Well-Appointed Desk a while back, but it had been a while since I last used them. After I finished the Posca sketch, I pulled out my Pericia set to refresh my memory.  Using three colors in the Pericia palette that are as close as I could find to the Posca triad, I sketched the apple again. Pericia pencils are also oil-based. There it was – that same super-soft, creamy application. 

I put the cores side by side: The same thickness, and the wood looks the same, too. In fact, the round barrel, matte finish and rounded end caps are also very similar.

From top: Pericia and Posca

Since opacity seems to be a selling point of the Poscas, I swatched both side by side on black paper.

Opacity test in Stillman & Birn black Nova sketchbook

 I’d be willing to bet money that Posca and Pericia cores are the same!

How are they different, then? Mainly the price. Although Blick doesn’t carry Pericia pencils, so I can’t compare directly, JetPens’ price is about $3 each. Pericia pencils come in a faux leather storage case that looks like it should contain jewelry. Blick’s images of Posca packaging show plastic trays. When I reviewed Pericias, I wondered how much of that price was for the fancy case . . . and now I think I know how much.

I don’t know if Pericia pencils are available open stock (I’ve never found them sold that way online), but Posca pencils are, so that also makes them a better choice. I say go for the Poscas. At least right now, Blick seems to be the only place carrying Posca pencils.

Edited 1/17/20: Using Blick’s chart of 36 open stock colors, I matched as many colors as I could from my set of 24 Pericia pencils. Except for a handful that appear to be unique to Pericia, I found close matches for all the rest. Color numbers do not match.   

Off the Couch and to the Couch

1/8/20 Roosevelt neighborhood

Cold and promising rain, the day looked grim. I was trying to get up the get-up-and-go to take a walk/sketch when I received a text: “Couch at 71^st and Roosevelt.” It was exactly what I needed! (Thanks, Natalie!)

When I got there, I was delighted to find not one but two couches right across the street from each other. I couldn’t get them both into the same composition, so I started with this one. By the time I finished, I was too cold to do the second. Maybe it’ll still be there tomorrow.

Lots of Lamps But Not Much Light

1/10/20 Broadway, Tacoma

Built in 1916 for the Fraternal Order of Elks, McMenamins’ newest hotel and pub venue in Tacoma would be challenging fun to sketch from the outside on a warm, sunny day. On a wet, cold Friday, however, we all stayed inside the Elks Temple, where it was cozy. The joint sketch outing between USk Seattle and USk Tacoma attracted a huge turnout, and many sketchers were attracted to the venue’s period-appropriate furnishings, especially the impressive collection of vintage lamps.

Ironically, despite all the lamps, I found most areas to be dimly lighted (authentic to the period, I suppose). After wandering around from floor to floor, admiring the décor, I found a stairwell window with a view of Broadway.

Later I found a seat on the main floor, where I noticed that all the fabulous chairs had clawed feet. I knew I didn’t have enough time for a whole chair, but I had time for one foot (well, three, actually).

1/10/20 One clawed foot and two booted ones.

Dark but full of gorgeous lamps

Lots of clawed feet

At the Elks Temple pub for possibly the
 largest USk lunch turnout ever!

Minimal Kit Check-in: Green, Gray, Bigger Book

Left: out; right: in

It’s been more than two weeks since I started using my minimal sketch kit, and I’ve already revised it, so it’s time to check in. After only a few days, I had to swap out the bright green/yellow-green Caran d’Ache Bicolor pencil for my tried-and-true Light Olive (245) in the Cd’A Museum Aquarelle line. The Bicolor greens were just too garish and unnatural for the dead of winter, and neither could be toned down with the other colors in my kit. By contrast, my favorite Light Olive is a versatile, medium green that can easily be brightened with yellow or darkened with blue. In addition, I took out the brown/amber Bicolor and put in my all-purpose neutral, French Gray (808) (also a Museum Aquarelle). Those Bicolor browns hadn’t been very useful, while the warm French Gray works well for both shading and standing in for an urban or natural brown.

According to my own rules, any change is fair game as long as I don’t increase the number of items in the kit. I still have a net of five sticks – but eight colors now instead of 10. (Surprisingly, I’m reducing colors instead of adding – who would have guessed?)

Ahhh.... it's nice to have my usual-sized "canvas" again.

During my walk/sketch fitness walks, the Field Notes Signature didn’t last long, either. I was afraid I was going to find the paper less than satisfying, but ironically, that part was fine; it was the page size that I found too constraining. I’m so used to having a full 8½-by-5½-inch page without a gutter in the middle that the smaller size cramped my style, literally. I’m now simply taking my usual daily-carry Stillman & Birn (currently a Zeta) on my fitness walks, too. It’s about 6 ounces heavier than the Signature, but I think it’s a worthwhile compromise to have a comfortable page size. Thankfully, it still fits in the mini-size Rickshaw Zero messenger bag I’m using for this purpose, so I didn’t have to change that.

Shown below is the revised kit – same number of tools with a few color changes. The ArtGraf water-soluble graphite pencil has proven to be a useful shading tool when some Bicolors have turned out to be too pale (as well as a fun drawing tool on its own). Normally, I would have reached for a cool gray or black for that role, so my minimalism challenge is teaching me to stretch the versatility of materials.

Revised minimal kit.

A Bend in the Road

1/7/20 Green Lake

Walking through the Green Lake neighborhood is interesting because all streets lead to the lake, so as long as you can see the lake somewhere in the distance, you know where you are. The road around the lake itself curves in funny ways, like this one, which is fun to sketch.

More Triads; Finding Balance

1/2/20 Caran d'Ache Museum Aquarelle (red 65, yellow 10, blue 185)

Day after day of rain is good for some things: I’m still studying primary triads.

At the same time, I’m trying to find the right balance for myself between a painterly approach and a more “drawingly” one (no, “drawingly” is not a word, but it should be if “painterly” is). After reading about Charles Evans’ approach, which has a strong painterly emphasis, I looked critically at how I might use more painterly techniques. Then I stepped back again to think about how I prefer to use watercolor pencils to get the results I want. It’s still somewhere in the middle between drawing with dry pencils and using water to enhance the drawing – without taking away the form that I only seem able to achieve with drawing, not painting. It’s a wobbly balance beam I tread.

The sketch above of the Cosmic Crisp apple is the same one you saw the other day, except this time I included the triad swatches. Preserving the yellow “star” would have been difficult to do with stronger, wetter brush strokes, so I was more reserved with water. This Caran d’Ache Museum Aquarelle triad is on the cooler side. (I’ve stopped trying to identify the cools and warms because I think it’s more informative to simply see the results.)

1/4/20 (no color numbers or names available)

Next I sketched a different Cosmic Crisp (at right) with some low-pigment, student-grade pencils (yes, sometimes I like to torture myself with inferior products just for kicks). Although the pigments were pale, I like this muted triad. The hard-working yellow did a lot to brighten the cool red and probably saved this triad from being glum. But the low pigment kept me from getting the shaded side of the apple to be as dark as I wanted.

Alas, my sketch of a pear (below) could not be saved, even by the yellow. The red and blue in this Faber-Castell Albrecht Durer triad apparently ran into each other head-on (as is apparent in the swatches, which show the purple as brown), and the dark side of the pear turned to mud. (Why do I go through with a sketch even when mud is apparent from the test swatches? I’m obviously a glutton for punishment. Although some part of me is always curious to see if I can prove the swatches wrong.)

 

1/5/20 Faber-Castell Albrecht Durer
(Middle Cadmium Red 217, Light Chrome Yellow 106, Cobalt Blue Greenish 144)

1/6/20 Winsor-Newton (Carmine, Sunflower, Midnight Blue)

The fourth triad in this post (right) is my favorite, and the sketch is also my best example here of the right balance between painterly and “drawingly” (especially the pear). This Winsor-Newton triad is really lovely, especially the clean and bright secondaries that came from it. This time, I paid attention to the swatches (what?? I’m actually learning?!): Despite those fresh secondaries, I saw that the center (all three primaries) could get muddy if the balance wasn’t right. So I minimized the yellow on the shadow side of the fruit and stuck mainly with red and blue there. I love the dark purple that resulted even more than the one that the test swatches had indicated.

In fact, I just went back and reviewed all my triads so far, and I’d say that the red/blue mix is critical in making successful triads. Yellow, a quiet, hard worker, usually brings out the best in either red or blue. But if red and blue together aren’t right, no amount of yellow will help. I’ll try that as a strategy next time: Start with a red and blue that mix into a strong purple, then add different yellows to see how the mix changes.

As for my application process, I most often get results I like when I use plenty of pigment in the first layer, activate it with a sparing amount of water (not too painterly), and then finish with dry pigment. The water step brings out the color intensity, but I can then take my time to model the form with pencil marks. If I go in again with more water, I tend to wash away all the careful modeling I just put in.  

Bitter Wind

1/4/20 Wedgwood neighborhood

It may look sunny, but those shadows belie the bitterly cold wind that day. I stayed inside my mobile studio.