It’s not very often that I come across a new product that absolutely rocks my creative world, but lemme tell you, these Tombow Dual Brush Pens have.
The funny thing is how I heard about them in the first place – my girlfriend who doesn’t paint or draw told me about them. She’s been swooning and craving adult coloring books.
Adult whaaa? (sounded a lil kinky to me, haha)
Yep, she said, as she pulled Amazon up on her phone and showed me her favorite coloring books. (Of course, you know when I saw all of the line drawings my wheels immediately started racing since I draw something nearly every day. But more on that later.) I quizzed her a bit more.
What do you color with? Crayons?
No, she said. There are these fabulous marker pens called Tombow, as she proceeds to pull up videos on YouTube.
Now I’m really intrigued . . . and since my eyes are past the point of watching a video on a phone, I pulled them up on my computer and I.was.hooked. Good grief, there are some artists that use these pens for amazing watercolors. Amazing!
For the first time ever, I reached out to a company and the people at Tombow were SO nice and were more than happy to send me a set of pens to try that come with a blender pen.
It was so much fun playing with them, trying different ways to blend, pick up color, and using the Blender pen rather than a paintbrush. It didn’t take long before I was ready to color some flowers.
Remember the coloring pages I just posted? Now you see what I was talking about, calling them “coloring pages”.
I made a short video for you to see the color and how it ‘moves’ but I also wanted to give some written tips too.
Okay, remember that I’m a newbie with these wonderful pens but I always share with you regardless. So far I’ve come up with a few easy ways to use them to get a watercolor effect. You could certainly use the pens as simply markers and get beautiful bright colors. I just happen to love watercolors.
First you need a pattern or coloring page. I’ve always always always used graphite paper to transfer my patterns to watercolor paper and canvas but I was too impatient and tried my HP printer. I just slipped a piece of 140 lb. watercolor paper into the printer and printed off the coloring page and it worked great!
You can get thinner watercolor paper too but I generally use 140 lb and was thrilled that it went thru the printer with no hang ups.
For the peonies I used red, green, the Blender, and also a few small paintbrushes. You’ll also need a paper towel, water basin, and foam plate which I use for a palette.
The pens have two sides – this flexible brush tip (the only one I’ve used) and a fine tip. The Blender is the same with two tips. This brush tip is very fine, which makes getting into tight areas so easy.
The first method I tried was coloring the paper with the red pen – just a tiny bit – and then dampening the Blender with water and going over the red and working outward – perfect for flowers which generally have their depth low on the petals and get lighter at the top of the petal.
You can also put some color on the plate and then pick it up with either the Blender or a paintbrush. This is also a great way to blend two colors, on your palette.
The upper peony was colored completely with the Blender and the lower flower I used a paintbrush on, then switched to the Blender because it was so much faster.
This peony was colored with red on the paper and then the Blender pen.
On this flower, I placed color on the plate and picked it up with a brush or Blender pen. Notice how it’s not as deep. And also how all of the darker pink is placed in the lower parts of the petals, or the center of the flower, if you will.
Also, none of these “strokes” are perfect. In fact, I think they look better being imperfect. I’ll continue practicing with leaving white space for highlights too.
Not bad for a newbie, huh?
Oh my gosh, put Tombow Dual Brush Markers on your list for your next art or craft purchase. They do so much more than this too – rubber stamps, paper crafts, all kinds of stuff.
I’m absolutely thrilled with them for coloring. So you know what that means right? There will be more coloring pages coming!
Happy Coloring!
Colleen
Colleen:
I really love your drawings, especially the flowers. Any more thoughts on an “adult coloring” book?”
Coloring is one of the most soothing things I know.
Pam in Louisiana
It’s ‘in the works’ Pam! Thanks for asking. Personally I prefer sketching over painting so when I found these Tombow pens, it’s like I have the best of both worlds. Although it doesn’t matter if you use colored pencils or crayons, the relaxation you get from coloring if fabulous, I agree.
My first book will probably be flowers. But I have a “list” of books I want to do. Thanks for the boost of confidence!
xo
Colleen
What a great tutorial, Colleen! I might actually be able to color something that doesn’t look like a toddler got into the colors! I just got a new printer that will handle heavy paper much better than my old one, I’m going to print out your lovely peonies and hydrangeas and give this a try. Thanks!
I’m so happy you’re gonna give them a try, Kris! If your printer doesn’t handle the watercolor paper, you can go to OfficeMax or Kinko’s and they’ll have a printer that will. I’m looking into another type of paper too and, of course, I’ll let everyone know if it works or not.
Beautiful, Colleen. I’m so looking forward to your coloring books. I know they will be lovely.
Aw, thanks Steph! I’m excited too!
I would love to receive new posts. Thank you.
Hi MaryEtta! Thanks for your interest. I’m trying hard to keep up with new blog posts as well as create art. I’ve yet to find a good balance. I’ll definitely be doing more with Tombow markers because I love them!
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Thanks again!