Prisma Color Premier, Lyra Rembrandt Polycolor, Raffiné Marco and Derwent Colorsoft - comparison.

Recently, I added adult colouring to my activities.  In my quest to master blending, burnishing and water drops I have watched utube videos, read multiple product reviews, then purchased many pencil crayons, books, markers, pastel chalks and gel pens.  These coloured pencils (pencil crayons Canada) were purchased from Amazon.ca in the largest set available.

Prisma Color Premier - 150 colours manufactured in Mexico ($.90 each). They blend wonderfully and lay down colour very well.  Their biggest drawback is they are fragile, the lead tips break easily, sometimes the core is not in the centre or broken all the way down.

Lyra Rembrandt Polycolor - 72 colours manufactured in Germany ($1.06 each).  These pencils are light, thinner than the others.  Lyra are oil based.

Raffiné Marco - 72 colours, manufactured in China ($.45 each). Hexagon shaped which I love using. Raffiné are oil based.

Derwent Coloursoft - 72 colours, manufactured in England ($1.47 each).  Bigger colour core, they sharpen easily, no breakage at all. They are a wax based. 

Marco Raffiné does not have the names of the colour printed on the pencil.  I could not find a list from the manufacturer with the names either.  The  colour chart above was printed then coloured with my pencils.

I like them all.  The Prisma colours are rich and vibrant, as are the Derwent.  The Derwent are not fragile, but Prisma has more than double the colour selection.

Side by side it is hard to tell the difference between Prisma and Derwent on paper.  They both lay colour down beautifully and blend well.

The Raffiné Marco in top left hand quarter, the Lyra Rembrandt in bottom right hand quarter.  These are the oil based colour pencils. They both require more effort for blending.  I did not use any solvent. The oil based pencils are fabulous.  The colours are not quite as vibrant, but they lay down so nicely. Both the thinner light Lyra pencils and the hexagon shaped Raffiné are a joy to use.  They feel really nice in my hand.  My only complaint with the Raffinés is no colour name on the pencil.  I have no cons with the Lyra Rembrandts.

The snowflakes were coloured white, the paper is light cream colour, but it is still difficult to see the white.

This picture was coloured using all four sets and Staedtler pastel chalks for the background. 

The fairies were coloured with Prisma Color Premier, Hilroy and Staedler triangular pencils.

The fish drinking wine is Derwent, Lyra and Raffiné Marco pencil crayons.

The vase of flowers is a combination of pencil crayon brands.

My conclusion is that we can never have two many pencil crayons.  The biggest bang for the buck are the Raffiné Marcos.  Most colour selection is Prisma Color Premier.  It is like machine embroidery thread, the more colour choices and brands the better. 

If there is a drawback here it would be that my adult colouring is interfering with quilting and playing the piano. 

Trapunto quilting - cushion cover top and wall hanging.

I took a trapunto quilting class through Nifty Needlers and made this cushion cover top. Trapunto, from the Italian for "to quilt," is a method of quilting that is also called "stuffed technique." A puffy, decorative feature, trapunto utilizes at least two layers, the underside of which is slit and padded, producing a raised surface on the quilt.

The extra layer of high loft batting is under the ring shaped motif and the letter A in the centre of the ring.

All the motifs were free motion quilted.  I traced the hearts on the fabric with a wash away pen.

The back side is warm and natural quilt batting.  I used polyester thread.

Shadow trapunto quilting is five layers instead of three.  I used Geta Grama's tutorial and her flower pattern.

Geta's technique requires wash away thread to stitch the extra layer of high loft batting to the organza around the designs that will be raised in the finished piece.

I drew the hearts on card stock paper then cut them out and traced the trapunto motifs onto the wash away embroidery stabilizer.  Pinned the stabilizer on top of the organza and high loft batting. After stitching with the wash away thread I cut away the batting around the flower and hearts.  Next I pinned the pink cotton quilt sandwich under the organza and high loft layer.

I used Marathon pink embroidery thread to quilt all five layers together.  The binding was applied then the wall hanging was washed removing all the stabilizer, wash away thread and fabric marker.

This is the back side. 

After stitching the trapunto areas, the entire piece was free motion quilted starting with the centre and working to the outside corners. I drew the stems for the spray of feathers in between the hearts.

 

 The texture is marvellous.

 The hearts and the flower are very puffy.

 The organza and embroidery thread make it shiny.

The binding is only two inches wide and was applied with a Bernina #71 Flat Felt foot.  I used Lisa Yarost's binding tutorial.

It's difficult to work with such a narrow binding but the finished edge is worth it.  The binding cannot be wider as it will not fit in the foot.

Cutting the high loft batting away from the organza was challenging, because it is easy to snip a hole in the organza, as long the hole is not in the motif it will get buried in the dense quilting.

This was a fun project.

Dear Readers, have you tried trapunto quilting?

Modern Nature Inspired Quilts by Bernadette Mayr - Pyramids

The local Nifty Needlers group has a library of quilting books, in April I volunteered to make one quilt from the book.  This project was outside my comfort zone, as I make baby quilts, Alzheimer's touch quilts, bed quilts, place mats, oven mitts, bibs, art quilts are not my thing.

I choose the pyramids because it was an excellent opportunity to use up scraps.

 The instructions are well written and easy to follow.

The pyramids are cut at 30˚, 90˚, 60˚ and 45˚ degree angles.

I made the inside border wider and the outside one narrower, then the instructions.

The backing is recycled denim from old bluejeans.

The outside border was free motion quilted with heart shaped leaves and the inside border is half spirals.

 The blue sky was straight stitched with tight vertical lines.

 The sand was straight stitched with tight horizontal lines.

 The pyramids are not quilted.

The binding is only two inches wide and was applied with a Bernina #71 Flat Felt foot.  I used Lisa Yarost's binding tutorial.

If I made this quilt again, I would try trapunto on the pyramids.

Adult colouring completed sheets - mermaids, owl, chameleon, butterflies and more.

This is my current favourite creative activity.  I started out with free pages from the internet, pencil crayons, markers and gel pens on hand from quilting and my kids' school days.  Very quickly I advanced to buying and trying several kinds of markers, pencil crayons, erasers, colouring books and a sketchpad.  There are lots of wonderful artists who review and provide free tips.  It was easy to find information on colouring supplies and free colouring pages.

I love angels.

The smear on the left side middle row of cupcakes is what happens when attempting to erase a pencil mark with an eraser that wasn't cleaned after blending.

 

The green chameleon was done using mostly Bic markers and only three colours.

Backgrounds are challenging.

These pictures were coloured with a combination of Papermate InkJoy Gel pens, Casemate pens, Uniball, Bic fine line Markers, CrazArt, Staedtler, Laurentien, Hilroy, Prisma Verithin and Prisma Scholar pencil crayons. 

Laurentien pencil crayons were bought out by Sanford who discontinued the line in 2012.  This company makes Prisma coloured pencils.  Compared to other hobbies, colouring is very affordable.

Dear readers, have you tried adult colouring?