Jackson's is having a discounted sale on their store brand watercolors through 6-25. If you're thinking about trying them, I would definitely consider White Nights (their prices are always fantastic)! Jackson's watercolor - www.jacksonsart.com/en-us/jacksons-artists-watercolour?___store=jacksonsart_us&acc=c0f168ce8900fa56e57789e2a2f2c9d0 White Nights watercolor - www.jacksonsart.com/en-us/st-petersburg-white-nights-watercolour?___store=jacksonsart_us&acc=c0f168ce8900fa56e57789e2a2f2c9d0
@@bethbloomer5951 It depends a bit on what you already have for basic mixing and if you're looking for fun extra colors. I really love their Quin Rose, Indian Yellow, Cobalt Turquoise and Mars Brown for a fun limited palette. You can get really stunning color separating mixtures with their QRose PR122/CobTurq PB28. If opaque pastels fit your style, mint is a really beautiful mixture. If lightfastness is not critical, the Green PG8 is a rare, single-pigment deep foresty green. It's one of the only "fair"/LFIII rated colors I make excuses to still use in my sketchbooks because it's so pretty. I'll swatch the whole catalog soon and make a video pointing out my favorites! Happy painting :)
Its sad, that Jacksons, Ken Bromley art supplies don't sell white nights anymore. I don't know a better alternative other than using the sennelier watercolour
Unhindered honesty is why we're here! If the brand is too scared for honest reviews, chances are the product isn't worth it. If you are ever so inclined, id LOVE a quick video on liner pens for watercolor, I've never seen that Tombow pen and although I love my Microns, their thinner nibs just wear down to nothing so quickly. A pen review or recommendations for waterproof fine liner ink pens would be hugely appreciated! Thank you for your hard work. I actually do trust you and your opinions, which is sadly so rare on yt. And in life lol. Anyway, thank you Kim!
I appreciate that, thank you! I use Tombo Mono pens when I'm feeling too tired to deal with my refillable technical pen. My Rotring Isograph filled with Rohrer & Klingner's Sketch Ink (Lotte, Black color) is my favorite, most durable, drawing tool. It's unfortunately a little high maintenance with periodic cleaning and needing to be used at least weekly or it gets clogs/drips. Every pre-made fineliner I've tried such as Micron, W&N fineliners, Tombo, Prismacolor, Copic and Staedler have all had their fragile thin tips get pushed in after a few drawings. They seem to all be pretty disposable, but I like how fast and reliable Tombo's ink dries waterproof so it's my go-to!
If you have not tried Uni Pin Pens, I highly recommend them. They are waterproof and they dry very, very quickly, no smudging at all. I like them even better than the Microns.
Thank you very much for the review as always, Kimberly! I really appreciate this channel as being a fountain of knowledge! You not only give out the facts behind these watercolors but I appreciate how even if you are negative, you give a good explanation as to why a certain product is faulty and how it can be improved! While Jackson's Art watercolor looks rather interesting, I think I'll skip mainly because I already invested so much in Sennelier and because the faulty labelling would drive me nuts. I'm already a stickler for when watercolor paint companies don't label their pigments, but having the same ones copy and pasted so haphazardly is kind of lazy to me. It just makes it harder for newcomers to tell what pigments they need to find or what their paint is even made of. Overall, thank you again for this!
And that is why I signed up for your patreon, you tell it like it is. Thank you for being a port of honesty in a sea of misrepresentation at best and outright lies at worst.
Your channel and videos are just plain fantastic. I appreciate how much effort you put in to organizing & presenting the information (saving us all some time & money!). I had looked at Jackson's watercolors before, but they never really hooked my interest. There just wasn't anything special or impressive about them (I love the granulating / color separating types). After seeing this though, I feel confident in my decision. Inconsistency and mislabels are a no-no in my book, that must have been frustrating to deal with! Lastly, don't feel bad about not getting any sponsorships and whatnot. There's plenty of people out there that just spout fake positive content cause they got something for free. I would rather hear your objective observations & honest opinions any day.
Thank you, I'm relieved to hear that. Honestly it doesn't feel good when I have to write a less than stellar review... but I feel like I have a responsibility to pass along unhindered honesty, even if it comes off negative or nit-picky.... There's just so many ways for artists to spend all their money and it makes me sad when wealthy big companies don't take us seriously and pass along such sloppy products.
Great review with much honesty! Ive seen a lot of people categorise Jackson watercolours as artist grade but Ive always felt that they were high "student grade" level because of the quality that they are presented and the way they behaved. I still like Jacksons paints for the costs but there is not a lot of options to pick from - I've been waiting for them to release the "perfect" yellow to add to my Jacksons set for a while and have not decided because of the lack of variety.
I greatly appreciate your information and honesty. Your posted pigment information and comparisons are fascinating to me! I have a science background, but I’m now trying to be more artistic.
Thank you, and that is funny, I have an art background and I'm trying to be more scientific. I have become fascinated with pigment properties and comparisons. I felt compelled to design my own swatch cards and start keeping track of things on a pigment database. It gets a little eccentric/fun at my house because the windows are covered in lightfast tests and I have a microscope to look at the pigment particles. I wonder what the neighbors think about all the rainbow stripes :D Happy painting!
@@KimberlyCrick I’ve done a some lightfast testing and discovered that my newer windows really do have some U.V. reducing property. The swatches went outside into full sunlight for further exposure. 😎 Thanks so much for all the effort you put into your channel. I’ve used some of your ideas for granulating mixtures since I buy tube paints. ❤️🇨🇦
So much great information here! I appreciate how invested you are in making honest and well-researched videos. For those of us who are still new to the subtleties and construct of pigment mixtures, your videos offer a wealth of helpful knowledge! Thanks, Kimberly!
Thanks so much for this review. Being Australian and utilizing Jackson's at times, I was seriously considering buying a few of Jackson's own watercolours....now I won't be. Keep up the great reviews. I really look forward to them
thank you for the honest review, makes it easier to make choice to what watercolours to get 😀 I'd much rather hear and tell the truth about supplies than anything else. hate wasting money on supplies that are not worth it and I will tell someone the problems a supply might have
Thanks for the great review. I think your critique is fair and very accurate. I bought a set of Jackson's paints as my first "professional" set about 3 years ago. For me, it was a great investment. I lived in a very remote part of Australia with no local art supplies store. Many regional art supplies stores here seem to only carry W&N professional and Cotmans, and maybe one other brand and at very high prices (triple what you pay for the same product from Jackson's). Jackson's home brand allowed be to get a set of 18 colour for the same price I could get maybe 5 or 6 colours locally. The biggest difference for me was, because of the price, I USED THEM. I painted, a lot. I actually got comfortable using the medium and started to grow as an artist. I'm one of those people who if a product costs too much, I feel like I'm wasting it if I don't create a masterpiece. I couldn't get better as an artist without lots of practice. And I mean LOTS of practice, I am not a natural artist. Jackson's let me do this with a clear conscious. I have now have a much more extensive collection of brands that include White Nights, M Graham, Roman Szmal and some Daniel Smith, Art Spectrum & Schmincke. I do think there is a place for "imperfect" brands like this if they actually get people over that first step of actually putting in the brush miles to improve. I use these when I paint with my 4 year old niece, I just don't care about what happens to them. I would not be recommending these to an experienced artist as their go to set, but for someone wanting to move from craft supplies to the next level who is constrained by cost, these are a viable option. Though with experience I would guide them toward White Nights as a better option. The key selling point for me was that I could get an 18 colour set where I chose all the colours myself. I know now that that is not always a great idea, but it gave me ownership of the process.
I did the same thing, but with Paul Rubens and Kuretake Gansai as my "use these until I'm better" paints. Totally understand that and it's a great use for them. I agree, usually when people ask me about what to start with, if White Nights is in the budget they are amazing! Happy painting :)
@@KimberlyCrick Yes, I recommend White Nights for beginners too. I also love them for my urban sketching and art journal. But, the very flawed Jackson's paints got me going, so I will always have a slightly soft spot for them.
thank you so much for this kind of videos, can't wait to see videos about your fav colors among sennelier and white nights. I always come here when I need to make new purchases.
I love your honesty and I believe that is what is much needed. Rather than not sponsor the idea would be for them to receive this as constructive feedback to work on. I have always wondered about the hype of big brand names and even though I own them all I would rather go for my A Gallo handmade watercolors and Roman szmal and white nights over sennelier, DS, w&n or schminke. I have them all but before I got into handmade my love was white nights over the top brands
your honesty is always so refreshing! Cant wait for the Sennelier and White Nights videos! Havent had experience with sennelier paints yet but love white nights for the most part (apart from some problem colors like their perylene violet)
@@atlasjulia It has a really ugly texture. Other brands are deep and smooth but the white nights version doesn't layer very well and doesn't apply evenly. Maybe it was just an early batch problem but i personally prefer other brands for that particular color
Thank You so much Kimberly! I truly enjoy your videos and go to them for your 100% transparent reviews and even more so your in depth thoughts with no fancy froo froo lol... Especially the last park where you mention sponsorship. I always feel like Artist who get them almost lie a bit just because they got the product for free....
I have seen a lot of positive reviews for things people got for free. I bet some skip over the problems because they feel bad they promised the company a video, but also I think our brains are more critical of things that we spent our own money on. Another issue is that sometimes a person reviewing an item may not be very experienced in that medium, or have used enough other brands to see how they truly compare. I appreciate your feedback and kind words! Happy painting :)
As always Kim, your reviews are FANTASTIC. I do have a preference towards Jackson's and white nights, but I do notice Jackson's itself has some problems with their product consistency, I've ordered quite a bunch of their paints in the past and again ordered in this sale. I think my only share of disappointments so far with their colors were the opera (not bright enough for my taste), cerulean blue 21ml tube (too much separation, but I think these heavier cobalt pigments do have some issues...), cadmium red violet tube (again binder separation) and their burnt sienna (too orange for my taste, I wanted a Daniel Smith hue kind of burnt sienna). Jackson's has a nice separating sap green tho, just like sennelier, with a yellow pigment and pb29. If there's a color from them that I like and decided to buy a 21ml version is the pr209. They're useful for skin tones! Other than that, I buy sennelier's different paints and invest anyways on white nights, as you can't beat that price :P
Thank you!!! I get really frustrated with product inconsistency and typos. I appreciate you sharing that about the binder issues with Cerulean and Cadmium Red Violet... I think that might be one of the colors they put on clearance (perhaps because it was problematic). You really can't beat the price on White Nights for how nice most of the colors are. I figured with the Jackson's sale this week a lot of people might be tempted by Jackson's brand, and maybe not realize that White Nights is always even cheaper. Thanks again for your thoughtful comments :D
@@KimberlyCrick you're welcome! And yeah, I got first a cad red purple as a pan, loved the hue (it's pretty, like a bloody red hue) and ordered the 21ml version on clearance.... And noticed why it was on clearance. Same thing with the cerulean. I'll still use the heck of these colors, though. XD
Thank you for making all of your videos. They are always informative and your honest in your thoughts and opinions and thats really refreshing. I think a lot of people just go by brand name and if a product has that brand on it it's immediately amazing regardless of the actual quality of the product. Thank you for all the time you spend on your videos. It's greatly appreciated. Have a wonderful day!
I really respect your full and honest reviews, always happy to see that. As of paints, I have one tube of Sennelier, cerulean I believe. It's definitely not my favourite paint, but I am well aware that it is not the easiest pigment. White nights has been on my wishlist for a while, but with the recent change in their packaging for the 12 sets (what I was interested in getting) I am less eager. Definitely still want to try out the paints, but I really don't like how the new pallettes look, so I'll have to do research into what colours to get. Still might be a while, as they're sadly not the most widely available around here.
Still at it with choosing the white nights paints?) From what I can tell, there's currently some errors in pigment labels with White Nights on Jacksons (White Nights recently changed/tweaked some of their colors, so I'm not surprised I suppose.) I wouldn't recommend getting their sets anyway, as I don't find all their colors to be great. By new palettes do you mean the plastic or metal ones?
@@dashas5198 the plastic ones. And I don't plan on buying from Jackson's, the shipping is outrageous, but thank you, other places will probably have that problem too then. Will look out for it.
Hi, Kimberly! I'm a bit late to the party, but I do have five tubes of Sennelier and many White Nights pans, so indeed I had an opportunity to test and play with them. My Senneliers come from their test pack. The pack contains 5 colours: Lemon yellow (P.Y.3), Bright red (n.r.), Ultramarine deep (P.B.29), Chinese orange and Payne's gray which are convinient mixes. I generally loved how these paints interact with each other and other brands, their texture -- how smooth, non-streaky, intense and creamy they are. I purchased the test pack because I want to see how Senneliers perform and to try and experiment with a truly limited palette. While I'm overall pleased with them, there are indeed some issues. First one, is the choice of colours and pigments. P.Y.3 is nice overall and especially nice here. I know it might be fugitive in some brands but hope it's more stable here. I loved the Chinese orange too. I loved that they added Payne's gray even though I prefer this colour by White Nights shade wise. Ultramarine deep is also nice. Even though it left me puzzled for it looks more like a mid-blue regular ultramarine. The colour that made me truly raise my brow is Bright red. They don't say which pigment it is. It looks quite cool but acts more like a warm red. Not my favourite combination and very strange. This red kind of ruins the pack as a set of basic colours. Because you cannot mix floral purples with it, if you use this palette only. Another downside is that strange chemical smell coming from the paints for the first couple of weeks that goes away later. I was hoping for it to smell of honey :)) The paint truly won't dry very fast and stays syrupy for about three weeks after you poured it into a pan to dry. Other than that all, I loved the paints. I'd call them pretty and charming :) As for the White Nights, they are my long lasting companions in this journey. I'm aware of their downsides but I love their upsides too :) Yes, I think that for that price point they are nearly perfect. Their cerulean blue that most people don't like is one my favourite colours. I recently purchased Rembrandt's granulating set which contains P.B.35 cerulean too. I loved it too, a lot. It's more pigmented and easier to pick onto the brush, than the White Night's one, but it has a slightly different shade. So they are still compamions. Not rivals. I also am a bit more demanding of the brand/paint if it's expensive and famous. I think noblesse oblige and I expect those pricy items to be good :) Again, I'm grateful to you for being objective in your reviews. You are not trying to just diss or praise a brand just because it's expensive or cheap. Instead, you truly go into detail with every paint, noting all its upsides and downsides. This is really helpful.
A very timely video! I was thinking getting a pan set of Jackson's during the paint sale. But after your review I think I'll just stick with Sennelier itself and give Jackson's a pass. Thank you for your hard work!
I never tried Jackson's... but I had the same issue with a pan of Cerulean Blue by Sennelier that I bought some years ago. It had a gelatin consistency when I tried to paint a gradient. I never had that issue with any other brand.. but I tend to stay with what I have and what's available to me.
Welcome, yes the stamp I make is currently available within the USA at www.KimCrick.com and printable digital download templates are available worldwide . Thank you, happy painting :)
If you lived in the UK, you'd have been awarded a *CBE by HM the Queen by now* - for services to artists, Kim. Your videos are _so_ helpful; thank you! 🙏🏼
Thank you so much for this video. This was very helpful! As a more affordable brand I like the Roman Szmal paints. They are very affordable (even cheaper than from Jackson's) when ordered from Artemiranda in Spain. They ship worldwide, as far as I know.
Sadly for the UK Jackson's is still the best place to buy Roman Szmal paints due to the duties added to imports over £135 from anywhere outside the UK. Their customer service is absolutely atrocious though, like dealing with angry teenagers, so I'm eager for other suppliers to start stocking his paints. The website you mentioned stock Rosa too which is interesting as I haven't been able to find their stuff anywhere here.
@@mydogeatspuke interesting. For me in Australia artemiranda is cheaper than Jackson's when it comes to Roman Szmals wc. I have never heard of Rosa wc. I will look them up.
YMMV, but between M. Graham and Sennelier, I have never had an issue with Sennelier tube paints in a pan. They do dry sticky but after curing they remain put in their pan. My M. Grahams have not and as a result I have stopped using that brand except for a stray color here and there (like their Indian Yellow) which manages to stay put in a pan. That said, I have not tried all of Sennelier's paints but French Vermillion, Yellow Sophie and Helios Purple are palette staples for me and I have never had issues with them.
I have heard about issues where MGraham liquifies and runs out of pans, so I try to limit how many MGraham colors I use too. In the case of Viridian though, I find MGraham's to be very valuable since PG18 is such a hard to re-wet pigment and Sennelier only offers a mixture with PG7 that doesn't have the same clean granulating properties. Overall I prefer Sennelier's tubes dried into a pan, even if they stay sticky. Happy painting :)
@@KimberlyCrick Thank you for that tip with Viridian. I have an old WN tube I like but it's hard to rewet, etc. It's a pigment I would like to play more with as I love the powdery granulation, esp. with cobalt blue.
Oh you so put me off buying Jackson’s watercolour. Putting it together with the fact that they refused to tell me who manufactures their paints. Thanks for the honest review.
Wow I really appreciate the Jackson’s tests as I buy their tubes now and then (their raw umber is brilliant and very cool and dark) and was considering full pans for a new full pan palette. And I appreciated your really calming voice just before I go to sleep at 4am after watching too much UA-cam. Edit: I find sennelier have far too many pointlessly multi-pigment paints. For example the sennelier yellow deep that’s a horrid muddy yellow when there’s so many beautiful yellows out there. However they do a Yellow Sophie py93 that’s a lovely yellow and the single pigment isn’t in any other watercolour brand. It’s listed as a green yellow but I find it a perfect primary yellow in my botanical set and it looks quite warm to me.
I agree, there are definitely some pointless excess mixtures in Sennelier, but a few of them are very good combinations that can save you time if it's something you'd mix frequently yourself. Yellow Sophie is quite nice and unique, I think it totally works as a primary option as well! Thanks for your input :)
I have a sennelier cobalt Turquoise or turquoise green that use PG50, weirdly they didn’t include any lightfast information but from any brand i see PG50 is lightfast and that make me question sennelier in general, also they dry with a crack and i was genuinely surprise since other watercolor i pour into half pan didn’t, it was an impulse buy from my part since it was cheaper and is a 10ml. Anyway great review i was considering their ultramarine but since i like a more granulating ultramarine i think I’ll get the schmincke one instead
Sennelier does some weird things with lightfast info. I suspect they don't actually test their own paints, but rather copied the available ASTM rating for that pigment code at the time they put it into their catalog (I noticed they rated their PR122 at LFIII, which only makes sense if they copied the old 1999 rating). Both PG50 and PR122 from Sennelier did not fade in my 1 year lightfast tests, the general user consensus is LFI. You'll be happier with Schmincke PB29 though, if you love granulation their French Ultramarine will blow your mind :D
I bought some tubes from Jackson last year. They were okay. Nothing fancy, very basic, dried well in the pan. And I do have some Sennelier pans & tubes from over the years. Luckily never encountered. No strange cut offs or half filled pans... Also over here (Belgium) the paint dries well and doesn't remain sticky as I hear from many other climats. Sofar. Because with climat change our summers are becoming hot. Over all I'm not inclined to buy more of Jackson's tubes because there are more interesting options (White Nights, Roman Szmal but they of course have no tubes, some Rosa,...) Did you confront them about the wrong-labelling?
The reviews seem fairly mixed about Jackson's, but judging from the comments I've received there's been a decent amount of problems that probably vary a lot by color. I didn't really have any notable complaints for a couple colors, so I figure some colors are better than others. A couple people mentioned to me that their tubes cracked or had excess binder separation when they tried to pour dry pans. I definitely think White Nights and Roman Szmal have much better, similarly priced, options. I have emailed Jackson's regarding site typos in the past and never got a response. I'm not sure if the customer service person passed the feedback along to anyone or just didn't know what to do about it.
@@KimberlyCrick I think The Spindoctor once did a review about Jackson's watercolor paint and I took that as a rather safe reference to 4 tubes (Bright red PR254/ PO43, Viridian PG18/ PG7, Burnt Sienna PBr7 & their Quin Gold PR101/ PR206/ PY150). I can't find the pans (too many...) but I have the tubes and swatches on hand and I intended to use these paints from the tubes with a palette knive so I cracking doesn't bother me too much in this case.
Its a shame that blick and jacksons don't have great store brands. Just adds to the negative perceptions on store brands in general. I try to be more open minded about store brands for the sake of my wallet and since i used to work in a grocery store that actually had products better than the major brands but I still get hesitant in other stores (grocery, art, tech, beauty, etc) because of cut corners and misinformation like this.
Yes, it's true, store brands can be really hit or miss and often the poor quality ones really cast a bad light on the term "store brand". Blick's store brand just repackages Grumbacher paints, which are by far some of the worst gritty paints I've tried. I feel really bad for Utrecht, which is not technically a store brand but often gets lumped into the same negative light. Blick bought Utrecht's factory, which has been independently run for decades, and because of this ownership many artists assume the quality would be the same as Blick/Grumbacher. There's a store called Cheap Joes that has DaVinci make their store brand, which are excellent, and they did have them create some unique mixtures for them. Unfortunately it defeated the purpose of a store brand because they ended up pricing them higher than you can just get from DaVinci directly. Maybe one day a store brand paint will get it right for us :)
I so appreciate the work that you do, Kimberly! I was very excited when I discovered Jackson's house brand because I could make my small art-supply budget go farther, but then I used them and was disappointed. I purchased tube paints, not pans, and most of them dried down very strangely--with deep cracking. And I noticed some of the same pigment number discrepancies you did. The colors were not as nice as my Sennelier paints. I'm glad to see that I wasn't off the mark. I feel like there are better alternatives out there. Every brand has strengths and weaknesses, but some shine more brightly than others.
Thank you Jennifer, I am not surprised by your evaluation as we tend to agree quite often regarding paint quality :) It really does seem that less care was put into the Jackson's line on top of starting with pruning out most of Sennelier's best options. I meant to ask you if you have started lightfast testing your Cobalt Violet PV14? Please drop me a comment somewhere if you start seeing some issues. I'm so darn curious since I didn't start noting such drastic changes until the combined heat/humidity of Florida and I can't find information anywhere about other people having fading problems.
@@KimberlyCrick Ack! I just finished my first semester of an MFA program and the plan flew out of my head. I'll try to start this week. Summer hasn't really begun yet in Pittsburgh. We've had cloudy and rain for about a week now. Thanks for the reminder!
I've considered White Nights many times.. but the profusion of fugitive/problem pigments has held me back. Almost all of their sets contain problem colors.. even some of their new colors are highly fugitive... and even trying to pick out a basic 6-8 pan mixing palette is difficult. I've sat down with a list of "acceptable" pigments at one hand, and their color chart on the other, several times and given up in frustration. They also have a history of false lighfastness rating which means I can't take their word for any of them... I have to verify exactly what is in that particular pan. Adding to the issue is that their colors have changed several times.. mostly for the good.. but you never know what you are going to get when ordering online. Heck even the color charts posted online aren't accurate and it's impossible to tell what is current and what isn't. I've already been burned more than once when ordering what I thought was one pigment only to get either a new or old formula instead that is something completely different from a distributor with other brands... thankfully the last time it was Van Gogh which meant I still got paints that function they just were not the single pigments I bought them for.
I bought their entire range recently so the chart found here is accurate: stpetersburgwatercolours.com/assets/img/whitenightscolourchart108.jpg The fugitive pigments are older paints that have since been reformulated and released with new names. They keep the old paints in rotation presumably for the people that still want them as some are fairly unique, but they don't release new paints with fugitive pigments now. I'm not sure what you're referencing with the false lightfast rating comment but if you have any links I'd appreciate them. I haven't seen anything inaccurate but I haven't done extensive testing.
@@mydogeatspuke white nights no longer *intentionally* release fugitive paints. Unfortunately they made a mistake trusting a pigment manufacturer rating for po64.... so orange and peach are fugitive. I’ll make a video about that issue soon!
@@KimberlyCrick PO64 is the issue? I see. I read about that one on your website. The ratings are usually based on masstone rather than diluted in watercolours right? So unless the pigment manufacturers specifically request watercolour testing, paint makers won't have a full picture of the pigments they're buying and may inadvertently misinform their customers. That's a shame as White Nights had specifically reformulated their orange with that pigment to replace the previously fugitive one for those who wanted something more permanent. I knew they'd been making a lot of changes to make their line more lightfast in the last few years, but the older versions are still available direct from the company and remain part of the colour chart here in the UK at least. I don't know if they've stopped selling them in other countries though? I picked up their whole line about a month ago (ridiculously affordable!) and they're all still available from the website I linked above for the colour chart. I do know that they're not intentionally adding new fugitive pigments to their line, but nothing has been marked as discontinued as of yet.
It has been frustrating collecting White Nights over the years, especially with all the recent changes. It's random if you might get old stock from certain stores and end up with something like PY1 instead of PY3, and like you said many sets still have fugitive colors. Despite this, their price remains competative even if you threw away several colors from a set, but it's better to collect individual colors from a store with a high turnover rate to avoid getting old colors. I'm really glad that White Nights has been making efforts to improve their selection. I wish they had done their own testing to realize some colors are not lightfast, but as we both know, even Schmincke and Rembrandt have made mistakes trusting modern pigment source ratings. I'll do some work in the future testing their new full range selection so we can come up with a good master list of lightfast options. For now, when I want to use a limited palette of White Nights specifically I pick Quin Rose, Indian Yellow, Cobalt Turquoise and Mars Brown (there's also phthalo or ultramarine for a more normal blue option, but I appreciate how affordable their Cob Turq PB28 is... and the lovely color separating mixtures it creates with Quin Rose). I'll work on that PO64 video next so that more people are aware of the general issue of not being able to trust ratings and having to check reliable pigment numbers instead.
@@mydogeatspuke Glad to see they have updated their chart, hopefully the stores will get theirs updated soon as well. Several of the new paints had problems, including including almost half of their new pastels... peach fades to white, rose quartz and coral were terrible, lilac wasn't as bad but still fades. All of their pastels were still given their highest lightfast rating. I've heard really conflicting info on PY3 which is their only transparent cool yellow and is used in some of their greens. Even Golden has reduced their ratings to "fair" on it.
Jackson's is having a discounted sale on their store brand watercolors through 6-25. If you're thinking about trying them, I would definitely consider White Nights (their prices are always fantastic)! Jackson's watercolor - www.jacksonsart.com/en-us/jacksons-artists-watercolour?___store=jacksonsart_us&acc=c0f168ce8900fa56e57789e2a2f2c9d0
White Nights watercolor - www.jacksonsart.com/en-us/st-petersburg-white-nights-watercolour?___store=jacksonsart_us&acc=c0f168ce8900fa56e57789e2a2f2c9d0
I love my White Nights. Thank you for reminding me to check out their newer colours. 🙂❤️👍
Out of all White Nights colors which would you recommend? I can afford around 4. Thank you to anyone w input in advance!
@@bethbloomer5951 It depends a bit on what you already have for basic mixing and if you're looking for fun extra colors. I really love their Quin Rose, Indian Yellow, Cobalt Turquoise and Mars Brown for a fun limited palette. You can get really stunning color separating mixtures with their QRose PR122/CobTurq PB28. If opaque pastels fit your style, mint is a really beautiful mixture. If lightfastness is not critical, the Green PG8 is a rare, single-pigment deep foresty green. It's one of the only "fair"/LFIII rated colors I make excuses to still use in my sketchbooks because it's so pretty. I'll swatch the whole catalog soon and make a video pointing out my favorites! Happy painting :)
Its sad, that Jacksons, Ken Bromley art supplies don't sell white nights anymore. I don't know a better alternative other than using the sennelier watercolour
Unhindered honesty is why we're here! If the brand is too scared for honest reviews, chances are the product isn't worth it. If you are ever so inclined, id LOVE a quick video on liner pens for watercolor, I've never seen that Tombow pen and although I love my Microns, their thinner nibs just wear down to nothing so quickly. A pen review or recommendations for waterproof fine liner ink pens would be hugely appreciated! Thank you for your hard work. I actually do trust you and your opinions, which is sadly so rare on yt. And in life lol. Anyway, thank you Kim!
I appreciate that, thank you! I use Tombo Mono pens when I'm feeling too tired to deal with my refillable technical pen. My Rotring Isograph filled with Rohrer & Klingner's Sketch Ink (Lotte, Black color) is my favorite, most durable, drawing tool. It's unfortunately a little high maintenance with periodic cleaning and needing to be used at least weekly or it gets clogs/drips. Every pre-made fineliner I've tried such as Micron, W&N fineliners, Tombo, Prismacolor, Copic and Staedler have all had their fragile thin tips get pushed in after a few drawings. They seem to all be pretty disposable, but I like how fast and reliable Tombo's ink dries waterproof so it's my go-to!
If you have not tried Uni Pin Pens, I highly recommend them. They are waterproof and they dry very, very quickly, no smudging at all. I like them even better than the Microns.
Micron did just come out with a new nib design, I haven't tried them but I've seen them online.
@@waymire01 if they make a silicone tipped fine liner in 005, so many ppl would order that!
@@sosumi_rogue I will check them out, thank you! Not sure I've even seen them before.
Thank you very much for the review as always, Kimberly! I really appreciate this channel as being a fountain of knowledge! You not only give out the facts behind these watercolors but I appreciate how even if you are negative, you give a good explanation as to why a certain product is faulty and how it can be improved! While Jackson's Art watercolor looks rather interesting, I think I'll skip mainly because I already invested so much in Sennelier and because the faulty labelling would drive me nuts. I'm already a stickler for when watercolor paint companies don't label their pigments, but having the same ones copy and pasted so haphazardly is kind of lazy to me. It just makes it harder for newcomers to tell what pigments they need to find or what their paint is even made of.
Overall, thank you again for this!
Honesty is why I watch you 😊🌺
Thanks God you're here actually reviewing art supplies and not just unboxing them and rating them as good after only swatching the colours.
And that is why I signed up for your patreon, you tell it like it is. Thank you for being a port of honesty in a sea of misrepresentation at best and outright lies at worst.
Your channel and videos are just plain fantastic. I appreciate how much effort you put in to organizing & presenting the information (saving us all some time & money!). I had looked at Jackson's watercolors before, but they never really hooked my interest. There just wasn't anything special or impressive about them (I love the granulating / color separating types). After seeing this though, I feel confident in my decision. Inconsistency and mislabels are a no-no in my book, that must have been frustrating to deal with! Lastly, don't feel bad about not getting any sponsorships and whatnot. There's plenty of people out there that just spout fake positive content cause they got something for free. I would rather hear your objective observations & honest opinions any day.
Thank you, I'm relieved to hear that. Honestly it doesn't feel good when I have to write a less than stellar review... but I feel like I have a responsibility to pass along unhindered honesty, even if it comes off negative or nit-picky.... There's just so many ways for artists to spend all their money and it makes me sad when wealthy big companies don't take us seriously and pass along such sloppy products.
Great review with much honesty! Ive seen a lot of people categorise Jackson watercolours as artist grade but Ive always felt that they were high "student grade" level because of the quality that they are presented and the way they behaved. I still like Jacksons paints for the costs but there is not a lot of options to pick from - I've been waiting for them to release the "perfect" yellow to add to my Jacksons set for a while and have not decided because of the lack of variety.
Agree, high student grade is a better description. No use to those who already have a collection of artist grade paints.
I greatly appreciate your information and honesty. Your posted pigment information and comparisons are fascinating to me! I have a science background, but I’m now trying to be more artistic.
Thank you, and that is funny, I have an art background and I'm trying to be more scientific. I have become fascinated with pigment properties and comparisons. I felt compelled to design my own swatch cards and start keeping track of things on a pigment database. It gets a little eccentric/fun at my house because the windows are covered in lightfast tests and I have a microscope to look at the pigment particles. I wonder what the neighbors think about all the rainbow stripes :D Happy painting!
@@KimberlyCrick I’ve done a some lightfast testing and discovered that my newer windows really do have some U.V. reducing property. The swatches went outside into full sunlight for further exposure. 😎 Thanks so much for all the effort you put into your channel. I’ve used some of your ideas for granulating mixtures since I buy tube paints. ❤️🇨🇦
I very much appreciate your honest reviews. I always consult your videos first before buying a paint. Thank you for the work you do.
So much great information here! I appreciate how invested you are in making honest and well-researched videos. For those of us who are still new to the subtleties and construct of pigment mixtures, your videos offer a wealth of helpful knowledge! Thanks, Kimberly!
Thanks so much for this review. Being Australian and utilizing Jackson's at times, I was seriously considering buying a few of Jackson's own watercolours....now I won't be. Keep up the great reviews. I really look forward to them
Thanks for your honest reviews, it is the best for us newbies out here to know what to expect.
thank you for the honest review, makes it easier to make choice to what watercolours to get 😀 I'd much rather hear and tell the truth about supplies than anything else. hate wasting money on supplies that are not worth it and I will tell someone the problems a supply might have
Thanks for the great review. I think your critique is fair and very accurate.
I bought a set of Jackson's paints as my first "professional" set about 3 years ago. For me, it was a great investment. I lived in a very remote part of Australia with no local art supplies store. Many regional art supplies stores here seem to only carry W&N professional and Cotmans, and maybe one other brand and at very high prices (triple what you pay for the same product from Jackson's). Jackson's home brand allowed be to get a set of 18 colour for the same price I could get maybe 5 or 6 colours locally. The biggest difference for me was, because of the price, I USED THEM. I painted, a lot. I actually got comfortable using the medium and started to grow as an artist. I'm one of those people who if a product costs too much, I feel like I'm wasting it if I don't create a masterpiece. I couldn't get better as an artist without lots of practice. And I mean LOTS of practice, I am not a natural artist. Jackson's let me do this with a clear conscious. I have now have a much more extensive collection of brands that include White Nights, M Graham, Roman Szmal and some Daniel Smith, Art Spectrum & Schmincke.
I do think there is a place for "imperfect" brands like this if they actually get people over that first step of actually putting in the brush miles to improve. I use these when I paint with my 4 year old niece, I just don't care about what happens to them.
I would not be recommending these to an experienced artist as their go to set, but for someone wanting to move from craft supplies to the next level who is constrained by cost, these are a viable option. Though with experience I would guide them toward White Nights as a better option. The key selling point for me was that I could get an 18 colour set where I chose all the colours myself. I know now that that is not always a great idea, but it gave me ownership of the process.
I did the same thing, but with Paul Rubens and Kuretake Gansai as my "use these until I'm better" paints. Totally understand that and it's a great use for them. I agree, usually when people ask me about what to start with, if White Nights is in the budget they are amazing! Happy painting :)
@@KimberlyCrick Yes, I recommend White Nights for beginners too. I also love them for my urban sketching and art journal. But, the very flawed Jackson's paints got me going, so I will always have a slightly soft spot for them.
I love my White Nights and am trying to patiently wait for the next release!
thank you so much for this kind of videos, can't wait to see videos about your fav colors among sennelier and white nights. I always come here when I need to make new purchases.
I love your honesty and I believe that is what is much needed. Rather than not sponsor the idea would be for them to receive this as constructive feedback to work on. I have always wondered about the hype of big brand names and even though I own them all I would rather go for my A Gallo handmade watercolors and Roman szmal and white nights over sennelier, DS, w&n or schminke. I have them all but before I got into handmade my love was white nights over the top brands
Thank you. I don't know many people but I will tell my few friends about your fabulously matter of fact honest channel reviews.
Thank you for taking the time to leave such a kind comment! Happy painting :)
your honesty is always so refreshing! Cant wait for the Sennelier and White Nights videos! Havent had experience with sennelier paints yet but love white nights for the most part (apart from some problem colors like their perylene violet)
What's the problem with perylene violet? I think it's good)
@@atlasjulia It has a really ugly texture. Other brands are deep and smooth but the white nights version doesn't layer very well and doesn't apply evenly. Maybe it was just an early batch problem but i personally prefer other brands for that particular color
Thank You so much Kimberly! I truly enjoy your videos and go to them for your 100% transparent reviews and even more so your in depth thoughts with no fancy froo froo lol... Especially the last park where you mention sponsorship. I always feel like Artist who get them almost lie a bit just because they got the product for free....
I have seen a lot of positive reviews for things people got for free. I bet some skip over the problems because they feel bad they promised the company a video, but also I think our brains are more critical of things that we spent our own money on. Another issue is that sometimes a person reviewing an item may not be very experienced in that medium, or have used enough other brands to see how they truly compare. I appreciate your feedback and kind words! Happy painting :)
Really like how you provide exact colour information used in the mixing tests. Thank you for the video.
As always Kim, your reviews are FANTASTIC. I do have a preference towards Jackson's and white nights, but I do notice Jackson's itself has some problems with their product consistency, I've ordered quite a bunch of their paints in the past and again ordered in this sale. I think my only share of disappointments so far with their colors were the opera (not bright enough for my taste), cerulean blue 21ml tube (too much separation, but I think these heavier cobalt pigments do have some issues...), cadmium red violet tube (again binder separation) and their burnt sienna (too orange for my taste, I wanted a Daniel Smith hue kind of burnt sienna).
Jackson's has a nice separating sap green tho, just like sennelier, with a yellow pigment and pb29. If there's a color from them that I like and decided to buy a 21ml version is the pr209. They're useful for skin tones! Other than that, I buy sennelier's different paints and invest anyways on white nights, as you can't beat that price :P
Thank you!!! I get really frustrated with product inconsistency and typos. I appreciate you sharing that about the binder issues with Cerulean and Cadmium Red Violet... I think that might be one of the colors they put on clearance (perhaps because it was problematic). You really can't beat the price on White Nights for how nice most of the colors are. I figured with the Jackson's sale this week a lot of people might be tempted by Jackson's brand, and maybe not realize that White Nights is always even cheaper. Thanks again for your thoughtful comments :D
@@KimberlyCrick you're welcome! And yeah, I got first a cad red purple as a pan, loved the hue (it's pretty, like a bloody red hue) and ordered the 21ml version on clearance.... And noticed why it was on clearance. Same thing with the cerulean. I'll still use the heck of these colors, though. XD
Thank you for making all of your videos. They are always informative and your honest in your thoughts and opinions and thats really refreshing. I think a lot of people just go by brand name and if a product has that brand on it it's immediately amazing regardless of the actual quality of the product. Thank you for all the time you spend on your videos. It's greatly appreciated. Have a wonderful day!
I love this channel so much. You give me a good thought about giving watercolor brands a go. I hope your shop ships internationally
I really respect your full and honest reviews, always happy to see that.
As of paints, I have one tube of Sennelier, cerulean I believe. It's definitely not my favourite paint, but I am well aware that it is not the easiest pigment.
White nights has been on my wishlist for a while, but with the recent change in their packaging for the 12 sets (what I was interested in getting) I am less eager. Definitely still want to try out the paints, but I really don't like how the new pallettes look, so I'll have to do research into what colours to get. Still might be a while, as they're sadly not the most widely available around here.
Still at it with choosing the white nights paints?)
From what I can tell, there's currently some errors in pigment labels with White Nights on Jacksons (White Nights recently changed/tweaked some of their colors, so I'm not surprised I suppose.) I wouldn't recommend getting their sets anyway, as I don't find all their colors to be great. By new palettes do you mean the plastic or metal ones?
@@dashas5198 the plastic ones. And I don't plan on buying from Jackson's, the shipping is outrageous, but thank you, other places will probably have that problem too then. Will look out for it.
I really admire your honesty and integrity. I always enjoy your videos.Thank you for taking the time to make them and Great job as always! 😺❤
Oh snap, Kim Crick layin' down some sharp truths. I like it! :D
Looking forward to the brand specific recommendations! Thanks for the fun video!
As always, so thorough. Thank you very much.
Thanks for this, Kim. Great work and greatly appreciated integrity ☺️🌺
Hi, Kimberly! I'm a bit late to the party, but I do have five tubes of Sennelier and many White Nights pans, so indeed I had an opportunity to test and play with them.
My Senneliers come from their test pack. The pack contains 5 colours: Lemon yellow (P.Y.3), Bright red (n.r.), Ultramarine deep
(P.B.29), Chinese orange and Payne's gray which are convinient mixes.
I generally loved how these paints interact with each other and other brands, their texture -- how smooth, non-streaky, intense and creamy they are.
I purchased the test pack because I want to see how Senneliers perform and to try and experiment with a truly limited palette.
While I'm overall pleased with them, there are indeed some issues.
First one, is the choice of colours and pigments. P.Y.3 is nice overall and especially nice here. I know it might be fugitive in some brands but hope it's more stable here. I loved the Chinese orange too. I loved that they added Payne's gray even though I prefer this colour by White Nights shade wise. Ultramarine deep is also nice. Even though it left me puzzled for it looks more like a mid-blue regular ultramarine. The colour that made me truly raise my brow is Bright red. They don't say which pigment it is. It looks quite cool but acts more like a warm red. Not my favourite combination and very strange. This red kind of ruins the pack as a set of basic colours. Because you cannot mix floral purples with it, if you use this palette only.
Another downside is that strange chemical smell coming from the paints for the first couple of weeks that goes away later. I was hoping for it to smell of honey :))
The paint truly won't dry very fast and stays syrupy for about three weeks after you poured it into a pan to dry.
Other than that all, I loved the paints. I'd call them pretty and charming :)
As for the White Nights, they are my long lasting companions in this journey. I'm aware of their downsides but I love their upsides too :) Yes, I think that for that price point they are nearly perfect.
Their cerulean blue that most people don't like is one my favourite colours.
I recently purchased Rembrandt's granulating set which contains P.B.35 cerulean too. I loved it too, a lot. It's more pigmented and easier to pick onto the brush, than the White Night's one, but it has a slightly different shade. So they are still compamions. Not rivals.
I also am a bit more demanding of the brand/paint if it's expensive and famous. I think noblesse oblige and I expect those pricy items to be good :)
Again, I'm grateful to you for being objective in your reviews. You are not trying to just diss or praise a brand just because it's expensive or cheap. Instead, you truly go into detail with every paint, noting all its upsides and downsides. This is really helpful.
A very timely video! I was thinking getting a pan set of Jackson's during the paint sale. But after your review I think I'll just stick with Sennelier itself and give Jackson's a pass. Thank you for your hard work!
I very much appreciated your honest reviews, Kimberly! Thankyou for another great one💗
Thank you, that was very informative 🌷
Hey dear I said yes,,,,,he won’t answer me, I said Yes....
I never tried Jackson's... but I had the same issue with a pan of Cerulean Blue by Sennelier that I bought some years ago. It had a gelatin consistency when I tried to paint a gradient. I never had that issue with any other brand.. but I tend to stay with what I have and what's available to me.
Hi - I'm new here. Thanks for reviewing Jackson's WCs. Is that stamp you use for your swatching tests available for sale? Thanks!
Welcome, yes the stamp I make is currently available within the USA at www.KimCrick.com and printable digital download templates are available worldwide . Thank you, happy painting :)
Thank you so much for this in-depth review, so very informative ! (the artwork is really lovely)
If you lived in the UK, you'd have been awarded a *CBE by HM the Queen by now* - for services to artists, Kim. Your videos are _so_ helpful; thank you! 🙏🏼
Thank you so much for this video. This was very helpful! As a more affordable brand I like the Roman Szmal paints. They are very affordable (even cheaper than from Jackson's) when ordered from Artemiranda in Spain. They ship worldwide, as far as I know.
Sadly for the UK Jackson's is still the best place to buy Roman Szmal paints due to the duties added to imports over £135 from anywhere outside the UK. Their customer service is absolutely atrocious though, like dealing with angry teenagers, so I'm eager for other suppliers to start stocking his paints. The website you mentioned stock Rosa too which is interesting as I haven't been able to find their stuff anywhere here.
@@mydogeatspuke interesting. For me in Australia artemiranda is cheaper than Jackson's when it comes to Roman Szmals wc. I have never heard of Rosa wc. I will look them up.
YMMV, but between M. Graham and Sennelier, I have never had an issue with Sennelier tube paints in a pan. They do dry sticky but after curing they remain put in their pan. My M. Grahams have not and as a result I have stopped using that brand except for a stray color here and there (like their Indian Yellow) which manages to stay put in a pan. That said, I have not tried all of Sennelier's paints but French Vermillion, Yellow Sophie and Helios Purple are palette staples for me and I have never had issues with them.
I have heard about issues where MGraham liquifies and runs out of pans, so I try to limit how many MGraham colors I use too. In the case of Viridian though, I find MGraham's to be very valuable since PG18 is such a hard to re-wet pigment and Sennelier only offers a mixture with PG7 that doesn't have the same clean granulating properties. Overall I prefer Sennelier's tubes dried into a pan, even if they stay sticky. Happy painting :)
@@KimberlyCrick Thank you for that tip with Viridian. I have an old WN tube I like but it's hard to rewet, etc. It's a pigment I would like to play more with as I love the powdery granulation, esp. with cobalt blue.
This was my first time watching your channel. Loved your review. I got your channel info from the frugal crafter
What a stunning end result.
Oh you so put me off buying Jackson’s watercolour. Putting it together with the fact that they refused to tell me who manufactures their paints. Thanks for the honest review.
Wow I really appreciate the Jackson’s tests as I buy their tubes now and then (their raw umber is brilliant and very cool and dark) and was considering full pans for a new full pan palette. And I appreciated your really calming voice just before I go to sleep at 4am after watching too much UA-cam. Edit: I find sennelier have far too many pointlessly multi-pigment paints. For example the sennelier yellow deep that’s a horrid muddy yellow when there’s so many beautiful yellows out there. However they do a Yellow Sophie py93 that’s a lovely yellow and the single pigment isn’t in any other watercolour brand. It’s listed as a green yellow but I find it a perfect primary yellow in my botanical set and it looks quite warm to me.
I agree, there are definitely some pointless excess mixtures in Sennelier, but a few of them are very good combinations that can save you time if it's something you'd mix frequently yourself. Yellow Sophie is quite nice and unique, I think it totally works as a primary option as well! Thanks for your input :)
I have a sennelier cobalt Turquoise or turquoise green that use PG50, weirdly they didn’t include any lightfast information but from any brand i see PG50 is lightfast and that make me question sennelier in general, also they dry with a crack and i was genuinely surprise since other watercolor i pour into half pan didn’t, it was an impulse buy from my part since it was cheaper and is a 10ml. Anyway great review i was considering their ultramarine but since i like a more granulating ultramarine i think I’ll get the schmincke one instead
Sennelier does some weird things with lightfast info. I suspect they don't actually test their own paints, but rather copied the available ASTM rating for that pigment code at the time they put it into their catalog (I noticed they rated their PR122 at LFIII, which only makes sense if they copied the old 1999 rating). Both PG50 and PR122 from Sennelier did not fade in my 1 year lightfast tests, the general user consensus is LFI. You'll be happier with Schmincke PB29 though, if you love granulation their French Ultramarine will blow your mind :D
@@KimberlyCrick wow thanks for the very fast reply, i keep that suggestion next time when my ultramarine runs out
Would LOVE to hear your Sennelier and White Nights favorites!
I bought some tubes from Jackson last year. They were okay. Nothing fancy, very basic, dried well in the pan. And I do have some Sennelier pans & tubes from over the years. Luckily never encountered. No strange cut offs or half filled pans... Also over here (Belgium) the paint dries well and doesn't remain sticky as I hear from many other climats. Sofar. Because with climat change our summers are becoming hot.
Over all I'm not inclined to buy more of Jackson's tubes because there are more interesting options (White Nights, Roman Szmal but they of course have no tubes, some Rosa,...)
Did you confront them about the wrong-labelling?
The reviews seem fairly mixed about Jackson's, but judging from the comments I've received there's been a decent amount of problems that probably vary a lot by color. I didn't really have any notable complaints for a couple colors, so I figure some colors are better than others. A couple people mentioned to me that their tubes cracked or had excess binder separation when they tried to pour dry pans. I definitely think White Nights and Roman Szmal have much better, similarly priced, options. I have emailed Jackson's regarding site typos in the past and never got a response. I'm not sure if the customer service person passed the feedback along to anyone or just didn't know what to do about it.
@@KimberlyCrick I think The Spindoctor once did a review about Jackson's watercolor paint and I took that as a rather safe reference to 4 tubes (Bright red PR254/ PO43, Viridian PG18/ PG7, Burnt Sienna PBr7 & their Quin Gold PR101/ PR206/ PY150). I can't find the pans (too many...) but I have the tubes and swatches on hand and I intended to use these paints from the tubes with a palette knive so I cracking doesn't bother me too much in this case.
I would love to see a vid on American Journey.
You got it - ua-cam.com/video/DHQcvEYrSOs/v-deo.html
Where did you get your swatch stamp?
I make them, you can find several stamp designs along with images of all my completed swatches for every brand I've reviewed at www.KimCrick.com
@@KimberlyCrick thanks
Its a shame that blick and jacksons don't have great store brands. Just adds to the negative perceptions on store brands in general. I try to be more open minded about store brands for the sake of my wallet and since i used to work in a grocery store that actually had products better than the major brands but I still get hesitant in other stores (grocery, art, tech, beauty, etc) because of cut corners and misinformation like this.
Yes, it's true, store brands can be really hit or miss and often the poor quality ones really cast a bad light on the term "store brand". Blick's store brand just repackages Grumbacher paints, which are by far some of the worst gritty paints I've tried. I feel really bad for Utrecht, which is not technically a store brand but often gets lumped into the same negative light. Blick bought Utrecht's factory, which has been independently run for decades, and because of this ownership many artists assume the quality would be the same as Blick/Grumbacher. There's a store called Cheap Joes that has DaVinci make their store brand, which are excellent, and they did have them create some unique mixtures for them. Unfortunately it defeated the purpose of a store brand because they ended up pricing them higher than you can just get from DaVinci directly. Maybe one day a store brand paint will get it right for us :)
I so appreciate the work that you do, Kimberly! I was very excited when I discovered Jackson's house brand because I could make my small art-supply budget go farther, but then I used them and was disappointed. I purchased tube paints, not pans, and most of them dried down very strangely--with deep cracking. And I noticed some of the same pigment number discrepancies you did. The colors were not as nice as my Sennelier paints. I'm glad to see that I wasn't off the mark. I feel like there are better alternatives out there. Every brand has strengths and weaknesses, but some shine more brightly than others.
Thank you Jennifer, I am not surprised by your evaluation as we tend to agree quite often regarding paint quality :) It really does seem that less care was put into the Jackson's line on top of starting with pruning out most of Sennelier's best options. I meant to ask you if you have started lightfast testing your Cobalt Violet PV14? Please drop me a comment somewhere if you start seeing some issues. I'm so darn curious since I didn't start noting such drastic changes until the combined heat/humidity of Florida and I can't find information anywhere about other people having fading problems.
@@KimberlyCrick Ack! I just finished my first semester of an MFA program and the plan flew out of my head. I'll try to start this week. Summer hasn't really begun yet in Pittsburgh. We've had cloudy and rain for about a week now. Thanks for the reminder!
Amazing
Thanks
❤
I've considered White Nights many times.. but the profusion of fugitive/problem pigments has held me back. Almost all of their sets contain problem colors.. even some of their new colors are highly fugitive... and even trying to pick out a basic 6-8 pan mixing palette is difficult. I've sat down with a list of "acceptable" pigments at one hand, and their color chart on the other, several times and given up in frustration. They also have a history of false lighfastness rating which means I can't take their word for any of them... I have to verify exactly what is in that particular pan. Adding to the issue is that their colors have changed several times.. mostly for the good.. but you never know what you are going to get when ordering online. Heck even the color charts posted online aren't accurate and it's impossible to tell what is current and what isn't. I've already been burned more than once when ordering what I thought was one pigment only to get either a new or old formula instead that is something completely different from a distributor with other brands... thankfully the last time it was Van Gogh which meant I still got paints that function they just were not the single pigments I bought them for.
I bought their entire range recently so the chart found here is accurate: stpetersburgwatercolours.com/assets/img/whitenightscolourchart108.jpg The fugitive pigments are older paints that have since been reformulated and released with new names. They keep the old paints in rotation presumably for the people that still want them as some are fairly unique, but they don't release new paints with fugitive pigments now. I'm not sure what you're referencing with the false lightfast rating comment but if you have any links I'd appreciate them. I haven't seen anything inaccurate but I haven't done extensive testing.
@@mydogeatspuke white nights no longer *intentionally* release fugitive paints. Unfortunately they made a mistake trusting a pigment manufacturer rating for po64.... so orange and peach are fugitive. I’ll make a video about that issue soon!
@@KimberlyCrick PO64 is the issue? I see. I read about that one on your website. The ratings are usually based on masstone rather than diluted in watercolours right? So unless the pigment manufacturers specifically request watercolour testing, paint makers won't have a full picture of the pigments they're buying and may inadvertently misinform their customers. That's a shame as White Nights had specifically reformulated their orange with that pigment to replace the previously fugitive one for those who wanted something more permanent. I knew they'd been making a lot of changes to make their line more lightfast in the last few years, but the older versions are still available direct from the company and remain part of the colour chart here in the UK at least. I don't know if they've stopped selling them in other countries though? I picked up their whole line about a month ago (ridiculously affordable!) and they're all still available from the website I linked above for the colour chart. I do know that they're not intentionally adding new fugitive pigments to their line, but nothing has been marked as discontinued as of yet.
It has been frustrating collecting White Nights over the years, especially with all the recent changes. It's random if you might get old stock from certain stores and end up with something like PY1 instead of PY3, and like you said many sets still have fugitive colors. Despite this, their price remains competative even if you threw away several colors from a set, but it's better to collect individual colors from a store with a high turnover rate to avoid getting old colors. I'm really glad that White Nights has been making efforts to improve their selection. I wish they had done their own testing to realize some colors are not lightfast, but as we both know, even Schmincke and Rembrandt have made mistakes trusting modern pigment source ratings. I'll do some work in the future testing their new full range selection so we can come up with a good master list of lightfast options. For now, when I want to use a limited palette of White Nights specifically I pick Quin Rose, Indian Yellow, Cobalt Turquoise and Mars Brown (there's also phthalo or ultramarine for a more normal blue option, but I appreciate how affordable their Cob Turq PB28 is... and the lovely color separating mixtures it creates with Quin Rose). I'll work on that PO64 video next so that more people are aware of the general issue of not being able to trust ratings and having to check reliable pigment numbers instead.
@@mydogeatspuke Glad to see they have updated their chart, hopefully the stores will get theirs updated soon as well. Several of the new paints had problems, including including almost half of their new pastels... peach fades to white, rose quartz and coral were terrible, lilac wasn't as bad but still fades. All of their pastels were still given their highest lightfast rating. I've heard really conflicting info on PY3 which is their only transparent cool yellow and is used in some of their greens. Even Golden has reduced their ratings to "fair" on it.