Hello everyone, I’m back again doing what I love the most, testing new pencils! But this time it is different.
A while ago, Woomer, a brand I never heard of sent me their 72 colored pencil set to test and review. As a serial pencil-killer and a serious pencil hoarder I have used pretty much every brand out there, I don’t impress easily. Turns out, sometimes we must eat our words, I am seriously blown away.
It’s been over two years since I last used colored pencils, I didn’t expect I could make this set work. However, as I mentioned, I am blown away. Enough with the small talk, let’s just straight to the review, so that you can see for yourself what I mean.
And a little disclaimer of course: the pencils were sent to me to test and potentially review but all opinions are my own and there are no affiliate links, blah, blah, blah.
Pigment Binder
Colored pencils fall into two big categories: soft and hard. Soft pencils are normally wax-based pencils, wax is the medium used to bind the pigment. They are soft and creamy, they apply smoothly and blend easily. Hard pencils on the other hand are oil-based pencils, (oil is used to bind the pigment) they are hard and can be sharpened to a super fine point, which makes them perfect for details. Hard pencils cannot be blended as easily, usually blending occurs by applying many many soft layers. When I first tried Woomer pencils, I couldn’t understand what category they fell into, they seemed to combine the best of the two worlds. Then I checked out the description on Amazon: “Specialized in pigments for many years, after thousands of pigment selections and tests, Woomer has this 72 Colour pencil formulas. Abandoning inferior oils and waxes as media, Woomer selected natural minerals and mixed a high-quality mixture of oils & waxes to touch the excellent expression of the pigments, ensuring the creamy texture, smooth painting feel. No need to be heavy-handed, Creamy-feeling keep painting relaxed”. So… both oil AND wax to bind the pigment. That’s a first. And they really seem to combine the best of the two worlds.
General Characteristics
The set consists of 72 colored pencils. They come in a metal case, enclosed with a hard paper binder, which becomes a swatch template when opened! Yep, love the small details that make a difference. The shape is basic and cylindrical, but comes with an exciting surprise, keep reading for more!
Color Variety
It was a relief that the set consists of 72 colors only. And let’s be honest, 72 is still a big number, however there are brands that offer sets with 150 colors. Personally, I prefer using as few colors as possible and mix them to create new ones (contrary to using a different pencil for everything). There’s a valid reason why I do this, but that’s a topic for another post. Suffice to say, I find it is better for color consistency.
The colors themselves are spot on, not too bright and flashy, not too dull. Perfect for portraits!
Texture
As mentioned, colored pencils generally fall into two categories, soft and hard. Now, soft pencils generally create a lot of texture, whereas hard pencils don’t (but that comes with a price: they take a lot more time). Depending on the pressure used, Woomer can act both as hard and soft, meaning they can either create small or big texture. It’s hard to explain if you haven’t tried in person, I’m afraid you have to take my word for it, bit I’ll try to demonstrate in a picture.
Depending how you use them they can be super smooth or super textury, and on a side note they are insanely pigmented, super opaque even on black paper. I’ll come back to this in a while.
Color Payoff
The pencils are incredibly pigmented and super opaque – even on black paper! I find that black paper is the ultimate test regarding colored pencils, because the pigment needs to be opaque enough to show through all this blackness. Generally, I love sketching on black paper. This is a drawing I did many many (more than I would like to admit!) years ago. I believe I used prismacolor white.
And here’s one with Woomer white. As you can see, white is almost radiating!
Layering
Personally with hard oil pencils I can layer as many colors as I want. With soft wax based pencils I can layer 4-5 colors before the paper cannot hold any more pigment. Woomer pencils are both wax and oil based so they have the best of the two worlds! I could layer indefinite layers of color, it was like the tooth of the paper was totally unaffected by the pigment. Check out the video at the end of this post, to see what I mean.
Blending
Oh, here we go again. I hate blending. Yep, I said it. I absolutely HATE blending. Especially when it comes to colored pencils. Why smudge the details I worked so hard to achieve? No, I won’t blend, thank you very much. I believe that blending makes a drawing lifeless, it strips it off of character. So I don’t think I am the right person to talk about blending, for me “blending” occurs naturally by cross-hatching multiple colors, one on top of the other. If, however, this is the “blending” we are talking about, Woomer does a fantastic job!
Lightfastness
Last but not least: Lightfastness. Lightfastness is my favorite topic, one that artists shouldn’t neglect. Lightfastness is the ability of colors to stay unchanged over time. Imagine having an artwork hanging on your wall, which changes over the years.
The thing is that today’s artists care only about short-term results = making fancy reels. And they ignore lightfastness all together. Selling artworks done with non-lightfast materials is not only unacceptable, but indicates that the artist does respect himself/herself and doesn’t respect the client either. But that’s a whole different story. Let’s stick to the topic.
The fact is that Woomer pencils have been tested regarding lightfastness and their lightfastness is actually pretty good! I honestly couldn’t believe it. An unknown brand actually respects their target group, providing high quality materials, tested in a lab and passing the test. As soon as I saw their lightfastness chart (and the willingness to undergo a lightfastness test), I knew they were serious about their business.
Oh, and a cute detail: Each pencil has its own lightfast rating etched on the side, so that you always know!
Lightfastness is something that I take very seriously. Sometimes it is the only reason I reject a whole brand, even if everything else is perfect. This is the very same reason why I still use Caran D’Ache Luminance, even though I do not like the pencils, because they have excellent lightfastness. However, beware Caran D’Ache, you found a serious competitor!
Open stock
Nothing is perfect, is it? The only disadvantage is that the pencils are currently unavailable openstock. Which is almost disappointing because I am already out of a couple of shades. Of course, you can always mix colors to create the desired shade, but still it’s not the same. In any case I hope they will be offering pencils open stock in the future.
Price
No review is complete without any price, so here we go. The 72 piece set currently is listed at $28.47 on Amazon. To have an idea, Faber-Castell Polychromos 72 piece set is $155, Prismacolor 72 piece set is $74.99 and Caran D’Ache Luminance 76 piece set is $289.51. And let me tell you: I liked Woomer a lot more than Caran D’Ache Luminance.
You can get the awesome pencils here: https://amzn.to/3EBf3x2
Final thoughts and a bit of shameless self promotion
I don’t know what else to say. It is too soon, I need to use the pencils more but for now… I believe I found my holy grail colored pencils. I have ZERO complaints. I researched the internet extensively, (because you know me guys, as a former phd candidate, I never share on the internet something I am not 100% sure about!) and some people complained about the core not being centered in some shades. I had no such experience. The pencils never broke when sharpened, had no wax bloom, no considerable shine, no mishaps of any kind.
In all honesty, I could never believe I would draw like this again. Since I had my first child, nine years ago, I only used colored pencils sporadically, and when I did, I was so disappointed, each time it took me years to try again. True story. Not exaggerating. But this time I feel different, these pencils were like magic encased in wood. They worked so well for me, I can’t wait to begin another project.
Oh, and you can also see the stylistic changes I like to make while making a photorealistic drawing. Keep creating!
