The best sketchbook is the one you have in your hands at the moment you need to sketch! But really, you can never have too many 🙂

Beautiful Chickadee. As a newbie, the way you seem to control your washes looks like magic to me. I'll continue to practice, but, sigh. I'm going to look the paper up.

Beautiful 😊

Your chickadee is adorable and lively! I have been using Hahnemuhle 100% cotton books for most of this year, and it has definitely become my favorite sketchbook! As far as I know, Wet Paint has the best prices in the US.

@deekang6244

4 ай бұрын

Yes!! Love Wet Paint.

I want to thank you for being such a great teacher. I found your channel a short time ago. I love watching one of your videos after another.

LOL - “ before I run out “ - you must be addicted to art supplies 😊 I’m not alone! Thank you for sharing

Wonderful painting! You did the chikadees gesture perfectly!

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

Thank you so much Lindsay! 😀

Thank you for this review. My local art store (in France) has been stocking them for about 3 weeks! I bought a small A6 landscape format as a treat as I was going on a trip to Scotland. I'm now back and enjoyed every second of drawing and painting in that sketchbook. It gives vibrant colours and is good both for wet-in-wet and more controlled washes. It's my favourite ever and new go-to sketchbook.

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

Great! Yes, I was told by Hahnemühle they would first be available in Europe. Glad you found some.

Yes, you can never have enough sketch books! So I'm making someto add to my collection. 🤗

Ohh wow I thought you were going to mess up with the first few washes of watercolor across the bird. But as always you showed me a great new technique to add background colors and a partial wash to color the bird as well. Love how you captured the details of the bird & ghost trees.

Loved the painting and the music. Very dramatic 😊

Recently I've learned how to make my own watercolor sketchbooks using 100% cotton Arches paper with Coptic stitch so I save a lot of money . No longer buying expensive ones😊

@CobaltThunder267

2 жыл бұрын

I've done some book binding in the past and have been thinking about doing this! Do you buy the big sheets and cut them down or just get the pads? Do you use chipboard for covers or go with a soft cover?

@maria.3649

2 жыл бұрын

@@CobaltThunder267 I buy Arches pads when I can get them cheaper or for exemple if you live in US ,Joann stores offer sometimes a 60%coupon and I buy Arches blocks 9x12 ,20 sheets with only $24 which is a very good deal.I save all the backing boards from my pads and blocks and use them for hardcovers.Hope this helps.I prefer to make my own since you cannot find any sketchbook made with Arches paper which is my favourite😊

@CobaltThunder267

2 жыл бұрын

@@maria.3649 Fantastic! Thank you for the fast and informative response 😁

Wow! Love that little Chickadee Steve. Thank you for the shoutouts and I can't wait to compare notes with you. Love the scrubbing you did. Good cotton paper should allow that for sure and Hahnemühle makes excellent papers are you know already. I think I figured out that these papers and the cellulose papers they put in their other books is made on the same Fourdriner machine with the same felt pads. I compared papers and they look/feel exactly the same. Can't wait to catch up with you my friend.

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

Thanks Buddy. Your guesses on the machine sound correct. At the very least the pressing felts are probably the same.

Really really love the music you were painting to. So gorgeous.

Thank you - for the review and the beautiful sketch! It's the first 100% Cotton Sketchbook I ever bought (in Germany they were available from February on) and I loooove it. (The prices here are about 30% higher than their pulp ones.)

@jenniefrench1338

2 жыл бұрын

Yikes!

I love the Chickadee. 😊 I would like to try the Hahnemuehle books but I have to be strict with myself and use up the ones I've got first. 😇 I like a brand of sketchbook that's made in the UK called Pink Pig. You can choose the paper, size and orientation of most of the books and they're a joy to use. I like the tiny square ones with mixed media paper for pencils and fine liners. I think they're available in the USA too. 😊

I have these in the cotton and the pulp versions and love them both. Firstly they open properly flat - I don’t like spiral bound because I like to paint across the two pages but I do want to be able to open the book flat! Secondly they come in square which is my favourite shape for a sketchbook. And finally of course because of the great quality paper - it’s lovely to paint and draw on, it’s the same surface on both sides, and as you said it stands up well to scrubbing - and using an eraser. Hahnemuehle really know how to make a sketchbook.

Thank you so much. Love your bird painting 😊

Beautiful 🐦

Saunders Waterford makes a pad, which is spiral bound, called a "fat pad", which contains 100% Saunders Waterford cotton paper. It is available on Jacksons. Congratulations on 300K subscribers. Well deserved.

@jennw6809

2 жыл бұрын

It is true -- in fact, there are Fabriano, Bockinford and other fat pads as well. But in the USA these things don't exist, and shipping from Jackson's adds quite a bit to the cost. Also Saunders only makes the Fat Pad in natural white.

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

Good to know. What's so lovely about this Hahnemühle book is the incredible quality of not only the paper but the sewn case binding.

Awesome job and excellent choice of music!😊

Thank you Steve I've been on the hunt for a decent sketchbook!

I bought Hahnemuhle sketch book and LOVE it!! It’s a perfect size too!

First of all, thank you for all the inspiration and motivation I get from watching and listening to your videos. About these sketchbooks: they are now available in Denmark, where I live. I have seen them in A5 and A4, portrait and horizontal, and a square of 19,5x19,5 cm.

You got it! Yay 👏😍👏

Another of your gorgeous delicate watercolour paintings of birds! How beautiful! :)

This looks beautiful.The cotton seems to take much more scrubbing and water than a normal paper.I have never tried any yet.But have seen others use it.This was a great review 🥰

You never disappoint with your videos. Thanks.

Marty O’s review is brilliant!

I accidentally saw the new sketchbooks online with the store i always order, and I promised myself no more sketchbooks until the 20 i own are full. But i saw the price and thought they were a bit pricey for Hahnemuhle. Until I realized they are new ones. So as i always do i checked the reviews on KZread, and i saw yours at the top. I was hoping for one of your sceptic reviews but you are chuffed to bits. Darn, now i have to get another sketchbook😜 as i was eyeing an a4 portrait size i can not find, and these come in that size.

Thank you, Sir !

Amazing! ❤️ I love it

I love that little painting that you did - so lovely.

Oooo nice to have access to 100% cotton in a sketchbook! So jealous you can play with it early, but it will be on my wish list. Thanks for sharing this lovely chickadee painting too. I loved the background! My nemeses! Going to try to do something like that next sketch I do. The ghosting limbs are brilliant!

Love birds - my favorite thing to paint - you do them superbly! Great cotton sketchbook too - not yet available on Amazon. I buy only 100% cotton - they are worth the money!

Thank you for doing this review and for linking to the Marty Owings review. Last year I got the Acadmie A6 sketchbooks and loved using one on our holiday in Cornwall - so good for little watercolour sketches. Now I've succumbed to temptation and just got myself the cotton sketchbook. Perfect for a collection of works inspired by travels. 🙂

Thanks for the review Steve. I can't wait to get some.

just awesome - thanks

That is a stunning painting.

That looks like an awesome sketchbook. Thank you for the beautiful demo.

I just Love it 💕.. thanks

Thank you for this review

Oh love to get my hands on this sketchbook. Thanks for the demo turned out beautiful.

Love your namesake pallet - so many beautiful greens

I think Chickadees are so sweet. The colors and details in this piece are stunning. I loved watching the development of this painting and the techniques you used to create it. And, oh... those splatters... so fun!

Simple! Gorgeous bird beautiful sketch. I am inspired! Thank you so much

Awesome...! And thanks for sharing.

I am always on a never ending journey. Thank you for your review.

Love how you handled the background wash. This looks like a great sketchbook. Thank you.

Beautiful

I'm in the market for a new sketchbook this fall and I think this one might be it. Thank you for a great demo. Also, I loved the way you did a light wash on the bird and background to tie them together. I will remember this technique. Thank you for showing it! :)

Beautiful chikadee! Thank you for the review, I'll have to keep an eye out for these in Canada

Awesome! I was about done with "sketchbooks" except Lindsay's handmade one (DROOL!) but I put this my Jackson's haul yesterday. I think it's the same: "Hahnemhule Watercolor Book 200GSM" and it was on sale!. But I got to checkout, and suddenly they were on backorder! 😨😂 Even tried the different sizes, but within the half-hour, all gone. Love the chickadee! -And I'm so glad that Marty picked up on the Etchr "binding issue". I'd started using cut up cotton sheets, folded but unbound so far, as "sketchbooks", but they're unwieldy! So happy that the Hahnemhule book has some stamps of approval from you and Marty!

Great review, of course I had to order one as Hahnemuhle’s regular sketchbook is my go to.

I like your method of painting. It has given me inspiration thankyou.

Thanks Steve.

Wonderful technique that produced a beautiful painting. Don't think I will be brave enough to splash paint on that way .... but I'll try. Thanks so much. Your information is always beyond the usual.

YAY!!!!! 🤗👍🙏🏻🖌👩🏻‍🎨

Yes. Available in the netherlands as well now.

Thanks- lots of great info, really enjoyed it and of course, your rendering is spot-on! Inspiration? Watching you create!

Glad you got your hands on one, Steve. Hoping to see you get some more plein air time with it too! Hint hint. 😊 Thanks for sharing, and congrats, btw.

Thanks for sharing this. The painting is just wonderful. Always nice to hear about new 100% cotton sketchbooks. I was able to get a few of the Creative Bee (my favorite sketchbook, Arches is still my favorite paper block.) in size 8 1/2x 11 at Blick, But the 8x8 keep getting put on back order.

Always a fun and informational video with you Steve, I often wonder 💭 why I have so many sketch books for my painting but I don’t use them as much as I’d hope.

Ahhh, I’ve been hoping you’d get one of these to try! Unfortunately I have too many sketchbooks on the go, I need to finish one before I can try this one!

Adorei o passarinho! 😍😍😍🇧🇷🙌🏼

I enjoyed this video...

Awesome! I just saw these pop up in my art stores, and I could not have asked for a better endorsement than yours! I will be travelling to Asia shortly, and I have to be very careful about packing light~ One of these sketchbooks might be going along :D

A year late, but thanks for the review! I almost bought the A5 portrait one on sale the other day (they didn't have the landscape A5), and I am feeling two things: 1) I want this book so much. I love the look of their prior, pulp-based, one but the paper did not work for me (because pulp-based) and this looks amazing. 2) I'm glad I didn't pick up the portrait one. I want an A5 landscape, that's the sweet spot for my sketchbooks.

I really wish Walmart would bring back the Strathmore 500.. they also carried the smaller pads. It was very handy to be able to just go grab one. Now all my local stores have is the Grumbacher which is straight up awful.

Great video, but you're such a tease. Show me something I can't have yet! So, I decided that Lebenzon will have to take my money in the meantime. Thanks for the discount. I just set up a new palette, all M. Graham. ❤them. Thanks to you my art room has so much good stuff in it! I'm looking forward to the new brush, just a try out for detail before I really splurge.

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

Coming soon to an art store (or Amazon) near you. LOL! Hopefully anyway.

Such a beautiful little chickadee, one of my favorite birds. I bought a couple of these immediately after seeing Marty’s review. They really are nice, I need to finish up 2-3 more pages in my Kilimanjaro and then I will start on one of these. Even though wetPaint said they were on back order, you can still place an order. mine shipped within 2 days.

Thank you for the review! I have time before Father's Day to start dropping subtle hints on my daughters (like sharing a link to your video) ;-)

Hey their new wc sketchbooks look great! Thank you for applying some washes and doing a bit of lifting cause the other Hahnamule wc sketchbooks would not have handled that. I have a smaller pulp one by a different name and just my own Arches handmade ones so this was great news. Marty is on my subscription list and I will definitely see what paces he put it through also. Oh and having a side that is closer to hp is wonderful too. I will definitely look forward to seeing it. Often times certain art supply shops for whatever reason still haven’t got much into the nicer Hahnamule paper in the US and it is frustrating or they offer the more inferior options. Nice chickadee with a soft background. Also the Kilimanjaro cp paper is made by Fabriano Artistico. I received a wrapped 5 sheet order of 16 x 20 cause I wouldn’t have any waste from Fabriano Artistico cp and half were watermarked with Kilimanjaro and Cheap Joe’s confirmed even though I actually bought it through Blicks but I didn’t let them know that. But it was true. I noticed that the Fabriano Artistico hp has changed for the worse just recently and is not the same at all. So my favorite hp paper has become Arches and Saunders Waterford I enjoy a bit more for watercolor actually. Sometimes I slip a bit of clear watercolor ground with a sponge brush on the older cheapo wc sketchbooks and it helps. Thank you so much for sharing the new sketchbook and your lovely chickadee.

Beautiful! So glad you did this, they're one of my MIL's favorite birds. I want to do a painting for her for Christmas. I'm going to look to see if you've done a cardinal pair. Every single time I see a review, I buy whatever the product is... and since I'm binging your channel right now, I can't tell if that's a good or a bad thing LOL!

@mindofwatercolor

Жыл бұрын

I have done a cardinal but not a pair.

I’ve really enjoyed the Kilimanjaro that you recommended in another video … now I’ll have to get my hands on the Hannemule next. I got some Academy watercolor blocks and I really like that brand too when I don’t want to use my Arches or Fabriano.

@OhJodi69

2 жыл бұрын

I absolutely love Kilimanjaro.

I bought a couple from Wet Paint yesterday - discovered them by accident when shopping for something else!

@owingsart

2 жыл бұрын

Thank you for supporting Wet Paint Jenn.

Arches has a new sketchbook coming out!

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

Really?! That'd be very cool!

Love bird watercolor. Love hahnemuhle too btw. Counting my blessings brand is fairly cheap on german border where I live :) have not seen it on the market yet, guess yours is a promo version? Lucky you :)

They must be pretty new. I search for a full cotton sketchbook by hahnemuehle in january. Cause I am german and the other avalible from Amazon at this time has been expensive. The new ones wasn't on their Website then. Endet that I make my own books. I think I continue that in the future. But thank you for the review.

Oooooh! ❤️

The Arch Art Supply in San Francisco has them. I got the larger square one.. they look great!

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

Oh really! Great to hear. They should be everywhere soon. Hopefully.

What was the beautiful music you played in this video? Perfect compliment to your beautiful bird sketch.

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

Thanks. I meant to put that in the description. I Give Ye My Spirit - by Bonnie Grace

Great sketch. I am wondering what the long bristle paint brush is. I haven 't seen these in the art store. Thank you.

You didn't mention Indigo Art Papers Wiro Pad 100% cotton notebooks. While sometimes the back cover comes off, these have become the 100% cotton watercolor notebooks I most enjoy using. I am glad to learn about the notebooks you reviewed in this video! Thank you.

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

Interesting. Might try one. I knew there were others out there less well known.

@reneeaubuchon6683

2 жыл бұрын

@@mindofwatercolor The cheapest price I am finding right now is at Jerry's. I like the 9 x 12 notebooks because I can leave paintings in the notebooks for storage without having a lot of loose individual sheets of paper around. If you decide to try them, I hope you like them!

Hi Steve! As always I'm in awe of you artworks. Thank you for this review. I wonder if you tried Koval sketchbooks? They are handmade sketchbooks made in Poland. They use cotton watercolor papers like Arches, Saunders and Fabriano. You can choose 50% or 100% cotton paper, 200gsm or 300gsm, cold press or hot press, extra white or natural white, landscape or portrait format, etc. They have international shipping option. Really well made sketchbooks! I'm also curious if you tried Roman Szmal Aquarius artist grade watercolors? They are also made in Poland. I would really love to hear your thoughts on them. Have a lovely day ☺️

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

I've not tried either. I've never heard of Koval. I am familiar with the Roman Szmak colors but have not tried them. I know they have a pretty good reputation. I do use Renesans from Poland which I enjoy.

Thanks Steve! Curious to know your thoughts in comparing this to the Windsor & Newton Professional Sketchbook.

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

If you mean the W&N Pro spiral books, both are really excellent papers. To my knowledge though W&N does not make a nice case bound book like this.

If you saw them [sketch books] at Walmart, the strathmore sketch books it was an error and you probably will never see them again

The strathmore books, what department! I’ve not seen any at mine. Craft, art or stationery dept? Thanks!

really looks like the best paper for watercolour, where you can buy it?

I purchased a Hahnemuehle watercolor notebook because of your video, and have been paralyzed by fear to paint in it! 🫣🫣I just know I'm going to screw something up! (This fear of imperfection is a regular occurrence for me. I have a Journaling Bible that has set perfectly untouched for 6 years 😢) Are you able to point me to a spiral bound book that is your favorite, so not if, but WHEN I screw something up I can just tear that page out? TIA!

For some reason the descriptions don't open up on my computer. I'd like to know what paintbrush you were using for the details in this video. Love the bird detail and the ghost background.

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

Thanks! Lebenzon goat and synthetic blend. My review of the brushes is here. kzread.info/dash/bejne/poyOysyTncqdfJs.html

Another great demo, Steve! Curious what brush you are using for scrubbing? I have some that are too stiff. The one you are using looks a bit stiffer. Thanks

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

It's from this set. amzn.to/37LAqvp

@kathleenpotter8453

2 жыл бұрын

@@mindofwatercolor Thanks!

Lovely ☺️. I would love to know what paints you used for those background washes🤔

@mindofwatercolor

2 жыл бұрын

There is a complete color list in the description. The background is a variegated mix of 2-3 colors but muted (primarily red iron oxide, dioxazine purple and neutral tint). All from my M. Graham 10 color set.

Love the music?

Hi, I’m sure you’ve said this somewhere, but I can’t find it, what size and gsm is the book you worked in? Thanks so much. Love your talent and reviews. They help so much!

@mindofwatercolor

Жыл бұрын

Thanks. 250 GSM A5 (8"x6")

Lovely painting 😊 which Hahnemühle paper is this closest to? Expression maybe? 🤔

@mindofwatercolor

Жыл бұрын

Yeah I think so.

@colourmequaint9690

Жыл бұрын

Thanks a lot- I can buy the sketchbook then 😆

Very beautiful ! Too bad I made the mistake of buying this brand of paper and it wasn't 100% cotton. Stupid of me!😥😉

What brush is that you are working all those details with?

I received mine this week. It seems more like hot press to me. Maybe it’s the weight of the paper, but I think I like 140lb better. Not quite enjoying it yet. I’ll keep working on it. Might just be me.

Do you use a panel board to put your watercolor paper on when painting? I want to buy very large paper, like 24x36" to paint on but I need a board to rest the paper in. Any suggestions?

@mindofwatercolor

Жыл бұрын

I just use drawing boards I bought.