Touchfive Alcohol Markers Review

Touchfive Alcohol Markers

Sorry for taking a while to post another blog, I have been distracted with other things and lost a bit of motivation but now I'm back and happy to finally post a review on the Touchfive alcohol markers I bought off Aliexpress for about US$18 last year. For the video review head over to my youtube channel "Mel Crafting" or just click here or view the link below.

First impressions are OK. I bought a 60 piece set and the Aliexpress seller threw in a couple of cheap pens. The listing said a colorless blender would be included but I didn't get one so I was quite disappointed with that.

Some of the tips were poking out and needed pushing back in so consistency of assembly of the markers isn't great. However, they did come in handy zip-up Pouch to hold the makers and it fitted a few extra markers I bought to complement the set so that was a bonus; again though the material of the bag is quite thin and does have a cheap kind of a feel to it.

Touchnew 60 set zip pouch

The markers have a bullet tip and a chisel tip for each color. The caps feel very secure when you take them off and they give a nice click when you put them back on so I felt their was little chance of them drying out due to a loose cap. Holding them and drawing/coloring them was comfortable in my hand, I would have preferred a round barrel rather than the square profile but I didn't get a sense of any control issues.

Touchfive bullet tip

Touchfive chisel tip

I swatched both the bullet tip and the chisel tip ends, noting down both the number and name printed on the cap of the markers. All the markers were juicy when using the bullet tip. I found marker 99 "Bronze" had a dried out chisel tip whilst marker 69 "Prussian Blue" had feathering issues with its chisel tip.

Touchfive 60 Marker Set Swatching

Marker 69 Prussian Blue Chisel Tip Feathering

Marker 99 Bronze Dry Chisel Tip

Moving onto some alcohol marker blending. I tried out sets of three in colors that I would commonly blend together when I make my cards. What I found was that some markers were easier to blend than others; so that missing colorless blender would have come in handy...

Testing out the Blending

I'm mostly happy with the color range for what I use them for (cardmaking/coloring), but I would have liked more in the purple range because, well, purple is my favourite color. The set has a great range of reds, blues, greens and brown/yellows with quite a few greys so really only limited by your imagination.

Overall, I recommend this 60 marker set of Touchfive alcohol markers as a first set for someone looking to try alcohol markers out but who also does not mind having a limited purple color range and can live with imperfect blending.

Thanks for visiting my blog!

Happy crafting!

Mel Crafting.

STA Metallic Brushmarkers - Review

STA Metallic Brushmarkers

So I got enticed by AliExpress recently and my stationery obsession led me to buy a 10 pack of STA Metallic Brushmarkers. For those that prefer to watch video reviews, click here or view below for mine...

I paid US$6.81 including shipping. I had the option to select a bullet tip but I went for the slightly more expensive brush tip end because I didn't have a set of brushmarkers, well I have watercolor brushmarkers (click here for more details on those) but they are quite different to these.

First up the package arrived safe and sound, I ordered it during lockdown level 4 in New Zealand on 30th April 2020 and it arrived on 23rd May 2020, that's just over 3 weeks - no bad during a pandemic...

The package itself was well packaged and undamaged. I was delighted to see it came in the sturdy plastic case as shown on the seller's listing. By the way, I bought these off a store called "wangwangkong Store" and they are pretty much as described in the listing but there were a few things that I was disappointed with. 

Well Packaged, Undamaged AliExpress Package.

Bit more on the plastic case...it's textured! The diagonal lines in the photo are actually slightly raised and gives it a neat feel. 

A

Plastic Case

The markers themselves are a thinline brushmarker so good for delicate colouring. As they are a brushmarker, I tried getting broad lines and I got good solid thick lines. Although the brush tip is nice and flexible, it felt delicate and one of them was a little frayed after a few strokes.

Testing on White Paper

 

The ten colours are (metallic): Black, Grey, Red, Blue, Olive, Green, Brown, White, Purple, Gold. All except the white were very pigmented. When colouring you can draw over the top of ink pen lines as well as other colors of the markers. The ink in these markers is most brilliant or vibrant when used on black or dark paper/card. I did not like the white, I wanted more pigmentation. I did not like how it seemed to write clear, even on black paper...you could only see a faint white marking when it had dried - the photo seems to brighten the white much more than it looks in reality.

 

Testing on Black Paper

I'm not great at handwriting or calligraphy but when I tried to do some basic brush strokes, they were achievable but I found the brush tip difficult to control.

Testing Brush Strokes

I tried these out on an acrylic block to test how well they write on plastic. Not so great. The ink bled and moved around a lot - not something I would recommend doing with these markers.

Testing on Plastic

Overall, I do like these metallic brushmarkers and they are a reasonable price. There is a good variety of colours in the 10 pack and whilst most colours performed well and gave a great metallic sparkle, expecially on dark cardstock... I didn't appreciate the lack of pigmentation in the white marker. These markers are ok for colouring, drawing and lettering; the fine brushmarker tip means intricate work as well as the bold lines or fills are not a problem. However, the tips seemed delicate and easy to damage or fray so you do need to watch the pressure you apply. As the stroke is hard to control I would steer away from these if you are a beginner calligrapher or lettering artist.

Great entry level metallic brushmarkers to add a bit of sparkle to any quick doodle or sketch. I would buy these again if I wanted some metallic brushmarkers for simple projects. If I needed to use them a lot over a long time or wanted perfect brush strokes, then no, I would not buy these. 

Hope you enjoyed my review.

Happy Crafting!

Mel Crafting.

  

Product Review - AliExpress Glue Pen

AliExpress Glue Pen

This is a product review for a set of glue pens I bought off AliExpress.

I paid US$1.55 for a set of 5 (only 4 are shown in photo because I gave one to my 4 year old and it has 'disappeared'!).

Check out my youtube review video by clicking here or see it below:

These glue pens arrived in great condition. They are sold empty and my intention was to fill them with liquid glue in the hope that I could more efficiently glue my die cuts and embellishments to my cards and crafty projects.

First thoughts are that they are pretty good quality. The lid feels sturdy and gives me the impression that it will last many uses without cracking or becoming brittle and disintegrating on me. Of course if you run it over with a car or drop a perfectly position rock onto it it'll probably break but under normal use I think it'll be fine. The tip is easily removed to fill and easy to replace. It is quite easy to fill, no need for a funnel but this is dependent on what you are filling from - my bulk liquid glue bottle has a narrow dispensing nozzle. Once filled, you can give it a good squeeze and there are no leakages - excellent.

After using it for a couple of months, I can say that it is air tight enough that the liquid glue doesn't go off, so no lumpy, partially dried glue reservoir to try and figure out how to deal with.

In practice on real projects, I love how I get really good control. Little dots, thin lines, thick lines, blobs are not a problem. I especially found it useful for adhering die cut sentiments to cards even really thin and delicate die cuts was not a problem.

My old method of squirting a blob of glue onto a scrap piece of paper and using a toothpick to glue any add-ons on to my crafty projects is out the window now that these glue pens are my go to tool for the job.

I'm pretty sure you can fill these with glitter paint or glitter glue or anything of liquid glue consistency where fine control and placement of goopy goodness is required for your crafty projects.

Definitely recommend these glue pens and have yet to find something I don't like about them.

Check out these crafty projects where I use this glue pen:

Birthday Beads Shaker Card



Happy crafting!

Mel Crafting

STA Aquarelle Brush Double Tone Watercolor Brush Markers Review

This is a review of the STA Aquarelle Brush Double Tone Watercolor Brush Markers I bought off AliExpress for US $12.69.

STA Aquarelle Brush Double Tone -Watercolor Brush Markers Review

Firstly, this came in a pack of 14 and they are dual tips with dual tones so you actually get 28 colors. The pack came slightly damaged but the markers themselves seemed unaffected.

Click here to view above review video in you tube.

Quick test swatching of the markers found them all very nice and 'juicy.' The brush tip works well and I found them to suit my style, ie. not too flimsy or too hard. Using them with water, I found they blended out well to a fade and are a nice pen to watercolor with. Although I would prefer to use watercolor paints over these because when I tried to apply more color to make it more vibrant. I can't say it  blended in nicely. I think water coloring with these suits quick coloring techniques or making random watercolor backgrounds - which are always fun to do!

Quick Test Swatching

If your looking for examples of these in action, check out the following where I put these markers to the test on some of my projects:

- water coloring on my 'oh kitty tree' Christmas cards (https://melcrafting.blogspot.com/2019/11/christmas-cards-using-oh-kitty-tree.html)

-Direct coloring on the background of one of my 'Mama' cards (to be posted in near future!)

-Water coloring on my 'CAS Monocromatic Christmas card'
(https://melcrafting.blogspot.com/2019/11/christmas-card-cas-watercolor.html)

If you're looking for a basic entry level set of watercolor brush markers then this is a fantastic inexpensive option especially since they're dual tone. A bit of a downer that the packaging turned up damaged and once applied it's hard to add more color without it looking a bit wack-a-doodle.

Overall, these are great and I would consider buying them again.

Happy crafting!

Mel Crafting.