It's Halloween!: All about Star Wars & Reeves Watercolor

Well, hello. How are you doing? Today is Halloween—a.k.a. the end of the month—November is literally tomorrow. But, where’s the graphic? Why a full post? Well, typically I only post a picture on days like Halloween or Christmas, and it’s become something of a trend on Our Thoughts Precisely. However, this year, I wanted to do something a little different. So to break that trend I’m going to do an art supply review instead, which is why I saved my reeves watercolor review for Halloween. As always, a full list of supplies used will be down at the bottom of the post.

Name: Reeves Watercolor Paint

Source: Purchased

Set: 18 count

ml/fl oz.: 10ml; 0.34 fl oz.

Michaels     Walmart     Blick Art Materials     Amazon     Office Depot     Joann

More info...

• Good color strenth
• Transparent finish

Colors: Chinese White, lemon yellow, medium yellow, orange, flesh tint, brilliant red, crimson, violet, phthalo blue, ultramarine, permanent green light, sap green, viridian hue, yellow orcher, burnt sienna, burnt umber, payne's gray, and ivory black.

Today, I’m going to be talking about Reeves Watercolor paint. When I did the review for Canson watercolor paper, I used these paints, which reminded me that I hadn’t really written specifically about them in any kind of review, general thoughts, or whatever. So, I’m finally going to do that.

What I’m working on…

• Padme Amidala fan art

Some things to know...

• This paint does have a slight chemical odor. 
• This paint does separate in the tube, but once everything is mixed it works perfectly fine.
• When setting up a pallet, keep in mind that this paint can experience some cracking. That’s what happened to me, but I don’t mind since I haven’t had any cracking on my actual paintings and don't really care how messy my folding pallet is or isn't

Here's what this particular set looks like. It's pretty basic, nothing fancy.

I actually like Reeves Watercolor. For a set of 18 colors, the price isn’t very high, and the paint quality is better than say something you would find at the $5 price point. To talk more in-depth about these paints, I’m going to kind of discuss my recent fan art of Padme Amidala—a.k.a., the whole reason why I was so excited to share this post on the blog.


Normally, I try to do original art, because it challenges me more than something that I have a clear reference for. However, I was in the mood to draw one of my favorite outfits from the Star Wars franchise: Padme’s Throne Room Gown from The Phantom Menace. I mean, I like this outfit so much that when I was a kid I actually dressed up as Padme for Halloween. Yes, this outfit in particular. I've always liked the color choices and style of this outfit. The colors are so vivid, which gave me the opportunity to really test how far I could go with the paint. I layered a lot in order to achieve the color you see in the final picture. And, oh gosh, this painting basically took me two days from start to finish—that includes the initial sketch in my sketchbook, transferring it to watercolor paper, and etc.. The effort was worth it because I’m happy with the result.

All paint takes a little trial and error to really see if it suites your style. I’ve exclusively used Reeves Watercolor for months and like it a lot. It’s easy to use, and the range of basic, straight from the tube, colors offers a wide enough range of choices that I sometimes paint without mixing. In this case, I did mix the colors to get the shades I wanted.

Some other good points…

This paint doesn’t have a chalky finish that rubs away when you touch it. I honestly hate that about some cheaper brands of paint. As you can see in the picture, I can touch the dried paint without any problems (as long as my my skin is dry, otherwise the paint would reactivate). To finish my fan art of Padme, I used colored pencil and white gel pen.

Will I continue using these paints?

The answer to that is a definite yes. Eventually, I do want to try different, more expensive paints. That being said, Reeves watercolor works perfectly fine for what I'm trying to do: improve.

Finished painting…

Hop on over to Adri's blog, Toile, Think, Go, where she is reviewing some of the seasonal candy corn: It’s Halloween, Now Let's Talk About Candy Corn. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got movies to watch. Happy Halloween!

Full List of Supplies…

Canson Watercolor Paper

Reeves Watercolor

Pigma Graphic Pen

Pigma Micron 02

Artist's Loft Colored Pencils

Sakura Gelly Roll gel pen (white)

Weekend Tidbits {#12}: Art Haul

I’m not going to bother with a long introduction because I meant to post this awhile ago (around Easter actually). This is just the kind of post that I kept adding to the longer it sat in the draft folder. Now that I've come back to it again and added a few more things to it, I figured that it was time to just post it so I can finally move on...

For Easter, I did some baking. The cookie recipe is Hershey's Doubly Chocolate Cookies just sans the chocolate chips, because they weren't necessary for what I was doing. I used the dough two ways: heart shaped cookies (pictured below) with the Wilton silicone heart mold, and the rest went to just ordinary cookies. The regular old cookies were used to make those sandwiches (pictured below). I also used up the left over candy melts from a different baking project, as you can see on the cookie sandwiches. The heart shaped ones also got a similar treatment, but I never got around to getting a picture of them before they got eaten. By the way, they were delicious.

In 2016, I focused more on developing my skills at digital painting, but this year I'm doing more than that. I've gotten back into painting by hand, and it's so much fun. It has been a long time since I’ve used watercolors, and I don't mean a couple of months. I'm talking about years. Yes, it has been that long, and during that time I lost my old watercolor pans as well as most of my supplies. So, I actually have a small art haul.

I picked up some Reeves Watercolour paints, new brushes, a watercolor pad, and a basic palette. I’ll probably talk about the paints later since I’ve only used them a few times. I also picked up some Papermate felt tip pens because they were on sale, and I wanted to try them. I’ve only used them a handful of times, but I love them so much. The colors are really nice and I’ve had a lot of fun just using them to doodle or quickly go over sketches. Like the paint, I'll probably have more to say about the felt tip pens once I've used them more than I already have. The last thing I picked up were two Gelly Role gel pens in white. My sister let me borrow hers, and I really loved how well the gel pens work for smaller details on top of the reeves paint. So, I felt that it was necessary to get my own since I plan on painting more.

Since I wrote this post a while ago, I've picked up more than just the above shown items. I've gotten some acrylic brushes, Reeves Gouache, and a new sharpener.

I forgot to mention this on twitter, but I picked up a few comics on free comic book day. I went to two different stores, but by far my experience at Ryan's Comics was the best. The staff was friendly, and they had a cosplayer by the door telling you about the event on the way in. So, there was no confusion about the event and how many comics you could pick. I've made purchases from Ryan's Comics before, and suffice it to say I will be going back again.