As a Makeup Artist, that also uses PanPastels, you can find the same texture of sponge as Sofft Tools if you know what to look for. No MUA uses sponge eye applicators on a client, ever, as you would get huge color pay off that would be extremely hard to blend, and you have zero control of product with those things, just like in working with paints, the denser the tool, the higher the color pay off. You can tell the ones you purchased are very dense and cheap as well. We will use a GOOD quality beauty blender for foundation, and concealer, sometimes, but we stipple the product, as we're building layers and blending product into product, as in concealer into foundation. Most professional MUA's use brushes, and really expensive one's at that, some of my brushes are 100 plus dollars, and just like other artists, we need multiplies of each brush. Good quality makeup brushes look and feel very similar to good quality art brushes. If anyone is interested in using makeup sponges for their PanPastels, you can feel them through the bag, if they're as hard as a rock, obviously don't get those ones, find some nice squishy ones, good quality ones will hold water, because most MUAs will dampen their sponges to sheer out their product and get a better blend, same with brushes, we dampen them to increase color pay off loose products.
As soon as I heard your intro I knew how this would end. 30 years ago you wouldn’t have been able to tell the difference between the applicators, but makeup applicators have become so crappy that for the past 20 years I’ve been using pastel applicators & sponges, and watercolour brushes to apply my makeup 😝
The last makeup sponge you used is a beauty blender. They are designed for the user to dab the makeup on and blend. You are specifically told NOT to brush it across your face. When you use the same technique with panpastels you get a really nice dappled effect with is great for bokeh backgrounds.
This was extremely helpful. As a beginner artist so far I have learned and experienced it's best to get the right tools for the job and not cut corners just to save a few cents. It's not worth the extra work or headaches.
I use make up brushes, the one with soft short firm bristles. They are called Eco tools. They work really well and can get details as there are different sizes.
Thank you so much for sharing this information. I was wondering if cheaper was batter. Just a beginner here and appreciate the help with tips and tricks. 😊
I bought some of the small applicators like you showed first. The ones I got were pretty good, shaped like a long oval and the plastic inside went all the way to the tip like the Sofft tool does. Also the texture was quite similar to a sofft tool. I haven't tried using larger makeup sponges yet.
Painting with pastels doesn't have to be expensive in terms of tools and surfaces though I do recommend high pigmented soft pastels such as sennelier or unison. There are others i haven't tried yet such as royal talons rembrant soft pastels which are a bit cheaper and claim to have a higher pigment ratio to binder. I started with a set of conté hard square and softer rounded pastels, these were in comparison to unison and sennelier a lot cheaper but were very satisfying to work with. I hope this helps with anyone new to this medium and are wanting to give it a go. Though I primarily paint with oils Ive done lots of projects with pastels such as a reproduction of David holding the head of goliath by caravagio on a gessod mount board and im very proud of how it turned out.
If im short on cash i use either thick A3 card or a large mount board for bigger projects and coat them with a thin even coat of gesso either white, black or any shade of grey ive even added some acrylic paint to the gesso if I want to have a tinted colour to work on and this method ive found is surprisingly good. For blending I love to use rice paper stumps and ive even found that using a stylus for tablets or phones work really well too.
I am watching this as I swatch my newly arrived order of PanPastels. This was a thorough review with lots of valuable information. I especially like the tip about using a chamois for cleaning the applicators. Since I don't have any chamois, I'm using a piece of leather on the suede side. I will be using my PanPastels on polymer clay for accents, so the applicator is not such an issue, but still I found this tutorial very useful.
Just and update: I am loving the rich pigments in PanPastels and I did decide to try the Sofft applicators. I chose the pointed ones since I work on very small scale as compared to other artists and these applicators allow me to get into small spaces and apply subtle amounts of color. Love them!
Great tutorial on the applicators out there. I have a black tool similar to your blue one and it come with only the two extra ones. But you can buy more I think like three or four to the pack for under $5. US money. It works really well for holding the right amount of pastels you are applying. Also Jane Davenport has blending batons with the sponge on both ends. They work really good also.
Im in agreeence with you and the jane davenport baton blenders .... they seem to worrk wonderfully an 5$ for 50 double ended and easy to clean too is always a plus
Thanks Jason, I was wondering about this. I LOVE applying pan pastel with soft tools! It’s so pleasurable and it works so well. I was wondering if I could use make up tools for it and you answered my question. Thank you again 😊
Thank you, Jason! I should be getting my first Panpastels (your set!) later this week so it is a very timely review. I did have the foresight to get the Soffit knife covers and I think the Panpastels come with a few sponges to get me started. So I will be set. I can't wait to use them after seeing your beautiful work with them. I do have a question, though . . . Do you typically put the background in first or do you just put the part of the background that touches the animal first (so you can do the outer fur properly) and fill in the rest later on? Or does it change with each design? I haven't had the chance to look at all the videos so I apologize in advance for asking something that you may have answered elsewhere. In any case, thank you again! Always love your work and our group members. You are correct in saying we have the BEST 'secret group' ever! :)
Australian dollars, a set of blending sofft tools on Amazon are $50 + shipping The 20 set of pan pastels works out at $120.. Wish we could get them at US dollars
Lorraine, shop around in Australia. I don't use Amason. There are plenty of other good online places. One recently had a sale of Panpastels and sponges. Sold out now but worth watching for. While I like to shop local, the prices my local art shops want to charge are ridiculous. So I shop around and mostly online now.
This is the biggest frustration I have with them, I can not get through one coloring page without having to switch them, and I am not using them on pastlemat which has a much rougher texture
I have to respectfully disagree. Wiping them on a cloth doesn't really get them clean. Washing them, well it is amazing how much is in them so needed to watch about 3 times and then that wore out the edges of the sponge and made it almost unusable. I like the blue sticks with sponges but again they wear and break apart so quickly. I go thru the sponges on the tips like crazy. This is just from my experience.
They also wear out less quickly in use if you avoid scrubbing with them and reload them more frequently. But even then they're not particularly long-lasting.
is there a difference with the different applicators when blending coloured pencils with the powder blender? I wonder if that was the reason why the powder blender had removed all colour pencil from the paper. Have I used the wrong applicators?
If you're using pastel pencils you don't need a Sofft tool to blend. These tools are designed for laying down/blending pan pastels and they're an expensive option for pastel pencil blending. You can use paper stumps or special rubber-tipped tools which are more affordable than Sofft tools. Or you can use cotton buds, which is what lots of artists do 🙂
@@kelseyforkner The best way to do that is probably with the square shaped pastels like the Faber-Castell Polychromos or the Conte sticks. You can use the edges for fine detail and you could quickly "sharpen" them by rubbing them on a scratch piece of paper or even sand paper to flatten the top.
If you just rub it off on a dry cloth or paper towel that is usally enough. You can use mild soap and water but they usually stay stained so not really worth it for the small sleeve ends.
As a Makeup Artist, that also uses PanPastels, you can find the same texture of sponge as Sofft Tools if you know what to look for. No MUA uses sponge eye applicators on a client, ever, as you would get huge color pay off that would be extremely hard to blend, and you have zero control of product with those things, just like in working with paints, the denser the tool, the higher the color pay off. You can tell the ones you purchased are very dense and cheap as well. We will use a GOOD quality beauty blender for foundation, and concealer, sometimes, but we stipple the product, as we're building layers and blending product into product, as in concealer into foundation. Most professional MUA's use brushes, and really expensive one's at that, some of my brushes are 100 plus dollars, and just like other artists, we need multiplies of each brush. Good quality makeup brushes look and feel very similar to good quality art brushes.
If anyone is interested in using makeup sponges for their PanPastels, you can feel them through the bag, if they're as hard as a rock, obviously don't get those ones, find some nice squishy ones, good quality ones will hold water, because most MUAs will dampen their sponges to sheer out their product and get a better blend, same with brushes, we dampen them to increase color pay off loose products.
thanks for your professional tips here...
As soon as I heard your intro I knew how this would end. 30 years ago you wouldn’t have been able to tell the difference between the applicators, but makeup applicators have become so crappy that for the past 20 years I’ve been using pastel applicators & sponges, and watercolour brushes to apply my makeup 😝
The last makeup sponge you used is a beauty blender. They are designed for the user to dab the makeup on and blend. You are specifically told NOT to brush it across your face. When you use the same technique with panpastels you get a really nice dappled effect with is great for bokeh backgrounds.
This was extremely helpful. As a beginner artist so far I have learned and experienced it's best to get the right tools for the job and not cut corners just to save a few cents. It's not worth the extra work or headaches.
I use make up brushes, the one with soft short firm bristles. They are called Eco tools. They work really well and can get details as there are different sizes.
i tried them but personally found it just seemed like brushing powder around - i must be heavy handed lol
@@wildlifeartjm i found that myself too
Thank you so much for sharing this information. I was wondering if cheaper was batter. Just a beginner here and appreciate the help with tips and tricks. 😊
I bought some of the small applicators like you showed first. The ones I got were pretty good, shaped like a long oval and the plastic inside went all the way to the tip like the Sofft tool does. Also the texture was quite similar to a sofft tool. I haven't tried using larger makeup sponges yet.
Painting with pastels doesn't have to be expensive in terms of tools and surfaces though I do recommend high pigmented soft pastels such as sennelier or unison. There are others i haven't tried yet such as royal talons rembrant soft pastels which are a bit cheaper and claim to have a higher pigment ratio to binder. I started with a set of conté hard square and softer rounded pastels, these were in comparison to unison and sennelier a lot cheaper but were very satisfying to work with. I hope this helps with anyone new to this medium and are wanting to give it a go. Though I primarily paint with oils Ive done lots of projects with pastels such as a reproduction of David holding the head of goliath by caravagio on a gessod mount board and im very proud of how it turned out.
Thank you. I have been looking for a tutorial on this. Really need this.
If im short on cash i use either thick A3 card or a large mount board for bigger projects and coat them with a thin even coat of gesso either white, black or any shade of grey ive even added some acrylic paint to the gesso if I want to have a tinted colour to work on and this method ive found is surprisingly good. For blending I love to use rice paper stumps and ive even found that using a stylus for tablets or phones work really well too.
I make my own P.P. & Sofftool . So many useful variations in my box.
I am watching this as I swatch my newly arrived order of PanPastels. This was a thorough review with lots of valuable information. I especially like the tip about using a chamois for cleaning the applicators. Since I don't have any chamois, I'm using a piece of leather on the suede side. I will be using my PanPastels on polymer clay for accents, so the applicator is not such an issue, but still I found this tutorial very useful.
Just and update: I am loving the rich pigments in PanPastels and I did decide to try the Sofft applicators. I chose the pointed ones since I work on very small scale as compared to other artists and these applicators allow me to get into small spaces and apply subtle amounts of color. Love them!
Great tutorial on the applicators out there. I have a black tool similar to your blue one and it come with only the two extra ones. But you can buy more I think like three or four to the pack for under $5. US money. It works really well for holding the right amount of pastels you are applying. Also Jane Davenport has blending batons with the sponge on both ends. They work really good also.
Im in agreeence with you and the jane davenport baton blenders .... they seem to worrk wonderfully an 5$ for 50 double ended and easy to clean too is always a plus
Extremely thorough and informative, as usual! Thanks for all your hard work making these videos. 😉
This was great and I was going to purchase the makeup sponges but looks like false economy and I’ll buy the sofft tools
Thanks Jason, I was wondering about this. I LOVE applying pan pastel with soft tools! It’s so pleasurable and it works so well. I was wondering if I could use make up tools for it and you answered my question. Thank you again 😊
I was actually talking about a brush. Not make up applicators. Like a paint brish only the make up brushes are wonderful!
Thanks for making this video. This is something I’ve been wanting to investigate myself.
Excellent test! TFS!
Very useful video, was just about to buy loads of these on my other i[ad watching your video... glad this came up
Thank you, Jason! I should be getting my first Panpastels (your set!) later this week so it is a very timely review. I did have the foresight to get the Soffit knife covers and I think the Panpastels come with a few sponges to get me started. So I will be set. I can't wait to use them after seeing your beautiful work with them. I do have a question, though . . . Do you typically put the background in first or do you just put the part of the background that touches the animal first (so you can do the outer fur properly) and fill in the rest later on? Or does it change with each design? I haven't had the chance to look at all the videos so I apologize in advance for asking something that you may have answered elsewhere.
In any case, thank you again! Always love your work and our group members. You are correct in saying we have the BEST
'secret group' ever! :)
It changes 👍
Watching in 2022. Thanks, very helpful.
Australian dollars, a set of blending sofft tools on Amazon are $50 + shipping The 20 set of pan pastels works out at $120.. Wish we could get them at US dollars
Still way expensive in US too.
Lorraine, shop around in Australia. I don't use Amason. There are plenty of other good online places. One recently had a sale of Panpastels and sponges. Sold out now but worth watching for. While I like to shop local, the prices my local art shops want to charge are ridiculous. So I shop around and mostly online now.
Hi, I am a beginner with PanPastel, I have a doubt. Is there any way to clean PanPastel Sofft tools?
Thanks for saving me some money. I’ve been wondering if something cheaper would work.
I hate how they crumble so damn quickly! It’s not right!
This is the biggest frustration I have with them, I can not get through one coloring page without having to switch them, and I am not using them on pastlemat which has a much rougher texture
Thanks for doing this experiment so we don't have to.
Please use UK PRICES and USA.
I have to respectfully disagree. Wiping them on a cloth doesn't really get them clean. Washing them, well it is amazing how much is in them so needed to watch about 3 times and then that wore out the edges of the sponge and made it almost unusable. I like the blue sticks with sponges but again they wear and break apart so quickly. I go thru the sponges on the tips like crazy. This is just from my experience.
If you put them inside a small lingerie bag they will get less battered. Although personally I wash items like this by hand.
They also wear out less quickly in use if you avoid scrubbing with them and reload them more frequently. But even then they're not particularly long-lasting.
is there a difference with the different applicators when blending coloured pencils with the powder blender?
I wonder if that was the reason why the powder blender had removed all colour pencil from the paper.
Have I used the wrong applicators?
If you're using pastel pencils you don't need a Sofft tool to blend. These tools are designed for laying down/blending pan pastels and they're an expensive option for pastel pencil blending. You can use paper stumps or special rubber-tipped tools which are more affordable than Sofft tools. Or you can use cotton buds, which is what lots of artists do 🙂
@@nerllybird
I mean normal coloured pencils with powder blender, not pastel pencils.
With the right tools, do you find it’s possible to get as fine of detail as you are able to get with pastel pencils?
SIMPLE ANSWER - NOPE ;)these are a completely different product, pastel pencils are best at fine details
Jason Morgan - Wildlife Art I keep hoping I’ll eventually find a pastel that will let me get fine detail without having to sharpen it. ☺️
@@kelseyforkner The best way to do that is probably with the square shaped pastels like the Faber-Castell Polychromos or the Conte sticks. You can use the edges for fine detail and you could quickly "sharpen" them by rubbing them on a scratch piece of paper or even sand paper to flatten the top.
Chrysostomos Chrysostomides Thank you! That’s a great idea. Have you ever tried the Caran d’Ache pastel sticks? If so, what did you think of them?
@@kelseyforkner why not sharpen pencils? Plus only alternative would be hard sticks.
Anybody have a good way to wash these things?
If you just rub it off on a dry cloth or paper towel that is usally enough. You can use mild soap and water but they usually stay stained so not really worth it for the small sleeve ends.