Some of the Pantone markers.
I’m a big fan of magic markers. I used them back in my college days in the 1980s and then I picked them up again around the year 2010 to try and find a finished style that I could make with them. That’s how I ended up with my “Dreams of Things” covers that I’ve been drawing for the last decade or so.
The main thing that I like about markers is that they are instant color. Put the color on the paper and it’s there. No messing with drying time. They are also convenient. I can have a whole bunch of colors at my fingertips that take up a relatively small space. I just have to take the cap off of one and it’s ready to go.
Over the last fifteen years I’ve bought a lot of markers. My main three are Copic, Artfinity, and Blick markers. I’ve also sampled and bought lots of other brands. Last spring I even spent about $125 on a bunch of paint markers. I haven’t used those ones a lot just yet but have them ready to go.
The main thing I like about markers that I can buy today (as opposed to the markers I bought in the 1980s) is that the Blick, Artfinity, and Copic markers all have refill inks that I can buy. That way I don’t have to buy an entirely new marker when it runs dry. I can buy the refill ink instead and fill up my marker. That way I don’t get caught short in the middle of a drawing by a marker running dry. I can just fill it up again.
The downside to the markers that I mentioned is that they are all dye based markers. That means that they are not lightfast. Dyes are a fugitive medium and the color will fade away with time. None of my ten year old marker drawings have started to fade but that doesn’t mean that they won’t someday. I’ve made my peace with that but it’s still a little disappointing.
Enter a new marker onto the scene last year: the Talons Pantone markers. Pantone is a well known company that makes specialty inks for printing and they have branded themselves over the last few decades as a company that is a leader in color. There are plenty of people in the paper, painting, and t-shirt printing world who know their colors by the Pantone color number.
The thing that got me interested in the markers is that they are pigment based. Pigment is a lot more lightfast than dye. Plus you could buy the water based ink (not alcohol) on its own or use the inks to refill the markers.
I ended up buying three makers and ink refills to check out. I only bought three because they are not cheap. Each marker is $8.50 with the refill ink coming in at $13. That’s $21.50 plus tax for the two. I paid about $70 for those three markers and ink refills. That’s steep.
I ended up liking the markers. They are well made and I like the way the ink looks. Water based pigment markers work differently than alcohol based dye markers and I need different techniques for them but they are not that far apart. Back in August I almost bought a few more Pantone markers and inks but I decided against it in the moment. I juts wasn’t in the mood to spend about $150 for six new markers and their ink refills.
Cut to last week and I’m looking at Copic markers on eBay. No real reason for it. I was just window shopping and there weren’t even any deals that interested me. I’ve never even bought any Copic markers on eBay. Usually I buy them from Dick Blick or Jerry’s Artorama.
As I was looking I spotted a set of Pantone markers. A set of nine colors for around $35 plus shipping. They seemed really cheap. I checked the regular online price and it came in at $75 for the same set. I have never even seen this brand of markers (it’s an English brand) discounted at all. Blick and Jerry usually sell their art supplies below the retail price but not these markers. They sell them at full retail price.
I looked around as I was trying to decide if I should spend $40 on a set of these markers when I saw an even bigger set. It was a set of eleven of these nine marker sets. Each one was a different color that added up to a set of ninety-nine colors. The price on the set was $330 (plus free shipping). The price would be nearly $850 at full retail. Now I had a decision to make.
I didn’t exactly have an extra $330 laying around but I thought it may be too good an opportunity to pass up. They was also a “Make an offer” button on the listing so I figured I’d do that. I made an offer of $250. I figured that if I could get them for that price then I’d have no choice. The seller came back with a counter off of $285 dollars and I grabbed it. What’s an extra $15 in this case?
After buying the markers I had a little bit of buyer’s remorse. That’s because, to me, a marker is nothing without its refill. Buying refills for these ninety-nine markers at $13 a piece is around $1300. Had I really just committed myself to spending another $1300 on these markers? That seemed excessive. I spent the next morning trying to figure out how I was ever going to be able to buy those refill inks.
I looked on eBay for the refills but there weren’t many to be found. Certainly not at the discounted rates of the markers. I figured my best way to get the refill inks would be a little bit at a time. If I got ten of them at a time I might be able to get ten a month. Maybe the blues one month and the reds the next. That’s about $150 a month on marker ink. Even that seemed absurd. But dropping $1300 dollars on them in a single day seemed even more absurd.
Then it struck me that the best thing to do would be to get the colors I use and like the most first. The rest can wait. I almost never buy big sets of markers because in any set I’m not going to use about a third of the colors. At least I won’t use them very often. I figure that by the time I buy the refills for the first fifty markers I can put off the rest until whenever I’ve got the money.
So I lost my buyer’s remorse and now am excited to get my markers. That haven’t arrived yet but when they do I’m make a set of swatches of them. I always find it satisfying to have a set of swatches. I also look forward to figuring out new ink marker techniques. I’ll let you know how it works out.