The Battle of the Watercolor Palettes

 For beginner crafters out there, traversing the waters of watercolors can be treacherous and can leads to fewer hits than misses.  I'm here to tell you about what I think are the worst and the best palettes for beginners budget.  Now, this post is just about the palettes you can get, I'm not even going to go into the tubed colors you can buy now that are also watercolors.  Palettes are the easiest to work with and come with the greatest selection of colors for one price instead of, say, six tubes of color for the exact same price.

The first palette I have for you, pictured above, is from American Crafts and I bought it from Tuesday Morning.  At first I thought, oh this is great, it's super vibrant, and the colors selection is fantastic.  However, much to my dismay, the beautiful pigment stayed in the palette when I tried to paint with them.  The colors were very light, almost Pastel looking but not in a good way.  They did not mix up the way I wanted them too and it was very difficult to pick up any color.  I had to lay down the color a few times just to get it even remotely in the same solar system as the color that I wanted.  The only plus side to this palette is that it came with two pretty nice brushes and the packaging is pretty sturdy for being made out of plastic.

 The next palette is the Artists Loft pearlescent palette from Michaels. I payed around $5 for this palette and for that price it was worth each and every penny.  The colors are in the middle of the rode as far as I am concerned concerning pigmentation but the real winner is the shimmer.  Now, it's nothing like the Fine Tec shimmer watercolors but remember those are close to $30 but it does hold it's own.  The shimmer is really nice and shows up the best when the paint is dry.  I haven't had a chance to try every single color but the ones that I have tried are really really nice and great for adding a pop of something to your project. It does come with a brush but I wound up moving that to my embossing powders and am using one of the brushes that came with the American Crafts palette.

 Finally, the palette that surprised me the most, the Artists Loft 28 Color palette.  I purchased this for a little under $7.  If that is a little too high for you, they have smaller palette as well that is the same consistency.  These colors are absolutely amazing, especially for the price.  They are creamy, pigmented, and have a great range of colors.The only thing that isn't so fantastic about this palette is that you are constantly wetting the cakes of color because they absorb the water so quickly.  Other than that I have found no fault with this palette and I am really happy that I got it.

Do you have any watercolor palettes that you really enjoy? I would love to know down in the comments! XO
~Emma~
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