Publishing Pals
Welcome to Publishing Pals Podcast, a podcast where two pals talk about publishing. For nearly a decade, we have tried, failed, and sometimes succeeded at being traditionally published. Come along with us as we share everything we've learned in this oddly gatekept, confusing, but incredibly fun and rewarding industry.
Publishing Pals
Art Supplies Recs!
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Hello!
In this episode we’re talking about art supplies! From tools for beginners to personal favorites, all our recs are linked below!
Here are some of supplies we recommended during the episode. Just a disclaimer - please do not take our word as fact. These are just our opinions and personal experiences.
Find Maria: https://www.mariaoglesbyart.com/
Find Katie: https://www.katiedwyerillustrations.com/
Here are the links for Caitlin Blasdell, the agent from our agency deep dive:
Website: https://www.lizadawsonassociates.com/caitlin-blasdell
Query Tracker: https://querytracker.net/agent/413
Publishers marketplace (you might not be able to access if you don’t have an account) https://tinyurl.com/4xaa28vj
This is the 5x5” sketchbook I’ve been using for my tiktok drawing challenge: https://tinyurl.com/bdfy4yns
5x7” watercolor block I use for pet portraits: https://tinyurl.com/ydx62wb9
The hot press arches block Katie uses: https://tinyurl.com/3k5j3dmy
Pencil/pen recs:
Colerase https://tinyurl.com/9uv4ava8
Microns https://tinyurl.com/4yeym599
Microns https://tinyurl.com/3hskre6z
Hitc c pens https://tinyurl.com/3thsv6p4
Empty cartridge https://tinyurl.com/2s4jf7wj
Refills for choose your own multi color pen https://tinyurl.com/34yypt3n
FW acrylic ink: https://tinyurl.com/mrx6cyhw
Ferris wheel press ink: https://ferriswheelpress.com/
Brause pen nib holder: https://tinyurl.com/3ph89ajd
And nib: https://tinyurl.com/4xhwdc23
Pencils
Mahl stick (stops you from smudging the surface with your hand): https://tinyurl.com/89tzpj3b
Neocolors (wax water souliable crayons) https://tinyurl.com/bp2ehzp9
Watercolor pencils: https://tinyurl.com/46kk78hd
Watercolors:
Schminke: https://tinyurl.com/4kw7ykrd
Holbein: https://tinyurl.com/3a48cfss
Winsor Newton set 1: https://tinyurl.com/mwaavxsw
Set 2 (cotman): https://tinyurl.com/pepk6d6m
Hillsborough art shop: https://www.anneandarthur.com/
Escoda watercolor book: https://tinyurl.com/ez2rr4br
Accordion sketchbook: https://tinyurl.com/3hzwc5z3
Viva colors watercolor sketchbook: https://tinyurl.com/bdhvwzp9
Canson graduate watercolor sketchbook: https://tinyurl.com/4a46kvfu
Brushes:
Silver black velvet: https://tinyurl.com/yn3padd9
W&N series 7: https://tinyurl.com/56kcecb5
Raphael kolinski: https://raphaelbrushes.com/
Uniball signo white pen: https://tinyurl.com/5f4tkmkk
Aqualift sponges: https://tinyurl.com/mema82wj
Holbein gouache: https://tinyurl.com/mufw74nd
Hello, I'm Katie.
SPEAKER_01And I'm Maria.
SPEAKER_02And welcome to Publishing Pals Podcast, a podcast where two pals talk about publishing. For nearly a decade, we have tried, failed, and sometimes succeeded at being traditionally published. Come along with us as we share everything we've learned in this oddly gate-kept, confusing, but incredibly fun and rewarding industry.
SPEAKER_01Yes, and I'm so excited to have you here for one more episode. Thank you for being here, Katie. Yeah. Yeah. And I guess we were thinking we're both artists, we're both always talking about art stuff. Um, and I wanted to close on a very artsy episode. So today we're going to be talking about our favorite art supplies. And I figured maybe we'll go by like category. We could do like paper, tools, and like media. Um, but I I thought I have a few that I think are great for beginners, and then a few that I just think are fun for me that I like to use. So maybe we could kind of switch between like what we'd recommend if you're just getting started versus like niche things that we found that we really like.
SPEAKER_02Okay. I am very into um just fully going in.
SPEAKER_01So at the beginning, I bought the nice stuff, which I wouldn't necessarily recommend doing, but yeah, it depends on your budget and it depends on how how much practice you plan on doing too. Cause I know for me when um when I was going through art school, like they had us doing so much stuff for homework that was like never gonna see the light of day that it was like not worth it. So we had those giant biggie size sketchbook pads that I'd go through like two or three of those um a term. And that was uh a lot. But I'm glad they didn't have us buying super nice sketchbooks.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I'm curious because I didn't I didn't go to art school, but like, did they just give you a list of recommended art supplies and brands that you could get?
SPEAKER_01Um, it depended on the class. The teachers would often give a list of supplies and then you'd get there and they'd either be like, oh, we're not gonna use that, or we're just gonna use that one week. And it was like a $50 tube of paint or something that they put on the list. And it's like, I just think it's fun. It's just what I like to use. And they treated it like, oh, this would be a fun thing to buy. Whereas some people were like teachers were like, Well, you need to have all five of these things here and present because we're gonna be doing an exercise every week with them. And there's a reason I asked you to buy them, and it was never like clear which one was required and which one wasn't. So I ended up with all these art supplies at the end of like my time there that it's like, these are so expensive, but also I'm never gonna use them.
SPEAKER_02And yeah, I feel like they should be a little more mindful of the college student budget.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, some teachers were and some really, really were not. Yeah, there was a supplies list, whether or not it got used and how helpful it was was debatable. Um, and those were for most of the like first and sometimes second year classes. And then after that, it it got a lot more like loosey-goosey, where um you were expected to start producing portfolio work, and the classes you were taking were more about here's color theory, here's what we want you to work on over the break. You could do watercolor, you could do gouache. Um, some places, like some classes let you do digital. So it kind of varied, and then it got to the point where it's like when you bring it in, it has to look nice, but you can make it look like any of these things. Or they would have you um scan it, or if it was digital, just print it and they had like a certain size print at a certain DPI, at a certain paper quality they wanted to have it printed as, but then you could make the original however you wanted. So it it varied from like class to class, but it it there was enough flexibility in later years that you could amass like a nice collection of stuff you were actually interested in, which was nice.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, as long as hopefully your tubes of pay didn't dry out.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Gosh, I still have a few things that I've just like never played with. Um, I've been doing these sketchbook challenges on TikTok where I do a different sketchbook drawing or painting every day. I'm thinking about making my next one just like this is the sketchbook where I use up as many art supplies as I can, and I take the stuff that I like almost never use, and that's what we're drawing with. Oh, that's a good idea. Thanks. Yeah, it's it's been fun so far. I've filled up this is my second sketchbook, and I'm almost done with the drawings, and then I have the paintings to do. Um, but it's been like two or three months that I've been doing it. Um, and I think it's really helped with just staying creative each day.
SPEAKER_02And do you get a watercolor sketchbook?
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah. So I guess starting with paper, the one that I've been using for these sketchbooks a day is like really small. I actually brought a ruler so I couldn't tell you how big these are. Um, this is just a five by five-inch sketchbook, and it's got this pretty blue cloth cover um and watercolor paper, and it's it's by this brand Potente, P-O-T-E-N-T-A-E. And it's got, I don't know if these are like Korean or Chinese characters next to it. I'm not sure what they mean, but uh it's got a bookmark and it seems pretty solid. I mean, I've opened and closed it a million times, like playing around with it. And um, I can draw on both sides, even though it's clear one is meant to be painted on and one is the back. Uh the back takes water really well, and I think it still looks good. Um, and I like watercolor sketchbooks where I can like really, really destroy the paper. Um, and this one holds up a lot better than some others that I've used. So I like that one a lot. But I like to say I favor really small sketchbooks. Like another favorite of mine is um like the Moleskin Watercolor series. They have a like three and three quarter by five and a half inch um watercolor book. And that before I got this potente one, this used to be my go-to for like watercolor sketchbook stuff. Um, mostly because they're like small and compact, so you can carry them around in your purse and they don't take up much space, etc. And then after that, like I think those are my two smallest ones, and then I have a five by seven aquarello hot press watercolor block um that I use for like five by seven inch art commissions, which I do a lot of custom pet portraits, and five by seven and eight by ten are the two sizes I offer, um, just because those are standard frame sizes. And what I don't like is having an art print that I love and then buying it and realizing that I have to get a custom frame made for it, and I can't just pick up something typical, um, or picking up something that is typical that has a matting built in, and then you lose some of the art. So I like the five by seven blocks. Um, and I I find that Acarello is like really good quality. This one's 140 pounds and it's made of cotton. And I don't know, I think it's pretty. Um, colder hot press both work, and that's what I've used for my commissions for like years. Um, and they sell an 8x10 version as well. But yeah, I don't know. Are they do you have a special paper that you use for commissions rather than like personal sketchbook use?
SPEAKER_02Um, well, I don't do commissions, I just work for when I do my picture book illustration, I always use Arch's hot press. I like the hot press more than the cold press because um it's smoother. And so that way when I use colored pencils or graphite or something, it's not quite as grainy looking. Um so that's like my go-to always is Arch's hot press. And I get the really big ones, the 16 by 20 inch blocks. Um, because typically when I do a picture book, I paint it according to size. Um, so if the book is like eight by 10, then it would be, you know, eight by 20 or something, however the math works out on that when I double it for a double page spread. Um, but I've started working smaller recently, but the big block is still really nice to have.
SPEAKER_01What made you make the decision to switch to smaller? Because I love working small. Um, but then I know a lot of people really love working big and like playing with texture. Why um why the transition for you? Is it like a change in style or how you produce work?
SPEAKER_02It depends on the book and like what kind of watercolor washes I want to get. If like the one that I'm working on right now is watercolor and ink, and I just feel like I can get like really cool details if I work smaller and just blow it up a little bit bigger rather than just like really long lines of ink. Um, plus it's just faster. Um but like another book that I'm gonna be working on, I'll use according to size because that's how I did the dummy, and I'm doing it in gouache and it has a ton of texture. So I want to get like a lot of brush strokes and painterly textures in it. So I'll do that one according to size. But it just depends on the project and what I'm trying, like the effects that I'm trying to get. Um for sketchbooks, I actually this is a confession. I don't use sketchbooks a whole lot. If I sketch, I usually do it on like random pieces of paper.
SPEAKER_01Are there certain types of random pieces of paper that you especially like?
SPEAKER_02Uh well, I have like a like a Bristol, um, just like a Bristol sketchbook for drawing. And then I do like the moleskin sketchbooks. I have a million sketchbooks. And I think it's a requirement if you're an artist to have a million sketchbooks. Yeah, I have so many. I like the moleskin watercolor sketchbooks. I really like those.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. I feel like the the regular moleskin sketchbooks, I I love the binding and I love that they're different colors, but I find their paper is a bit thin. But I feel like for watercolor, it's thicker, but it's thin for watercolor paper. Um, but I I like that. I feel like it can take a fair amount of water for its thickness before it buckles. And it's nice that it you can carry around a watercolor book that isn't like crazy thick because of how big the paper is. Yeah, I agree. I have a few watercolor sketchbooks that I love, but I will say like watercolor is mostly what I use. I've only I don't think I have any non-watercolor sketchbooks in this pile that I brought over.
SPEAKER_02Um if I'm sketching, I actually prefer drawing over painting. Um so I just like to have a pencil or like a crayon, and that's what I like to use. Like a crayon.
SPEAKER_01What's that? Like a conti crayon or like a wax crayon.
SPEAKER_02Like a crayola kind of I will I will literally like if we go to a restaurant and my kids are with me, then they'll give us like the crayons, you know, for their menus. Oh, yeah, sketchbook with me, or my son will bring a sketchbook with him, and then we'll like draw in just like a small little sketchbook, like my Bristol one that I carry around, or he has one that he carries around as well. And so we'll just take the crayons from the table and draw on it. Thank you. And that's actually one book that um is currently like out on submission, and yeah, uh, I can't really say anything about it, but the idea for that book literally came from when we were at a restaurant drawing with the crayons at the table. That's awesome.
SPEAKER_01I love it when you go to um more indie restaurants instead of those like standard little cardboard packs of crayons, they've bought like a giant crayon set and they just give you a few from that set. So you don't have like four generic colors, you've got four weird colors that you get to play with. Um, there's a diner that I went to all the time growing up that was like that. They would give you a mug of like random crayons from one of those like 200-piece sets.
SPEAKER_02I don't think I've ever been someplace that does that. We always just get like the set, this like in the little plastic case or like the little box.
SPEAKER_01Oh, I know the one by where I grew up, it they just had extra mugs and they'd put five or six crayons in a mug. It looked like they just bought a giant set and thrown a few in there.
SPEAKER_02I like that. I like that better than just getting the standard colors, like the yellow, green, blue, and red, because then different.
SPEAKER_01For drawing, I like these Prismacolor Colorace. And oh yeah, I have those as well. I've got like a million packs in carmine red. And then I also I, you know, I like a classic pencil, and then I love microns. And they have a micron now called just PN. And instead of like a brush size, it's like a felt tip pen, but it has a little bit of ink on the sides too. Um, so you can get like some variation in width, which is really nice. Um, and I know you can do that with other pens, but the micron pens have waterproof ink, which I love. So I can paint on it and then I can watercolor on top of it. And that's always been like a favorite way to draw for me.
SPEAKER_02Same. I love the microns and the book that I have referenced a couple times already that I can't talk about. Um, I use micron pens and watercolor. And I've always loved micron pens for line drawing. Before I even got into children's illustration, I just really love to draw um flowers. So I like do challenges where I would draw a different flower every day, and I always use microns. They're just, I love them. They're the best.
SPEAKER_01Yes. Warning though, micron does sell one that just says Pygma brush on it, and that one is not waterproof. I'm guessing because the brush pen has to stay wetter and more flexible, so they can't have acrylic ink in it, but they don't tell you that. Um, so that one you can't paint over. I learned that the hard way. But all the other ones you can. So the PN and then any of their other like 0.05, 0.08, whatever is. Yeah. I don't know. I like their 0.01s. Um, I think that's my favorite size. Do you have a favorite that you like to draw in?
SPEAKER_02Um, I like the I like the 0.01s. Um the 0.05s are just a little bit too small for me. But yeah, like the what does it go to? 0.01, 0.0. I think it goes to 0.8. Yeah, 0.8. What's a little like 0.5 maybe is a good one if I want a thicker line.
SPEAKER_01Which is weird because when I use high-tech C pens, I prefer the 0.3. I don't know why it's different for Micron.
SPEAKER_02I don't know. I'm not very good at remembering the numbers of things. I usually just like take it and start drawing. I'm like, oh, I don't like this. And then I try something else. I'm like, oh, I do like this.
SPEAKER_01I appreciate that it's on the label and that I don't have to like look it up each time. Right. Because I would not remember otherwise. Do you have the high tex? The what? Do you like the high texis? I don't think I've ever used those. I like them a lot. Um, they're they're ballpoints, but they're very high quality and they come in a bazillion different colors. And uh they have their like on the pen cap, they have the like 0.3, 0.5, and they come in different sizes. Um, and there used to be this store, I think it was called Maido, where there was like a station where you could make a like four-color clicky pen and you could fill them with like high-tech C cartridges. So you could pick whatever colors you wanted. And I've actually been on some stationary stores and bought a lot of refills. So I have these two clicky pens that I can just refill the cartridges whenever I run out of ink. So that's fun.
SPEAKER_02You use a lot of ink? Seems like you do.
SPEAKER_01Um, so if I paint with ink like with a brush, um, which I do for pet portraits sometimes, I do like to use FW acrylic ink again because it's acrylic and it comes in a bunch of different colors, but I generally just use like the burnt umber, the sepia, and the black for pet portraits. And then I used to paint ink almost exclusively, which acts a lot like watercolor, but then it dries acrylic. So you have to paint it all very quickly. You can't wait, it doesn't reawaken. But once it's done, it's just done and you can layer other stuff on top of it. Um so it doesn't reawaken the layers under it if you decide to do that. Um, plus it's it tends to be a lot more saturated than a lot of watercolors. So you can get these bright, vibrant paintings. But I've I've veered a little bit more away from it towards watercolor the past years. And now the ink that I'm obsessed with is this like Ferris wheel press iridescent ink, which I use for fountain pens and map making. Ooh, that sounds really pretty. It is. I mean, you can shake it up and you have to use the Ferris Wheel pen, like fountain pens for it. I found that if I put the iridescent ink in other pens, it clogs them. But I think these must have wider cartridges because the the brand name pens, like it seems to flow just fine. Um get kind of sparkly stuff from it. Um and then if you just dip your brush into the very top after the sparkles have settled, then you can just use it as like just regular colored ink. But I've used it for maps before. So I pencil it in very roughly. I paint in with watercolor, like a sepia tone, and then like uh any sort of like water bodies, I do like a blue watercolor, and then I go on top of it and I use the Ferris Wheel Press ink and a dipping pen. I use the um Brouse B R A-U-F-C like wooden pen nib handles and then the high-tech C zebra pen nibs, which get these really beautiful fine lines. And then I use I dip that into either the FW ink that watered down because acrylic ink can be thicker, or like the calligraphy pen ink from Ferris Wheel Press. And then I do my maps in that.
SPEAKER_02I have a really hard time using nibs because I'm left-handed. Um, and fountain pens, like I remember getting a fountain pen as a child, and I couldn't figure out why it wouldn't work for me because I didn't understand left-handed people hold it differently, and they're really just made for right-handed people. I didn't know that. Yeah, because you have to hold it at an angle that's like back toward you, it's um to right so that the ink flows out, but left-handed people typically hold it the opposite so that way it's angled away. The pen is angled away from you. Because when you're writing, you're writing from left to right, and you have to be able to see what you're writing. So we hold it over so we can kind of see like over the writing, as opposed to right-handed people, their hand rests under the writing. And so then the ink doesn't flow the correct way. Okay. Are there any pens that you'd recommend for left-handed artists? Not nib pens or fountain pens. You just have to learn to hold your pen differently. It's the same with like um brush pens. Like if you're calligraphy or something, you have to learn to hold your pen a different way.
SPEAKER_01So, what art supplies uh have you been really into lately?
SPEAKER_02Um, I love watercolor, gouache. I use a lot of graphite pencils. Um certain brands that you like for the graphite pencils? Yeah, I like the Faber Castell pencils. Um I really like the thicker ones so you can get the darker ink. So like I typically gravitate toward 4B or 6B.
SPEAKER_01Oh wow, that's dark. Yeah. I feel like I'm, I mean, I am right-handed, so I'm not as as handicapped with it, but I still run my hand all over the page. I I use like the 2H statlers, and I go the opposite direction because I'm like, if I wipe my hand on it, like a 6B is gonna smudge. So you must be so careful and precise when you're drawing.
SPEAKER_02It is actually really frustrating. I feel like I still haven't gotten it because I'm constantly smudging. It's so frustrating. So then I'm like, okay, I guess I'm gonna fix that digitally.
SPEAKER_01That stuff is so hard to erase, too.
SPEAKER_02It's so hard to erase, and then I just have like these darker smudges of pencil on my paper all over. I'm like, oh my gosh. And I try like I'll try and put a paper under my hand so that way I won't smudge or like what are those things called? You recommended it to me where it's like that long stick. Yes, I got one of those and I still struggle with it. Like it's just frustrating for me. So anyway, um, I smudge if anytime I had to write on the board in school, it's the worst because those markers smear really easily, right? And as you go as a left-handed person, you're constantly smearing. So you have to hold your hand up in front of the board and not touch it or else you'll smear. And I I just can't do it.
SPEAKER_01I can't do it. So left these out there. If you have any art supplies solutions for us, feel free to contact us. Seriously, I could use some help.
SPEAKER_02Um, but I I love watercolor gouache, graphite pencils, and then I have colored pencils, and then um I am really into the neo color twos. The Karan Dosh neo color twos. There have been those have been my favorite um art supplies lately. I'm actually illustrating an entire book in just those.
SPEAKER_01Those are like the are those like the crayons that yeah. Okay.
SPEAKER_02They're the wax water-soluble crayons, the water-soluble wax pastels, and they're amazing because they have a lot of texture. Um and you're really saturated, right? They're really saturated, and you can um wet them or keep them dry. So you can color all over and then take your brush and just sweat it down, and it looks like watercolor, but it's more vibrant and more opaque. But it can still also keep a little bit of that texture in there, and then you can just draw over it even more with um the dry crayon, and you just get really beautiful effects. I like to take multiple colors, like different hues of a color, and just draw all over it, and then take my water to it, and then you just get like this beautiful effect of like all these different blues or greens or whatever you're using.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I've used some watercolor pencils before, and it's kind of a similar effect, but it I don't think it pushes quite as much pigment, but it's still crazy saturated.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. I I haven't used too many watercolor pencils. Um, I just really like the crayons because I like getting that vibrant. I love watercolor, but one of the things that I hate is how many layers you have to use in order to get it to be the way you want it. So I feel like it's a little bit of a cheat to use um neo colors. And they have neo color ones, which are not water soluble, which are also really beautiful, but the twos are the ones that you can use with water.
SPEAKER_01I um I've used a lot of watercolor over the years, and I find that my favorite brand is Schminky, but it's really expensive and they are really, really saturated. So if you don't want saturated as opposed to like mixing stuff down. I tend to mix it with cheaper watercolors and then use the schminky for like the really bright things that I want to pop a little bit more that's hard to find color for. Um, so I have like some Windsor Newton tubes, um, just from like some of the generic sets that I'll put on my palette um for the more earthy tones and then for like blacks and whites and stuff, and then use my schminky set for like the brighter hues.
SPEAKER_02I have never used Schminky. Um, I should try it though, because I use Windsor Newton and Holbine. Um, I think I like Holbine a little more than Windsor Newton, but um yeah, those are the ones that are available at my local art store. So those are always what I buy.
SPEAKER_01I got spoiled. I um when I lived in LA, I was like 20 minutes away from like one of the foundation like Blick art supplies stores. It was like two stories, and so I have all these art supplies that I'm like, I got spoiled with brands, and now I have to like go online and look for them.
SPEAKER_02I really don't like buying art supplies online. I would so much prefer to go into a store and be able to look at everything. Yes. I used to live by a blick also. I went to Oh, go ahead. Oh no, I just miss it. I miss the blick.
SPEAKER_01Dude, I wish there was a blick's here or something besides Michael's. Um my gosh. Or Jerry's Ardorama. I really like Jerry's Ardorama. Yeah. My um, my hometown has this super cute indie art supplies store called Ann and Arthur. And I will put it in the show notes, but they don't have any of their supplies for purchase online, which sucks. And I keep asking them to, and they're like, oh, we don't want to put in the effort. We're doing fine as a brick and mortar. And I'm like, fine, but like you'd have a customer. But they're wonderful. So if you're ever in Hillsborough, North Carolina, um, the lady there has some great taste and she's always trying out different brands. So I got this brand called um Escoda Barcelona, E S-C-O-D-A. And it's just a really nice watercolor sketchbook. Like, I don't know. It's just it's pretty, it lays really flat. The pages are kind of thin, but they don't buckle very much. And last time I was there, I got this sketchbook that's actually an accordion. So it's one giant long. I love those. I'm I've never had one before, and I'm so excited to use it. Um the thing is, it's got like a picture of a rooster on the back, like stamped into it, but it doesn't have the brand name written anywhere. And so I have no idea where it came, like where to get it, aside from just going back there.
SPEAKER_02But you can just search for those. They have them on Blick. I bought one from Blick once, or Terry's I don't remember. I just bought one online. I think they're just called accordion, right? Accordion. Yeah, they're accordion sketchbooks. Yeah, they're so much fun. Yes, I'm excited to do one. What did you put in yours? Um, I took it with me when I went to France on an artist retreat. So I wanted to lay out like a whole story, which I didn't do a great job of.
SPEAKER_01I didn't do a job. You're in France on an artist retreat. I'm sure you have other stuff to do.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_02I get too social when I go on artist retreats. Some people are like fully locked into the art and just spend a lot of time doing that, where I'm like, tell me your whole life story.
SPEAKER_01I mean, I feel like part of the reason you go is to network and to make artist friends who are like interested in the same stuff as you. Like you don't get to do. Yeah, I still do talk to some of them. That was like three or four years ago. I'm so jealous. I would love to do that. I also got a Viva Colors watercolor sketchbook from them, which is a shinier leather cover, but also I just love hardbound watercolor sketchbooks. And this one has like some nice quality paper.
SPEAKER_02Now, when you um do you bring a watercolor sketchbook when you go places, or do you typically just use them at home?
SPEAKER_01It depends. Like, um, I use them at home a lot, but like this is my purse sketchbook. It's a um, it's a Canson graduate sketchbook, and uh there's a a bigger purse that I have that I keep this one in. And like I brought this on um a family vacation with um my boyfriend's family, and his nieces got really excited that I could draw, so they asked me to draw them a lot. So I have a lot of sketches of them in there, but I have some sketches from like a boat trip we took and a few other things.
SPEAKER_02Um then what supplies? Sorry, go ahead. I was gonna go ahead. I was gonna ask you what supplies you use when you like what do you put in your purse? Because you use watercolor. So like what is your travel set that you use?
SPEAKER_01Well, I'm not gonna bring a watercolor set in my purse unless I'm going on vacation and I'm specifically going somewhere to paint in watercolor on location, but I'll put those micron PN pens and then I'll do all my drawing in the micron um in the watercolor sketchbook and then I paint them when I get home. Oh, okay. Yeah. Or I'll have the watercolor set like in my suitcase and I'll paint when I get back to the hotel or whatever if I'm on vacation. Um or bring that out with me specifically. But even the watercolor sets that have like um watertight pen or airtight, like water pens in them, as opposed to like expecting you to fill it up. Like I worry about them leaking or about them getting warped if it gets too hot in there. So I just put dry media in. Um, and then sometimes I'll have a couple other pens. Like I usually keep a fountain pen or two in my purse, um, just something that's fun to write or draw with. Um, if I decide that I'm not going to paint something, but micron is my go-to and then a pencil. How about you?
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Um, I don't like traveling with watercolor because I feel like you just need so much stuff. Like you need the water to rinse your brush off, and you need like, you know, maybe a cup, or you need paper towels to dry to dry your. And it just seems like so much work. And I have three kids. So if I'm going on vacation or something, I'm with my kids. I don't have time for that. So I typically just bring like a sketchbook, and at least I like um mechanical pencils, honestly, because they're so easy to have to worry about sharpening them. So I'll bring a mechanical pencil with me, and sometimes that's it. But if I'm feeling adventurous, then I might bring some colored pencils with me, and it's just kind of like whatever colors I feel like drawing in. You just pick out a couple. Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. I have this Windsor Newton like compact watercolor set that has like you open it up, it has a water pen, it has like a mini palette, and like I just put that in a napkin in my purse. I'm gonna paint watercolor, but again, don't want it to leak. So yeah. But I find that Windsor Newton is a really nice kind of middle of the road brand for stuff where it's like, I'm not gonna be doing any like really nice portfolio pieces with this, like this is, but it's like decent enough quality that like I'm not gonna be frustrated by it while I'm working. Because I find that the really, really cheap watercolors can be kind of waxy, especially after they start to dry, and they can be kind of grainy to paint on. Um, and Windsor Newton always feels smooth, it always reawakens pretty easily. Like, I think if you're getting started and you're not sure where to start and you don't want to spend like a huge amount of money on paint, Windsor Newton's like a decent solid brand that you can get like a starter set in.
SPEAKER_02Have you tried um is it the Cotton Cottman? Coltman? Is it Coltman? Is like the point? I'll I'll double check. Under and I feel like it's related to either Holbein or Windsor Newton. It's like they're one step down. But maybe I'm it is Cottman, you're right.
SPEAKER_01Cottman watercolor.
SPEAKER_02Is that its own separate brand or is it related to Windsor Newton and Cottman watercolors?
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_02I haven't used those, but I feel like if you are on a budget, that might be a good place to start. But again, I've never used them, so I don't know what the quality is like.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, if you get watercolor paints from like five below and stuff, the quality is probably not going to be there where you're gonna get great results. But honestly, if you had to invest in either a brush, paper, or paints, I'd invest in a brush. And then yeah. Cause like a good watercolor brush, when it's damp but not wet, it's going to form a perfect point and it's going to hold that point for a really long time the nicer your brushes, um, because the binding underneath where like the metal part of the brush is is really stable and it's really tight and it's really well done. And as you push paint into the bristles, it's gonna kind of push that binding out. And if it's not very well done, then you're gonna get some really frayed um edges, and you're gonna get like a lot of hairs that are spouting in different directions, and you won't be able to get like a really sharp line. And being able to create a certain amount of line, I think, is more important than the paper or the paint. Um, I like Windsor Newton Series 7 for watercolor, and I also like the Rafael Kalinski um brand. And those are the two that I tend to use.
SPEAKER_02I use um silver black velvet brushes. I got them years ago, and I definitely can tell that I'm gonna need to get new brushes soon, but they have lasted me so long. Um, and I got a set of seven, I just looked it up on Blick, and you can get a set of seven for $133, which seems like an insane amount of money. But water good watercolor brushes are so expensive. I've paid like $80 for a single brush. One brush. Yeah. I find brushes that I want to get, and then I look at the price tag and it's over $100. I'm like, okay, I guess I'm not getting that.
SPEAKER_01But yeah, take good care of your brushes. If you work in watercolor, like make sure that the watercolor is not staying in the brush, even though it will reawaken, like it does pull that binding apart if you move in. Um, and I find that because watercolor doesn't ruin brushes, like people are less careful with their brushes if they're doing watercolor. But I think if you really want to prolong the longevity of your brush, like wash it out thoroughly each time.
SPEAKER_02When I use um acryla gouache, actually, even just gouache too, um, I tend to be really rough on my brushes because I'm I kind of make like a scratching motion. So I won't use my watercolor, like my good watercolor brushes for that. I use like cheaper brushes so that way I don't have to worry about it because they get frayed at the ends really quickly. Do you ever use masking fluid? Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I use masking fluid a lot. Love masking fluid. I I mean, I know you don't like the dipping pens, but I use my pen nib to apply it to get really fine lines.
SPEAKER_02Um my gosh, I never thought about doing that. Yeah, because it's metal, so you don't ruin the brush with it. My mind is literally blown. I have nibs. I'm totally gonna start doing that because oh my gosh, seriously, my mind is blown right now because I use it and I can, you know, like do like someone's head, a character's head, and you know, do the circle. But then for like really fine, like fingertips or something like that. I'm like, I can't get it thin enough. And now I'm gonna start doing that. Yes, it's this whole episode just became invaluable to me.
SPEAKER_01I'm so glad. Yeah, masking fluid is great. Keep in mind it will destroy your brush if you are new to it. Make sure you have a crappy brush to use on because it is going to dry holes or something. You can't wash it out. It's not like you can't be like, oh, I'll clean it really well afterwards. No, it's gonna dry into rubber. It's it's liquid rubber that you're gonna pull off. Um, but it's amazing because you can draw it on a completely dry surface. If it's wet at all, it might damage the paper, and then paint over it and then peel it off, and it keeps that area perfectly white. So for me, I like my pet portraits that I do, I'll like um draw out the whiskers with um a nib, and then I can paint over them and then erase it afterwards, and the whiskers can be like bright white against black for something. And you don't have to really carefully paint around it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's magic. It's amazing. Um as long as you get the whole area. There's been times where I thought I got a whole area, but I missed a little bit, and when I peel it off, the paint is on that like little one spot.
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah, it sucks. But fortunately, there's there's Photoshop and or the clone tool in Procreate, if you prefer that. Unless you're doing a pet portrait. Unless you're doing a pet portrait, in which case you just have to um you have to figure out a way. I do have these uh Uniball Signo uh gel pens, and they do clog kind of easily. So I feel like I'm always buying new ones, but they do a pretty good job of like touch-up if there's an area that's supposed to be white with masking fluid, and I got a tiny bit of ink on it. I use those for touch-up, but you can only use them in very small areas, like the texture will be evident if it's not just a spot clean. But I've used those when I've gotten in trouble.
SPEAKER_02I really like for watercolor if I do something that I didn't want to do. They have um sponges that you can just wet and then lift off the water. I find that they work really well. Mine are called aqua lift.
SPEAKER_01Oh, I didn't know they had special sponges just for that. I just used a paper towel.
SPEAKER_02Oh, yeah. These sponges they'll hold water and they have very fine tips because they're shaped like triangles. That's cool. You just dip it in the water and then you kind of scrub away at the watercolor, it gets it off very, very well. They're almost like makeup brushes, it looks like. Yeah, they do kind of look like makeup brushes. That's cool. But they're fantastic. They've helped me when I've gotten in trouble. I love acrylic gouache. If you haven't used whole bind acrylic gouache, it is incredible. It is gouache, but you can't re-wet it because it's made with whatever bindings that's in acrylic pink. But it's not the same as acrylic because it's matte, which is what I really love about it. Because um, I've worked in acrylics. I don't love the sheen that comes with it, but acrylic gouache um is totally matte, and um, you can get so many good texture and layers, and they come in a million different colors that you're gonna want to buy all of. And um, you can even wet them down enough so you kind of get a watercolor effect to them, but they're much more opaque.
SPEAKER_01Isn't called Holbine after the like painter from um Six the Musical, the House of Holbein, of that painter who painted Anna of Cleves. I don't know. If you're not familiar with Six the Musical affairs, there's a whole song called The House of Holbein about uh this famous painter who like painted all these ladies' portraits for Henry VIII to bew.
SPEAKER_02That is, I'm gonna have to look it up. We saw that together. I know, it was so fun.
SPEAKER_01Um, we saw it when we went to the SCBWI conference in New York.
SPEAKER_02Okay, so it honors Hans Holbein the younger, celebrate the celebrated 16th century German painter and printmaker of the Northern Renaissance. Oh my gosh, so that is him. I think it is him. Oh, that's awesome. And it's funny because it's a Japanese company named after a German artist. Interesting.
SPEAKER_01The more you know. Yeah. So for our agency deep dive, we are talking about Caitlin Blasdell at Liza Dawson Associates. Um, and I have been super excited because I just I finished all of my uh edits. I finished all five drafts of my book. And I started querying two weeks ago or a week and a half ago, um, which is very exciting. I sent out like 25 queries and I got one rejection and I got one partial request, which I am so excited about. And I currently have a 50-50 success rate on queries, which if you completely ignore the sample size, is very exciting. So I want to talk about the agent who requested a partial from me because I'm so excited about it. So Caitlyn Blasdell has very little on her actual agency website. I had to look at her publisher's marketplace to get more of a feel for what she's selling. Um, and based on what she's selling, that's why I queried her because I thought she'd be a really good fit for my current project. So when I queried her, I mentioned some of the stuff that she'd recently posted on Publisher's Marketplace and said that my thought, I thought my stuff had a similar vibe. But she's been a literary agent with Liza Dawson Associate since 2002 with a focus on commercial fiction. Before becoming an agent, she was a senior editor at HarperCollins Publishers, a graduate of Williams College. She lives in Westchester with her husband and four sons. And that's all she has. She doesn't have an MSWL site, but she does say that she specializes in commercial fiction, including sci-fi fantasy, historical fiction, mysteries, thrillers, and women's fiction, and handles select middle grade and YA. And then if you look at her query tracker, um, querytracker.net gives a list of genres and like age ranges that agents take queries in. She does list um under fiction commercial, fantasy, historical, middle grade, mystery, sci-fi, thriller suspense, women's fiction, and young adult. So um she doesn't have a whole terribly lot on there, but if you look under her dealmaker page on Publishers Marketplace, she is ranked number 10 in UK fiction international rights, number 31 in children's fantasy, and number 34 in sci-fi fantasy. And okay, I haven't read Heavenbreaker, um, but that is at the top of her notable tiles, and the cover looks really familiar. And I'm like, I know I've seen that displayed somewhere. Um so if you've read it, awesome. She's done 114 deals overall since she started Agent Dean. And in 2026, she's already gotten uh six deals. So it looks like she's pretty busy. She seems to be selling a lot of um comedic romanticy. Um, amongst her titles that she sold recently are All Is Fay and Love and War, which I thought was funny, and then Dragons, Heist, and Other Retirement Plans about two elderly partners in crime who make a comeback out of retirement. Um it just sounds adorable. I want to read it when it's out. Um, but she's also sold um some UK fiction rights, she's sold a mystery crime, and she's sold a sci-fi fantasy this year. So she's kind of all over the board within those set categories that she takes queries in. Um, you can query her by going to the Liza Dawson Associates website, and there's an email as opposed to a query tracker that she receives queries from. And I think that's everything. Um, thank you so much for joining us today. Katie, thank you so much for guest starring on PublishingPals for the last few episodes. It's been so wonderful having you and getting a chat, all things artsy.
SPEAKER_02I've been so happy to be here. I'm so glad that you asked me.
SPEAKER_01Yes, I was so glad you said yes. Um, and we will see you next time. Bye. Bye.