- Twintip: One brush nib and one chisel nib
- 96 colors (including a blender)
- American marker
- New for 2016
New alcohol
based marker from Chartpak
I haven’t
bought any new markers for a long time even though I have seen several markers that
I do not own. I am tired of poor quality
markers and the disappointment that follows. However a new marker from Chartpak
made me immediately interested. Chartpak is one of the companies that manufactured
markers back when all markers where xylene based instead of todays standard alcohol
based. They are the only company left that still produces a xylene-based
marker, the so-called AD marker. AD marker is not a pleasure to use since the
smell is very harsh, but it is a quality product. However the hope this being a
quality marker started to fade when I opened the package and first saw the top
of the markers. I thought they looked a bit like the cheap Finecolor marker but
with a black barrel.
 |
| Different nib of Spectra |
Good and
bad
The nibs
are good. On one side you have a brush nib that is flexible and on the
other you have a bit different larger nib. It looks like an ordinary chisel nib (but a
smaller one) and it is cut a little different. The ink however is quite bad. The
blending ability is very poor; if you try to blend two colors together they never
really blend, instead they look like it is one color on top of the other. Most of the colors look about the same when they are wet as when they have dried. Stone is one of the colors that I experience to change the most, more in hue then in value.
 |
| Spectra, Promarker and Copic chisel nib |
Plagiarism
or loan
All color
names correspond exactly to Blick Studio marker. And they also have 96 colors
in their collection, just as Blick does. Even many of the colors them self look
almost identically to Blick Studio markers. The warm gray have a lilac tone,
just like Blick (I was so hoping that Spectra should have the same warm and in
my opinion beautiful gray that AD marker, the xylene based one, has). The other
grays also look identical to Blick’s grays. They also use procent instead of numbers for their gray, just like Blick (and Prismacolors). The similarity goes on. You have
Taupe, Stone and Latte, three colors that you will find in both ranges. The
problem is that they also look almost the same, which is a waste when they offer
so few colors. Even if most colors look exactly the same as Blick´s colors there
are exceptions. Beach, shell and light peach have a different hue then Blick.
Unfortunately the ink quality seems to be the same as well. All colors are
quite dull and flat looking. Even the barrel looks like the barrel of Blick Brush marker, (I do not own one of the Blick brush so I can not say for sure) but instead of white (like Blick brush marker is) it is black.
Poor
quality
Some of the
caps don´t feel like they are firmly fit. They wobble a lot on the barrel. One
of the markers had dried out when I received the markers. After a couple of months
five more marker had dried and I didn´t even use them enough for that to happen.
 |
| Some of Spectras colors |
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| Spectra |
