I was searching really hard for a set of paints under $50 that were easy to get in Australia and didn’t suck. And when I say easy, I mean like 90% of people could go out and buy them today kind of easy. This Reeves set, avaliable from officeworks pretty much hits the mark.
This set of paints includes 12 colours, listed as titanium white, lemon yellow, medium yellow, brilliant red, crimson, phthalo blue, ultramarine, sap green, viridian hue, yellow ochre, burnt umber and ivory black. The little blocks of paint are housed in quite a nice tin, which feels like better quality than the $20.50 price tag.
I was pleasantly surprised when I started swatching these out. They’re not too chalky, they colours are quite bright and and the colour selection was pretty much what you’d expect in any 12 colour set. There is no pigment info included in the set, and as such would never recommend these paints for work that would be exposed to any amount of sunlight.
When I started using them, I was a little less impressed. I felt like i was flighting to get them to work the way I wanted them too, and I felt the lack of a bright cool blue was more of an issue than I’d initially guessed (there is the warm ultramarine, and a shade that’s more like indigo). However, I was actually pretty surprised with how much I liked the the final painting that I was able to create with these! The colours were a little muddy, which I feel we cant really expect much better at this price point.
Honestly, this is the set I’m going to recommend to the people who ask me what paints to buy the say before an art class. Not cos they’re great, but because everyone lives near an officeworks, they’re $20, and they could be worse.
Pros
Ease of purchase
Not terrible
Cons
Still $20
Not great by any stretch