KALOUR Premium Colored Pencils,Set of 120 Colors,Artists Soft Core with Vibrant Color,Ideal for Drawing Sketching Shading,Coloring Pencils for Adults Beginners kids

.I reviewed alot of colored ;pencils before I ordered these. I have prism color pencils & love them but not the price. These pencils lay down nicely, layer well & have fantastic color saturation. They feel smooth while your using them, they glide across the paper easily, don't snag & don't make your hand tired. They came with more colors than ive ever seen in one spot & multiple shades of every color. The set includes metallic, neon & pastels. They don't fall apart or break down in the sharpener & the carry case is awesome to keep them all together & tidy. You won't be disappointed with this set

Update: The more I use them, the better I like these pencils. I am having no difficulty getting 5 layers down and they blend well. I purchased a small set of Prismacolors just to see what the fuss was about and honestly find the differences between the Kalour and Prismacolors to be insignificant for a beginner like me. Also purchased the Starjoy Gold and found that while the pigments are vivid and they have a great range of hues, the cores are hard as a rock which I do not like - I am using them for outlines and sketching but really find them difficult to use. Alternatively, these Kalour pencils are a joy to use. At some point I will likely buy a larger set of them in a tin (best thing about the Starjoy is the tin they come in - love it!) FYI, apparently the Kalour pencils are made by Brunfuner and seem to be the same as the Brunfuner round oil based colored pencils. Apparently, all colored pencils contain oil and wax and are referred to by which they have more of, so not sure why the Kalour are listed as wax and the Brunfuner as oil. These same pencils are apparently also sold under the brand names Soucolor, Shuttle Art, Southsun, Womoxe and maybe more. Under the Brunfuner name, they get consistently good reviews and I can see why. May try some of the Brunfuner square colored pencils at some point as they are supposedly better than the round ones, but since they are the same hues as my current Kalour set, I will likely wait on that. May still try the Arrtx at some point, but concerned now that they may not be soft enough for me. Borrowed some Arteza and found them almost as hard as the Starjoy - ugh.Orig Review: No broken cores on my set, except for some pencils I dropped myself. These are wax-based so I carefully heated the pencils I dropped (used method on youtube for prismacolors) and that melted the cores enough to repair the breaks and does not seem to have damaged anything. Cores are soft, which I like - makes color easier to lay down, but harder to get precise details, which is the case for all soft cores. They lay down and blend easily and have a very good range of colors. Color names and numbers are on the barrels - yay! A few colors (5 or so) look like duplicates of others to me, or nearly the same. Some of the barrel colors do not match the core colors, and some color names are not matched to traditional colors for that name, but I see that sort of weirdness in just about all color pencil sets these days. Fortunately there is a good swatch chart included (which was much appreciated - thanks!) and I did receive all colors on the swatch chart, plus blender, white acrylic pen and sharpener. I have had no issues sharpening. Not professional quality - from reviews appears these do not blend or layer as well as prismacolors or polychromos and are not lightfast - but these cost a fraction of those brands. I am no expert, but these seem quite good to me. I have heard the Arrtx set may be better than these (also wax based), but they cost more than 2x what these do, which seemed a lot to me - may be better to buy Prismacolors at that price point. I have also heard the Starjoy colored pencils may be superior to these - those are oil based, sell at a similar price point to these and also have a wide range of colors. I have ordered a set of the Starjoy pencils and a small set of Prismacolors to try out and, at some point, may try a small set of the Arrtx. FYI, these Kalour pencils are sold by several sellers under various brand names - check youtube reviews to avoid buying duplicate sets, lol. At the time of my purchase, these were the best reviewed wax-based pencils with a wide color range under $25.

This kit comes with 120 soft core pencils, a "colorless blender" pencil (which is not sharpened so you can spot it immediately), a white gel pen, and a dual metal sharpener (which was at the bottom of the container). I didn't spot the sharpener until I was done swatching all the colors, and for some reason did not think that was coming with this pack so I was quite excited because metal sharpeners are very nice, and this one is no exception. I have the same type for my other set of pencils and it has lasted years.I am really pleased with these pencils - they are pre-sharpened and arranged nicely in the box. Of course, that box would not last you long before you sharpened them too short to see anymore, but it is nice for initial storage.I like coloring books with big pictures like kids use and I wanted pencils I could easily blend. These are not as buttery as some I've used but for the PRICE they were very good. I got most of them to blend with very little effort, and the blender pencil makes it even easier. Just to see, I used a paper blending stick, but the pigments do not blend with just pressure. The blender pencil has the same consistency as the other pencils, but unlike white (which can muddy colors) this truly imparts no color, just blends the pigment you add.These "dry down" quickly (I know that's not the term but I forget what it is called) so you do have time for blending, but once you blend, that's the end. I was a little worried these would transfer, but they don't smear or transfer very well. Also, as expected, these do not erase very well, although you can get some nice lightening effects with a rubber eraser.I liked the utility of the swatch card provided - I now have a ready reference. Some of the colors are so similar I can't tell them apart in normal light, but that's fine. I am pleased with the range. They also sharpen well, just avoid over-sharpening, which may stress and break the core. I am used to hard cores, so I went a bit overboard on my first sharpen.For coloring and other informal/general tasks I think these are terrific for the price!