Watch other brush test videos: bit.ly/3moFE4y Hi-res scans of the test sheets in this video and all of my other videos: Patreon www.patreon.com/otokano

Yesss I’m in for this series 😄 I found my perfect brush (well two actually…one is the Silver Black Velvet 12 round, the other is a super cheap no-name calligraphy brush). I’ve been using them for over 4 years with no regrets. But I always keep an eye out for the next best brush…

This is a fantastic series to do! Definitely looking forward to your results. Those brushes aren't very expensive at all, in the States. Definitely grabbing one, to send to you, as a Thank You for all your wonderful content.

HI!! OTOOOOO!! So nice to see your face :D (Again, always happy to send along some Princeton Heritage if need be ;) )

In Canada, Wallack's, Curry's and Delta Art seem to stock them at the moment :)

Thank you so much for this! I've been trying to find a brush that has an even load release when painting leaves and this Heritage is the "Golden Ticket" I've bought SO many brushes and actually had a #8 heritage that I had bought in the beginning of my water color journey and for some reason it got put with my rejects. I've been using Escoda Perla, but they are much more expensive here in California. So tonight I tried the Heritage again because of your video! Such a nice brush! I see why it's one of your favorites. I know this video is 2 years old but if you see this and you still need any of these, let me know. I can easily get them. They even have them at the local art store near me (Art Supply Warehouse)

Oto, DickBlick has a Heritage set with four brushes including this #10 for $26. I am not sure how shipping to UK works, but it might be worth your while. I order my Escoda Versatils from Jackson's and even with shipping they are still cheaper than buying stateside. Princeton make good dependable (and in the US at least) affordable brushes. I have used the Snap (bargain white toray), Velvet Touch (golden synthetic ... taklon?), Neptune (synth squirrel ... my favorite) and Aqua Elite (synthetic sable ... new to me). Hopefully you can easily get your brush. These aren't expensive here so there has to be a way to get cheap shipping to the UK!

I use the Princeton Velvet Touch 6 & 8 and the Princeton Aqua Elite 12 & 8 . & they are all superb brushes .

Ha! I got a brush explosion like that looking for my favorite affordable too. This will be good to see. Always take good care of your brushes and reshape them I highly agree. I'm hard on my brushes too. Thanks Oto 💜

I love that we get to go on this journey with you! It's going to be fascinating and I always appreciate your insights!

Wow Oto your content get more and more interesting and useful. You are certainly a treasure to the art community. I am learning so much and seeing all the test and what each represents makes me more confident when buying now. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Sad you can't get the Princeton brushes in the UK. They are my go-to brush and very reasonable here in the US.

Don't forget the Faber Castell kiddies brush set! 😂 they are awfully amazing. Primary colours and bright with a kiddy soft grip that is removable --- but I've never failed with them!! They would probably fail tests but there is something about them, on a day I cannot paint - they just always seem to work. I hate that I love them so much haha (Because I invested such a fortune in the Princeton, not available where I am) I also have a few silver and many Princeton and many various others too, so that's my point of reference. Also, I prefer synthetic now going forward.

Oh this cuts deep. The Princeton heritage is my unicorn brush here in Australia. It's the one I want to try but is impossible to find without importing it.

i’m so excited for this series! thank you so much 🥰

So hopeful to understand why my brushes may or may not be doing what I want them to do. Thank you!

I bought this brush on a size six when I was following a tutorial doing leaves and could not get the right look! I love it, but I pretty much love all of the Princeton brushes I've tried.

This is going to be fun! I love my Princeton brushes. Neptune is my fave though followed by velvet touch. Have a few Heritage ones, never had much luck with them. Can't wait to see what you discover, I'm so excited!

This is great. My wife bought me the full set of 4050 rounds for Christmas. They are amazing. I rinse and shape after each use as you describe then deep clean them with Master Brush cleaner each week to preserve.

I love my Princeton Heritage. I have 0, 2, 4, 6 round, 4 fan, 2 liner, and for fun, a 30 round. They are all so easy to manage. But I love brushes and have many. Really looking forward to this series.

Thank you thank you for the brushes episodes! I’m new, and definitely need this information !

I only have Princeton brushes, and some Rosemary & co. Princeton are great....high quality and performance, at a great price. I have Elite, Neptune, Velvetouch, and several of their "Value"line.

Really love the test sheet! I find myself hoping that a synthetic Tintoretto Quill brush will find its way into this series! I have the travel ones and I love them! They have a point, hold water and pigment well and mine give a very even release of them as well (they perform better than Escoda Ultimo on all of those points)! 🥰

Dear Dr Kano Thanks for the peek at your studio, the whites and yellow green olive plants make it look relaxing, and productive. Great idea to test the brushes this way, particularly liked the close up part included, as you moving it with your finger, and how it sounds! This is very hard to achieve when we buy online. Everyone has a favourite brush for different reasons and purposes, so when we are recommended a brush, we buy it, it may not suit us. I thought I would include here my favourite swatching brush, and general use, is a "Polina Bright on Etsy, light pine handle, in a 0. It is a mop, and it is synthetic." I like it as it is very light weight so I can do more swatching, as swatching generally is quite tight. The main reason I like it, is to change colour, it is less movement in the water jar! So it is quicker to release pigment, to change colours. I keep a serviette on the edge of my desk on the right, to touch the back end of the body, to stop the bead on the ferrule! (I then use the serviettes in my sketchbooks, as I open them and the pattern of ink, or watercolour is across two of the ply, so when I separate the ply, I have a beautiful abstract spread, often no more is added to it! I use "yamato" rice paste, or "matte mod podge for paper" or Atelier matt varnish becomes more of a shell hardness to glue it down, and go over the top of the serviette..) QUEstioN : How do you use the Princeton? Do you use it for the dry brush qualities, or just the tip qualities? In kindred spirit Eliza Australia x

This will be a fantastic and informative series. I can't wait for your other tests. 🙂

I love the Princeton heritage so I can’t wait to see how the others work for you. Great idea for a series!

Thank you! I appreciate how you compare with specific examples. I'm looking forward to watching and learning.

Wow! What an exciting series Oto! 😁

This is the best idea for a series. I used to love the Lowell Cornelle until it was discontinued. So, I am on the search for perfect brush , too! I heard the Princeton Velvet Touch of the Kingart Originial Gold are the next best thing. Love the Kingart Brushes. Thank you for all you do!

These are around 10.00 on Amazon prime, free shipping. My favorite golden taklon brush is KingArt 9000 KINGART® Original Gold® 9000 Series Golden Taklon Round Brushes

as always, your vids have such great timing! im doing a no buy 2022 this year specifically no buying colours but may be buying brushes. so this series would be absolutely useful! thank you for sharing with us 😊👍🏻

Hello Oto, it is interesting for me what you think is useful to test brushes. And I am looking forward to the next examples to compare. One brush alone doesn't tell us much right now. So we will see. For myself at some time of my watercolor journey my cheap brushes didn't hold enough paint for a certain area of paper and the spring was too much for my liking. So I was looking for a fine tipped, soft, juicy brush. My favorite brushes so far are da vinci casaneo, which come in many different styles. They are synthetic too, but really delicate and pointy. We as artists have such good products here in Europe that we need not ship (or even fly) them from far away. But all those videos (and the english language) make us think, that we need the products from the US. I for myself try to buy even art supplies as regional as possible to spare the transportation and take care of the environment. So I am thankful for every European supply tip from you. But I totally understand that you in your case will talk about (and buy) Japanese supplies too.

Wow! Today i received my first Princeton Round 8 and immediately can see a huge difference in how paint and water gives way more drama than a similar round brush I was using ( much cheaper Indian brand Aurora Taklon) The cheaper brush is lovely as well however the Princeton totally made me wake up to 'great quality'....

Really interesting! I can get the Princeton Heritage series pretty easily, but they are towards the top of the price range (not counting Kolinsky Sable of course). Your new studio looks great!

Excellent! I’m looking forward for next videos. I would love you to compare the velvet touch, the silver brush black velvet, the pristone neptune and the escoda (I would love a scoda… but are expensive to buy without a good reviews … well all that I named are on the pricier side

I would be happy to send you one!! My local art store has them. This is a great review idea!!!

I love brush reviews so much!

The Princeton Heritage is probably the best synthetic made by Princeton. I have the 8, 10 and 12. They really are wonderful. I do use a few costly ones my favorite being the long Isabey #6 pointed round. Rafael soft Aqua brushes are great. Regular sizes run small so I would say double your size and they have lovely small pointed quills synthetic. Simmons white brushes worked very well, I tried them out before sending them as a gift. And I also use the Escoda Versátil and Reserva. I was very surprised by the Rafael soft aqua brushes and their point, just double your size or have tech check it against a regular size but it was great to find some that had nice rounded bellies and great points. One doesn’t really need sable but I do admit that one of them is my favorite brush. My size 4 versátil is my favorite 4. Hope that helped. Oh and the Silver black velvet brushes are wonderful too! I think that they are a blend of synthetic and squirrel. Ok thank you for your input and hope that this helped also.

I like the belly drag effect.

to me it looks like the brush is made from 2 parts.... a core which will be natural hair and the belly wrap around the core that is synthetic....... the max width test is solid in the centre and fides in the outer edge and the belly drag test at the tip of the brush is strong all the way but much weaker as it goes into the belly, so I think its made from 2 parts if that makes sense. thanks for the video

Ok I have tried to find all the brushes you tried before I ask this question. Have you tried the Raphael Kaerell 8394 brush

Do you have any brand recommendations to get a wider leaf shape that still has a sharp point at the tip?

I think the belly drag shows some interesting textures.

Thanck you, iblove this topic, i hope you will find an other one, i'm exactly in your case !!! 👋🏻

I think I have a Princeton heritage brush somewhere. I actually prefer their velvet touch line, which I think is a step or two down from the heritage line. They remind me a lot of the much pricier Cosmotop spin brushes from DaVinci.

It's just $10.00 in the USA. Have you tried the Black Velvet brushes? Black Velvet costs a bit more but I like them as much as my very expensive sables.

Oh this is going to be good. Love the new direction. Thank you! Not sure if you can help but one of my biggest challenges is deciding between different sizes in the same range. e.g. do I take the da vinci quil size 4 or number 6? The 6 is big, but if you have a look at their promo video then the so does the 4.

pls review the Royal & Langnickel Zen Series if you can get ahold of it :) those are the brushes I use but i'm curious to see how they stand against other, more popular brushes

OMG Thanks! This is amazing!

How much fun is this?! I will be super interested if any of my already purchased brushes show up (to see if I made good choices!)

These look great. It's a shame Jacksons don't stock them

wondering if you've tried princeton aqua elite synthtiic sable? its t dream one so far

Have you tried Rosemary brushes? Hand made in the UK and really excellent.

Aren’t you an angle!