I went to Five Below a couple of weeks ago and they had SO MUCH available in stock! There were artist markers for $5 a pop and I had to grab them all. I was waiting for a chance to try them out so that I could write my impressions of them.
Today I will review the Manga Drawing Set 13-Piece from Five Below
Note that my box does not look like that. Mine looks as you see in the featured image.
The contents of the package are below. Top to bottom there is an archival/inking pen, a white highlight pen, 2 black brushes, a colorless blender alcohol marker and 8 alcohol markers. Some have a brush tip and some have a chisel tip. All are dual-ended with a finer end.
The selection is pretty nice! I never had a white highlight marker before so I’d say I scored alone for such a great deal. I gave the set a whirl.
I tried the ink pen and brush first and it’s OK! I think the inking/archival/lineart pen is nice. I can always use more of those. I went to try out the colors.
It’s all right. I used some postcard-sized paper I bought from Daiso and I think the ink pen and markers worked pretty nicely on it. It didn’t feel too bad. I gave the white highlights a try here. They were very faint but I think if I tried to layer it it would be brighter. I generally don’t use the colorless blender that often and I didn’t have an opportunity here, but I don’t think the quality of those can be too different.
Verdict: A pretty decent starter pack for those for anyone for a very affordably priced “Manga Drawing Set” which normally runs for about $25 at any craft store. Unless it’s PRANG or Staedtler, I can’t imagine the quality of a craft store’s in-house brand could be that much better. 8 markers are very limited for colors, but there is a black/dark gray one to color in grayscale for that manga style effect. For the image above I did pair the colors with the other set in the first image, the “Illustration marker set” which ran for about the same price. Frankly, I liked the colored markers in the Manga Drawing Set more. All in all, the markers themselves feel exactly like the 2 marker packs they sell at Daiso, which I didn’t like too much.
If my inks/colors ever ran out, I’d probably be buying another. I really do think it is quite nice, considering each one of those markers usually cost me $5 when I try to restock. It’s a win from me!
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