Art Supplies: Lyra Aquacolor Watercolor Crayons

Lyra Aquacolor watercolor crayons are paint in the form of a dry medium. You use them by drawing directly on paper with the crayon; after that, you can use a wet paintbrush or blending tool to achieve smooth blended watercolor effects. The pigments dissolve effortlessly when you wet them.

Lyra aquacolor crayons are lightfast, so you can use them in projects that you intend to keep for years.

Lyra Aquacolor crayons are versatile, and can be used in a variety of different projects. They are suitable for fine art and also for crafts. Lyra Aquacolor crayons are popular with artists, rubber stampers, scrapbookers, and card makers.

Drawing and Painting With Lyra Aquacolor Watercolor Crayons:

If you already know how to draw but you don't know how to paint yet, Lyra aquacolor crayons present an ideal opportunity to ease into watercolor painting. These watercolor crayons blur the line between drawing and painting. You can draw in the usual, familiar way, yet still achieve watercolor effects with a minimum of effort. There is a bit of a learning curve with this product. With a little practice, and perhaps a ruined project or two in the beginning, it's pretty easy to get the hang of using Lyra Aquacolor crayons.

Lyra Aquacolor Watercolor Crayons For Rubber Stamping:

Some rubber stamped images resemble smaller versions of the type of images that you might see in a coloring book; they are inked outlines that can be colored in. Lyra Aquacolor crayons are ideal for adding color to the uncolored areas in these rubber stamped images. They are also a quick and easy way to achieve gorgeous blended backgrounds for rubber stamped images. The rubber stamped images can be incorporated into handmade greeting cards, scrapbook layouts, art journals, collages, mixed media art, home décor projects, and other paper crafts.

Disadvantages of Lyra Aquacolor Crayons:

Lyra Aquacolor crayons will melt if they are exposed to heat. I found this out the hard way when I left mine outside all day. It didn't come as a big surprise that my crayons melted in the hot southern California sunshine, but it was still a bummer. Plein air artists, take note: Lyra Aquacolor watercolor crayons might not be the ideal medium for you. On the bright side, the crayons still work OK even if they have melted a bit. They will re-solidify when you bring them inside. Mine are now lumpy and mis-shapen, but they do work.

I am not aware of any easy way to sharpen Lyra Aquacolor crayons once they get dull. I suppose I could try using a crayon sharpener or pencil sharpener, but I am hesitant to attempt it. I'd rather use a dull watercolor crayon than waste the pigment on sharpening; others might not share this opinion. If you can't stand drawing with a dull instrument, this is going to be a consideration for you. (If you have suggestions for sharpening Lyra Aquacolor watercolor crayons, please feel free to comment. Thanks!)

Lyra Aquacolor crayons aren't cheap. Getting started with them requires an investment. But then again, I can't think of all that many quality art supplies that don't require an investment when you first buy them.

My Experiences With Lyra Aquacolor Crayons:

I was introduced to Lyra Aquacolor crayons when I purchased a box lot of scrapbooking supplies on ebay from a fellow scrapbooker who was cleaning out her stash of crafts supplies. The package of Lyra crayons had been opened, but barely used. I tried them out, but on a first impressions basis, I wasn't all that inspired by them. I couldn't think of anything I really wanted to use them for. So, they got buried in a drawer, and didn't see much use.

Nowadays, I occasionally find uses for my Lyra Aquacolor crayons. When I am making greeting cards, I use watercolor crayons to create washes of color under the stamped sentiments. Solid paper makes a boring background to stamp sentiments on. If I scribble a few doodles or lines onto the paper with the watercolor crayons, then brush over the page with a damp sponge brush, and then stamp the sentiment, the result is more interesting. This technique is more time consuming, though; the image cannot be stamped until after the paper has dried enough that the stamped image won't bleed. It is easier to just stamp onto patterned paper, so I only reach for the watercolor crayons when I don't have a patterned paper that is the right color to use in the card I am working on.

I am a frequent stamper, but I prefer to use images that don't need to be colored in. While I enjoy coloring, it is too time consuming for me to want to bother with it. I recently purged almost all the stamps I owned that required coloring. So, I don't have occasions to use my Aquacolor crayons for coloring in rubber stamped images.

Conclusion:

Lyra Aquacolor crayons are a versatile tool in the artist's arsenal of art supplies. These watercolor crayons can be used in a variety of ways. They are useful for rubber stampers who do significant amounts of coloring. They are also recommended for artists who excel at drawing and would like to ease into painting. In my opinion, Lyra Aquacolor crayons are not must-have supplies unless you fit one of these two categories. For artists and crafters who already own watercolor paints or Copic Markers, Lyra Aquacolor crayons are not a necessary purchase.