What’s your magic brush?

Guess which question I am asked most often?

“Which brushes are your favourite?”

Almost each and every tutorial on my YouTube Channel that’s the top question.

First of all - why brushes are soo important? (Are they important in principal?)

I would say - yes, they are. A bit less important than the right paper but the convenient brush sometimes “paint by itself” kidding aside.

Do you need a good brush? 100%!

Do you need an expensive brush? - not really

For my style of painting (mix of traditional botanical illustration and loose techniques) the one , the most important detail I need - is a fine brush tip! And what’s also important - that file top should stay fine for a bit. Otherwise it’s annoying and expensive to change brushes after every picture.

I tried out dozens of different brushes, including high-end brands and…. Came to an interesting conclusion.

Many branding brushes do not keep the fine tip long enough. After a few pictures you could give the brush to your kids. Or it looks like kids have painted with it.

I tried… IKEA…

Yep! Those round short brushes with white tip from kids section. And they were actually very nice! The tip is great and they saved me a lot of custom orders. The only minus - they were not convenient in hand.

After a while I finally found my treasures - the synthetic brushes from Søstrene Grene and they were really good for most of all loose and botanical techniques. Not sure if they are available world-wide though.

So, I kept looking for something what I could recommend for anyone and the other great choice I found - Princeton brushes, Heritage Series (Synthetic). Fine tip, very flexible, aesthetically pleasant to hold and to paint.

*This all not advertisement. I do not get paid for those promotions (kind of pity)))

With my painting technique I usually use 2 brushes at the same time. My favourite sizes are #6 and #10. For super-fine details sometimes I use #2.

And that’s all. With a really good brush you could paint the whole picture just like this!

Another advice I would give to you - if you are not happy with your materials - check out kids creative stores or something local.

There are might be real treasures in there!

I talk about my materials more on my YouTube channel