Cards & Color Charts using Tombow's ABT Pro Alcohol-Based Markers

Last Christmas Tombow reached out to me for a collaboration with our two teams and while the logistics didn't quite work out, they still mailed me a few of their alcohol based ABT Pro Markers sets to try out and I actually really liked them. The are produced with excellent quality flexible Japanese nibs that are really enjoyable to color with and form a nice fine point that are perfect for coloring small stamp images like ours. They also have some lovely bright colors that Copics doesn't produce so little by little, sale by sale I ended up purchasing the entire line. 

I think the only real downside is they are not refillable, but their reasonable price point (see sales info at the bottom of my post) and their new color options has helped me get past that one flaw. When I was initially looking to add just a few colors to my collection, I was having a really tough time finding anyone who had created real life color charts with side-by-side color comparisons for the entire collection. I didn't feel I could rely on the colors on the caps which is the case with most markers. 

I also found that the 5-pen color groups were a great way to pick up pens at a cheaper price point, however they didn't always appear to have pens grouped together that were the best for blending purposes (some sets are better than others in this department--The red set in particular really needs the help of open stock colors). When I was discovering this issue I was dying to know which open stock colors I would need to purchase to remedy this, but I came up empty in my search so today I thought I would share my own findings for others that might be finding themselves in the same boat. 

To start, here is my (sloppy) coloring of the chart that Tombow provides as a free download on their website HERE (under the product downloads tab). You can click on my image below to view it larger.

I also wanted to create my own color chart by placing colors side-by-side that I thought would blend well together to make it easier for me to quickly grab colors while I'm coloring stamp images. In addition, I like to have larger color swatches to fully see the colors so this is what I came up with. It's far from perfect, but you can print and/or download a blank version of my "chart" HERE (just make sure to print it in landscape mode). 

While it's impossible to have every color you might want for a blend with "only" 108 colors (vs. Copic's 358 colors) I found I almost always was able to get around this with some tip-to-tip coloring to help blend out shades that might be farther apart than I would have liked. I also think I will start incorporating these colors to fill gaps in shades with my Copics and vice-versa. 

There are quite a few pretty purples and pinks in particular that I have been longing for so I'm super excited for those. I also love some the bright greens, turquoise shades and blues which are also unique to these pens. As a result many of my card samples below focused on these new-to-me colors.

Tombow has these awesome storage cases which have been custom made to perfectly fit their longer markers. Each binder holds 54 pens and there are 108 ABT Pro Marker Colors available so you can fit the entire collection in two binders. The binders come with a zippered pocket on the last flap which I've used to put color swatches and extra pens I've purchased of my most used colors that I want to have back-ups for when my original markers run out of ink. 

Some of these colors might look out of order to you, but I was trying to place them in color blending families similar to my chart so that I could figure out what blended best together even when I might not have my color chart handy. As mentioned earlier, in some cases the cap colors are also misleading.

Shortly after I purchased my binders, Tombow released this amazing Desktop Organizer with stacking trays. I also discovered they have a handy Marker Case that holds all 108 pens in one convenient handled organizer. Oh well... While I'm loving both these other options, I think my zipper binders will travel well with me on the go in a carry-on bag so I have no regrets. I'm also lacking extra counter space so the trays as pretty as they are weren't going to be a viable option for me anyway.

I recently shared a number of cards for our Fall & Holiday release last week using these ABT Pro Markers which I will re-share here just so you can see the type of coloring you can achieve with these pens. While I didn't keep track of the exact blends I used for each card, I think it's fairly easy to figure out using the color chart I shared above. Clicking on the individual card photos will take you to the coordinating blog post where additional details were shared about each card including the links for the Sunny Studio products used.

I hope you've found this helpful. ☺

Please note: While Tombow mailed me a few initial sets of markers for my post I shared HERE, they did not ask me to promote them here today. I'm just a happy customer who loves to color with alcohol markers and was excited to find additional color options I felt like I was missing with my Copic color wheel and thought others might feel the same way. 

If you haven't signed up for Tombow's mailing list, I would highly recommend it. They have some seriously great sales on their site that are hard to pass up. I know a series of stellar sales definitely helped me assemble the majority of my collection you see here today. In fact, in honor of Labor Day I see they are having a 50% off sale on select items including all their ABT Pro Marker sets and binders featured here today running through Monday using discount code SAVE2022 at checkout. Even better they have automatic free shipping for all USA orders over $40.