I Ranked 3 Oil Pastel Brands: Sennelier, Holbein, Caran d’Ache

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There is one brand that needs to be mentioned. Mungyo Gallery is an artist quality pastel that is only a smidgeon softer than Caran D'ache and about 1/3 of the price. They have an amazing range of colours with really great pigment load. I just checked on Amazon and a set of 120 will run to about USD100. They are incredible value and a joy to use. Just be careful to get the "Gallery" and not the student grade. I really enjoyed the righteous indignation re Holbein. TAKE THAT, HOLBEIN! 🤣

I love Mungyo Gallery soft oil pastels because they go on like lipstick.

The Marabu Art Crayons look like sets I’ve seen on Amazon with the label Kingart (so perhaps white-labeled). The Kingart ones are listed as “artist pigment crayons” and “gel sticks,” and are often compared to tempera sticks (that also come in a plastic casing) such as those by Shuttle Art.
Among mixed-media artists on YT, there seems to be an interest in art supplies made for children. An interest in mostly discontinued Faber-Castell Gelatos led to artists discovering & sharing Shuttle Art tempera sticks. And people who loved the Caran D’Ache Neocolor ii re-discovered & shared the Stabilo Woody water-soluble crayons.
These are fun sketchbook materials and I’m here for it!

I have the caran d’ache 24 set and a mungyo 48 set which is perfect for my non pro artist needs and process. I’d love to know what you think of the Mungyo oil pastels. They’re pretty affordable and I find them to almost be a dupe of the caran d’ache neopastels, except they’re a touch softer than the caran d’ache and the vibrancy is a little different.

Clara, i love that you are into the same supplies as me!! I always feel like such an outlier because i am all about the Neopastels and Neocolor I ( the non watersoluble ones) and everyone always loves Sennelier and Neocolor II! i think i started watching Art Prof in fact because i came across one of your videos with Neocolor I pastels and was so excited to come across another artist who loves them as much as i do! They are so underrated!

Thank you for this video!!! Absolute GOLD!

Holbein is my favorite brand of oil pastels! They’re the perfect degree of hardness/softness, layer well and have excellent pigmentation. I love that they come without wrappers because for me, wrappers just get in the way. I hate having to unwrap a stick to break it and use the side, or using a piece and having to pause my workflow to mess with the paper. I only wish the original expanded line of 225 colors was still available open stock. They are the best! Well, besides Sennelier of course, but Sennelier is a luxury category of its own!

oil paste;s are absolutely my favorite drawing medium, My favorites are Van Gogh,, mungyo, and sennelier for top layers. I also like Van Gogh and sennelier because I can buy them individually at the art store so I only buy what colors I need instead of spending money on colors I'll never use

great reviews! ❤I love love colored pencils art and I am now exploring pastels and how to use on portrait😅. But this is really helpful when comes to shop for different brands❤

Meanwhile everyone is buying Mungyo Gallery and Paul Reubens on Amazon 😂

For some reason, the Caran D'ache set is retailing for more than USD 200 here in India. Is that how much they cost in the US as well? Anyway, totally unaffordable for a broke student like me at the moment. I guess I'll go for the Mungyo set and see what I can do.

I really like the sennilier oil pastels but I also bought a big set of caran d arch.

I love love love oil pastels❤ this was so interesting, thank you

Isn't sennelier like the producers Picasso sought out to formulate the original oil pastels?

Neopastels also last FOREVER. I still have some from when I was 8, and as a kid I used them a LOT! Though I use that set sparingly now and have newer ones I use instead because I wan to keep that set from my childhood for emotional reasons. BUT... they still work ok!

The maibou are like the gelato crayons. They are a hybrid. Also Distress crayons are similar. These are marketed to art journalers, mixed media people, like the crafter market

Great comparison! Tx!!

Thank you for sharing all of your experience about pastels! I recently picked up some Rembrandt oil pastels and they don’t come wrapped in any paper either. What kind of paper did you use to wrap the Holbein?

The Marabu art crayons are water soluble and most similar to Faber-Castell Gelatos (except I have several sets of Gelatos in fun stuff like iridescent, metallic, and neon and Marabu ones aren't as varied). I use them in my mixed-media journaling. Once you've applied water or even just burnished it with a finger or tissue, it doesn't lift up like oil pastels, so it works well inside a sketchbook or art journal (or junk journal). It also doesn't muck up a scanner bed if you are making digital copies of your art. These are also compatible with acrylics, again, because they're water soluble.

Her: I recommend Caran d'ache oil pastels
My wallet: 💀

The marabou ones look like either gel cryons or tempera sticks. I've heard them compared to Gelatos from Faber-Castell.

I completely understand about the Sennelier. I regret buying so many of them, but that's how I learn. I use them the same way you do. I've also learned that these are the only ones I keep coming back to:
Permanent Intense Red
Ash Blue
Moss Green
Yellow Green Light
And a metallic gold color I can't remember the name of.
I even stopped buying their white because the white from Paul Rubens behaves exactly the same and costs only $10 for six, whereas one Sennelier costs over $5.

Very helpful video. Can you recommend the surface you think best for oil pastels? I’m a beginner, with a small supply of 12 oil Neopastels , and 3 starter Senneliers. Thanks. I’ve admired you work for several years now, since I first came across you during COVID.

I have the Sennelier full range ( incredible deals last year, could not pass 😉). Yes they can get gooey pretty fast ... but ... their neutral range is unique and so beautiful.
(A bit too subtle for me at this point to make the best use of the range but ...I find them.... mesmerizing 😅)

I so agree ! Holbein is great but I simply cannot adjust to wrapper-less oil pastels. They are too expensive to have to wrap them myself. When I don’t wrap them, they get filthy. Definitely not for me. Neopastels are perfect year round oil pastels. I use Sennelier a lot but honestly I cannot tolerate them in summer. I live in the Deep South where summers are hot and humid. Sennelier in large amounts in summer is very annoying.

Could you try Sennelier Oil Patel Grande? The large size Sennelier oil pastels, I think, will change your mind on that they are too soft. The large size ones are soft, but not too soft like their regular ones. I think the most outstanding characteristics of Sennelier Oil Pastels is their colors are more like oil paint colors: There are translucent, semi-opaque and opaque colors. They use generous amount of pigment so very intense. Since you are familiar with oil painting, I really hope you can use the Sennelier Oil Patel Grande and give us lessons on how to take advantage of different opacity of the oil pastels colors (None of other oil pastel brands have this).

I also put paper around my Holbeins, hahah

Oh noes - I put a comment with recommendations for cheaper and great alternatives to Neopastels and Sennelier but I think I edited it too many times and it disappeared. *shakes fist at RUclips*

When it's time to use Holbein use gloves.

Caran d'ache are NOT soft. I really regret buying them. Truly awful.

My faves of all time are Neopastels. My mum bought me a 10 set when i was 8 and i have loved them ever since. I much prefer them to softer pastels like Sennelier. In fact i think that when people hear talk of harder/softer pastels they immediately think of Pentels and imagine that a harder pastel will be waxy, crumbly and unpigmented. But these are not that… they are sooooo smooth. Whereas Sennelier are very greasy and blotchy to me. They do not finger-blend as well. They are good for impressionistic style unblended painting but make a greasy mess on most other paper. They work best on paper designed specifically for pastels. Whereas Neospastels will work on anything. They are wonderful. And the last longer. Though this is all personal preference - they are all excellent pastels in the end.
A pointer: if you like Sennelier oil pastels your cheapest best alternative are Paul Rubens oil pastels (but be careful as i think they use some toxic pigments such as cobalts and cadmiums, so wear gloves); if you like Neopastels, then Mungyo Gallery oil pastels are an absolute godsend as they are very similar for a fraction of the price (but make sure you get their artist grade line which i think has MOPV written on it in the small print - NOT their student grade pastels which are awful and like children's oil pastels) . Follow my channel for more tips 😂