Miya HIMI Jelly Gouache Color Review #7: Black and Nude

Goodness, it's been a while since I made a post on this. My apologies to those of you who have been waiting in real time for the final post in this series (although if you followed my page on Facebook, I'm sure you saw the finished painting quite some time ago). 

This is the seventh in a series of reviews of the individual colors from the Miya HIMI brand 24-color “jelly” gouache paint set. This review will concentrate on the Miya HIMI Black and Nude jelly gouache paint colors and will also include updates on my Star Trek painting and how my swatch chart is coming along.

Miya HIMI Jelly Gouache color Black

Last time, I painted Captain Picard's uniform tunic, using Deep Red for the shadow areas and Ponceau to balance out the bright, neutral red. I needed to paint the black part of Picard's tunic, and I decided to paint his horse body in a grey Appaloosa style, both to match his grey hair (he has some hair!) and to contrast with Kirk's golden brown satyr body. It also coordinated nicely with his tunic, like Kirk's coloration coordinated with his. I used the Black and White colors to do this and also to paint Kirk's horns and hooves so they would stand out more from his hair and furry legs. 

The Black swatched out with a high opacity and medium granularity on the black and white charts.   

Miya HIMI Jelly Gouache color Nude

I chose to paint the faces and hands of Kirk and Picard before painting their instruments, which were in front of their mouths (as we've learned through this series, I always start in the background and go forward, even when it gets granular, like this). 

The Nude had medium opacity and granularity on the black and white swatch charts. 

The Nude color was quite pale. Suitable for Patrick Stewart's British pallor (or should I say pallour), but I did need to mix in a little of the previously-opened Burnt Umber and a smidge of Ponceau to paint that tan Canadian, Shatner. 

I used some of the more tan color for Picard's lips and cheeks. After that, I was able to paint Kirk's pan flute with the Umber and Earth Yellow. I painted Picard's flute and added details with White, like the Captain's rank (four dots) on his color and the "silver" background of his communicator badge. With these finishing touches, the painting was complete! 

I must say, it has been a real pleasure working with the Miya HIMI Jelly Gouache. It's very easy to use and to reactivate when dry. The colors mix well and it applies evenly. Of course, the colors dry either lighter or darker than you'd expect, but that's gouache for you. That's why we make swatch charts! 

For the original post describing the unboxing of the Miya HIMI jelly gouache paint set, go here: https://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2023/03/unboxing-himi-jelly-gouache-24-color-set.html

For the first review in the series, go here: https://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2023/06/himi-jelly-gouache-color-review-1-sky.html

For regular shenanigans, please follow my Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/allsortsofart

The Illuminated Manuscript Project: Genesis, Chapters Nine and Ten (NIV)

Hello, and welcome back to my illuminated manuscript of the NIV Bible, Book of Genesis. As discussed in earlier posts, this is a project that I made for myself to experiment with illuminated manuscript whilst making my way through the Bible, a traditional manuscript for illumination. I try to bring some creativity and fun into the lettering and illustrations. It's all done in a hardbound sketchbook, colored with magic marker, gel pens and colored pencil, so it's a fun little practice project. 

Now that I'm using a more stable pen for lettering, the text should be more legible. Sorry about the purple ink bleedthrough from the "10" heading. At least it was just the zero and not the whole thing --small blessings. 

On with the tale! 

Chapter Nine: 

Chapter Ten: 

As always, you can click the first picture to enlarge it and then scroll through the pages from there. 

Here is the first post, if you'd like to start at the beginning (everything else links forward from there). 

Here is the previous post (everything links backward, too. Hooray for completism!)

For regular posts and artwork, please follow me on Facebook at  https://www.facebook.com/allsortsofart

The Illuminated Manuscript Project: Genesis, Chapters Seven and Eight (NIV)

Hello, and welcome back to my illuminated manuscript of the NIV Bible, Book of Genesis. As discussed in earlier posts, this is a project that I made for myself to experiment with illuminated manuscript whilst making my way through the Bible, a traditional manuscript for illumination. I try to bring some creativity and fun into the lettering and illustrations. It's all done in a hardbound sketchbook, colored with magic marker, gel pens and colored pencil, so it's a fun little practice project. 

Being a casual and experimental project, I'm learning as I go what works and what doesn't. There are messy bits, awkward bits, and many places where my materials have simply betrayed me! For example, the black pen I was using for lettering seemed fine at first, but eventually reacted with the paper to leach out into a weird mess, creating bluish blobs on the page and reducing legibility. It took a while for it to do that, so I was already on Chapter 7 before I realized there was an issue and switched pens. I'm sure it's easy to see where that happened, but just to verify, it's on the page with the Noah's Ark illustration. Good news - the lettering will now be much clearer and easier to read, barring any further unforeseen reactions. 

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

As always, you can click the first picture to enlarge it and then scroll through the pages from there. 

Here is the first post, if you'd like to start at the beginning (everything else links forward from there). 

Here is the most recent post (everything links backward, too. Hooray for completism!)

Here is the next post (hello from the future!)

For regular posts and artwork, please follow me on Facebook at  https://www.facebook.com/allsortsofart

The Illuminated Manuscript Project: Genesis, Chapters Five and Six (NIV)

Chapter Five of Genesis is also known as the "begats" section, tracing the family line from Adam to Noah and giving truly wild lifespans to a lot of the line. Chapter Six recounts the great flood, and if you look at the title illumination for "The Flood", you will see that it contains a teeny little flood (as always, just click on the pictures to see them larger). 

Chapter Five:

Chapter Six:

This is the last page of Chapter 6 and a BIG head start on Chapter 7. Stay tuned! 

Here are links to the previous chapters: 

https://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2026/04/the-illuminated-manuscript-project.html

https://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2026/04/the-illuminated-manuscript-project_10.html

I'll publish another installment later and be sure to link it here https://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2026/04/the-illuminated-manuscript-project_25.html

In the meantime, please check out my Facebook page, if you haven't already: https://www.facebook.com/allsortsofart

The Illuminated Manuscript Project: Genesis, Chapters Three and Four (NIV)

In my first post, I explained that I am trying my hand at producing an illuminated manuscript. I am going by the NIV version of the Bible so that I can understand the text more easily in order to make accurate illustrations, and I think it's also easier for other people to read and enjoy. I am not using very expensive materials because this is kind of  a practice for me. I am using the opportunity to work out what works and what doesn't. 

I am producing this manuscript in a hardbound sketchbook, so the paper is not very expensive or heavy. This has caused bleedthrough on some of the pages, so I hope you will take this in the spirit of endeavour and be forgiving. 

Chapter Three

The last line of this page ends with "...you will strike his heel."

Chapter Four

To see any picture enlarged, just click! You can also click on the first picture and scroll through them, which is probably the best way to do this. I'll publish another installment later and be sure to link it here: https://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2026/04/the-illuminated-manuscript-project_16.html

In the meantime, please check out my Facebook page, if you haven't already: https://www.facebook.com/allsortsofart

The Illuminated Manuscript Project: Genesis, Chapters One and Two (NIV)

I have always been interested in illuminated manuscripts, and so I thought I would try my hand at it. Since I have never read the Bible cover to cover and it's a traditional illuminated book, it was my first project.

It's kind of an experiment in what works and what doesn't. For example, the ink I used for lettering on the earlier pages both faded but also discolored the paper, but it is still legible and doesn't seem to have affected the illustrations. As I post further pages, however, you'll notice that sometimes the way I colored the illustrations didn't do them any favors.

I'm just practicing and trying to move forward, so I'll consider this my "comp sketch" in case I want to do a more finished version.

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Just like the monks who copied old manuscripts by hand, I tried to inject a bit of light-heartedness into the illustrations. To see any picture enlarged, just click! You can also click on the first picture and scroll through them, which is probably the best way to do this. I'll publish another installment later and be sure to link it here: https://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2026/04/the-illuminated-manuscript-project_10.html

In the meantime, please check out my Facebook page, if you haven't already: https://www.facebook.com/allsortsofart

Review of Colored Pencils and Drawing Supplies from the Artownlar 72-Piece Art Supply Set

 

So far, I have written about unboxing the Artownlar 72-piece art supply set, which features a large assortment of different kinds of pencils – colored, graphite, charcoal, and watercolor pencils – along with the typical accessories pencils need, like a sharpener, erasers, sanding block, and blending stumps, and a self-wetting brush (the handle can be filled with water) for the watercolor pencils. These supplies are neatly packed in a zippered case and accompanied by a generous pad of paper, which I examined in detail in its own post.

Now that I've given everything a good look, it's time to start using these supplies and see how well they do. I like to do an actual project, rather than just scribbling “test marks”, so for this project, I chose to do a portrait of my late Aunt Myrtha, who was an army nurse in World War II. I had this lovely old photo of her to use for reference. As you can see, it's sepia-toned with a little bit of color added, but I decided to make it full color.

My weapons of choice for this piece would be a graphite pencil for sketching, a pencil sharpener, a kneaded eraser, and colored pencils for the color work. For the paper, I chose one of the tan pages of the provided sketchbook, since the reference photo had that golden undertone. As I mentioned in the sketchbook preview, the tan pages had different textures on each side. The smooth side wouldn't do for a medium like colored pencil, which must be built up in layers for best results, so I chose the side with a noticeable texture (you may need to click the picture to enlarge it).

The provided pencil sharpener was small and simple, but it worked fine on the graphite pencil and the colored pencils. 

There is a nice range of graphite pencils, all the way from 5H to 8B, but I wasn't doing a graphite piece, so I used a 5H for the sketch. If you would like to learn more about the different grades of drawing pencils, I made a blog post that explains it. The harder pencils have less of a tendency to smear, and it's important not to get grey or black pigment mixed into a color portrait – especially in the skin tone. We don't want our subjects to look dead! The pencil worked very nicely for the sketch.

For my eraser, I chose the kneaded eraser, which I prefer over hard erasers. It worked as expected, picking up both the graphite and even the colored pencil, which is usually a little harder to erase.

There are 12 regular and 12 metallic colored pencils in the set. Since I was doing a very traditional portrait, I chose not to use the metallics, this time; I'll save them for another project. The 12 regular colors are very basic, bright colors, but as an experienced artist, it wasn't too difficult to make more subtle and specific hues by layering the colors to blend them. The pencils were very easy to use! They were soft enough to get a pretty satisfactory coverage and blending experience. The paper took the layers of color well, and the portrait came out well, I think. 

I was very pleased with the results. Considering how inexpensive this set is, the Artownlar supplies I've used so far have been a good quality for the money.

Thanks for reading my review! Here are some other reviews of art supplies I've done: 

https://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2023/06/himi-jelly-gouache-color-review-1-sky.html

https://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2023/07/himi-jelly-gouache-color-review-white.html

https://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2023/09/himi-jelly-gouache-color-review-3-pale.html

https://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2024/04/himi-jelly-gouache-color-review-4-jade.html

https://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2025/06/miya-himi-jelly-gouache-color-review-5.html

https://allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2025/07/miya-himi-jelly-gouache-color-review-6.html

For regular shenanigans, please follow my Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/allsortsofart