Colored Pencil Review: Qili QL-150 Artist's Pencil 150 Colors

Qili QL-150 Artist's Pencil

I had the Qili QL-150 Artist's Pencil 150 Color set on my Amazon shopping list for over a year before I finally took the plunge. They're not widely talked about, but every now and again, I'd come across a picture in one of my coloring groups, either on Facebook or Reddit, that had been done with these pencils. And when I asked about them, I'd get one of two rather extreme reactions from the artist. Either they'd rave about them, telling me that they were the best pencils they've ever used. Or else they'd rant, telling me they were terrible, awful, waxy monstrosities and they wished they'd never bought them. It was never anything in between.

I finally decided to roll the dice. I'm a sucker for a bargain, and there was a 10% off coupon on Amazon, so I figured, "What the hell." There had been more raves than rants and, in all honesty, a lot of the work I'd seen in my groups that was attributed to Qili pencils was really nice. At $29.90 for 150 pencils, it was worth the risk.

The pencils arrived decently packaged (for Amazon) in a box that was not extremely oversized, although it was too large for the box of pencils, which was free to slide around inside. There was no padding to keep the pencils from being banged up during shipping. That is the fault of the seller, in this case HongliUS through Amazon, and not the manufacturer. 

Upon opening the outer box, I discovered no damage to the actual box of pencils. The box is sturdy cardboard, with very pretty artwork as you can see in the picture at the top of the post. The lid is not hinged, and lifts off with ease. It doesn't appear that it will rip easily, although time will tell.

Inside, on top of the first tray of pencils, there is a thin foam pad. This is to provide some protection against breakage during shipping, as well as to absorb some of the chemical odor that emanates from most Chinese pencils. It doesn't work too well for that purpose, at least not with these pencils. The odor wasn't overwhelming to me, but it was there. I don't have a particularly sensitive sense of smell, and art supply smells don't bother me. I'm used to working around things like oil paints, turpentine and other thinners, and other chemicals, so the minor smells that people talk about coming from colored pencils have never been something I'd even noticed until I joined Facebook, but if that's something that bothers you, I would suggest taking the lid off these pencils, separating the trays, and letting them sit for half an hour. The smell isn't overpowering, but again, it's there.

Top Row

There are three rows of pencils; on the top row there are two slots with small hand-held pencil sharpeners. Not the greatest, but you can use them for eyeliner if that's your thing. I wouldn't use them for colored pencils. The pencils come in a reasonable order, although I wound up rearranging them to my liking, which I always do and most others do as well. I prefer my pencils in color family order, and then separated within color family order. I'm weird like that.

The trays themselves are very sturdy plastic, with perforated cardboard handles for lifting out of the box. Due to space limitations, I usually prefer to keep my pencils in cases, especially large sets like this. But the packaging in this set makes it feasible to keep the pencils in the original box, although I'm not sure how long the paper handles would hold up to repeated use. The plastic trays are definitely sturdy enough.

Handles for Lifting

Okay, now to performance. Normally, I swatch a set before I review them, but I wanted to get this post up so I decided to skip that part. I promise to do a swatch page with blending and layering, and I will do a separate post. 

When I first looked at these pencils, I have to admit, my soul died a little. I took one out, scribbled in a sketch book, and a voice in my head whispered, "Sudee Stile." I bought a set of those back in 2017. It was the first "big" set of "good" hobby pencils I had ever purchased, and they were a huge disappointment to me. I don't know if it's an entirely fair assessment, though. I was used to Prismacolor. I got those pencils and I expected them to act like Prismacolors. When I got less pigment than Crayola, I was pissed.

Anyway, these pencils look just like Sudee Stile, right down to the grey barrel.They feel extremely light in your hand. They're pretty, but they have no weight to them. The entire barrel is grey; the end is dipped in a color that does not match the core (Again, I will swatch and I will make a post). Written on the barrel is Artist Color Pencil along with NO: followed by the color number. There are no color names. So, swatch these before you start coloring, or have a sheet of paper next to you so you can see the color before you put it to your picture. The core does NOT look the same on paper as it does on the pencil and it certainly doesn't match the end cap.

My first caveat: sharpen these pencils before you use them. I would say that about all colored pencils. They usually have some kind of film covering them to protect the core during shipping. But these pencils are all but unusable until you sharpen them. When I picked up that first pencil and tried to color a box with it, I almost cried. I was pushing hard and getting almost no pigment. However, once I sharpened, it got better.

I chose a picture from Coloring Bliss, printed on Neenah 94 Bright White 110 lb Index card stock (199 g/m^2). I laid down extremely light layers. I mean, really light. And this paper takes a lot of layers. The problem is, these pencils only give so much pigment. Here's an example of light pressure to super hard pressure:

That's one of the darkest purples. And while you can't really see it in the picture, there's a huge amount of bloom even on the lightest pressure. It's a chore to add layers with these pencils. I found myself going in with a cotton swab to rub off the wax bloom, as well as working over them with a colorless blender during the coloring process far more than I normally would just so that I could get other colors over the top.

I didn't finish the picture I started. Here's what I managed after 3 hours.

That's 6 layers of pencil, using a blender pencil and Gamsol during the process, so not even an accurate representation of the pencils on their own merit. I found myself getting frustrated with the pencils, having to really push to get the colors to blend, and if I'm fighting with my pencils, I'm not going to keep going.

I wanted to love these pencils, I really did. The thing is, some of them are great. Several of the pinks, some of the yellows, the blues, a couple of the violet purples, all good. But they're inconsistent. Some of them are SO waxy it's almost like using a cheap crayon. 

On further investigation, I've seen other Qili pencils (aside from the watercolor pencils) in different packaging. Perhaps those are the pencils that created the beautiful artwork that made me want to try these pencils. Or, maybe I just had an off day and didn't give these a fair shake. I will do a full swatch chart and blend test and do a second post, just to be 100% fair. But if you're looking for a quality hobby set to make your coloring more enjoyable, this ain't it, sis.

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Picture from Coloring Bliss

Qili 150 Colored Pencils on Amazon