Review on 🎨 Mungyo Gallery Soft Oil Pastels Set - 48 Assorted Colors by Sasha Hsiao

First of all I have to say that I am satisfied with these pastels. I don't have much experience with oil pastels, but I've been experimenting with a lot of vintage craft items lately, including a large mixed media set. I really liked oil pastels, but I wanted to try something better without much investment. They fit the bill and give me the oil pastel feel I thought I should have expected. From the physical aspects, the packaging appears to be quite sturdy, although the foam that holds it is a little flimsy. I didn't feel the need to put them in a prettier box that said (to me) they were acceptable. Despite the thin foam, they got to me safely. I used to only paint with very cheap oil pastels (I'll compare later) but I tried several brands that were available in the store. I found Sennelier to be comparatively soft, but felt a bit "greasy" when applied compared to Sennelier, which I would describe as "creamy". They're a simple cylindrical shape with no Sennelier bullets (which is fine with me) but it's an obvious difference. I found they didn't crumble much (the cray-pas specialist crumbled more). Overall, I'd say they hold up well against the competition. Next I want to talk about painting and blending. I've tried them on watercolor paper, mixed media paper and pastel paper. The softness of all three makes it easy to apply fairly thick coats. They are simply smoothed to the side with a finger, cloth or stump. They can be layered on top of each other, but trying to layer and then blend them can be tricky: it seems better to just draw the colors from their respective sides, gradually reducing them toward each other, and then smoothing them perpendicular to them Gradient. They worked well for sgraffito and all common oil pastel techniques. The colors are definitely bold, but there are a few areas where I felt they were lacking as I couldn't find a really strong base red. Still, I wasn't disappointed and doubt it will put me off. In terms of price, I would like to compare it with a cheap set that I have tried before. It was a very cheap set of 36 from a retail store. A small measurement tells me they have about 2x the volume (i.e. deliver 2x more material). With that in mind, this is 2x the price per volume (compared to the absolute bottom of the line) and about 1/4 the price of Senellier. Compared to that cheap set which I used to find awful, waxy and flaky when applied with weak colors and difficult to blend, they are definitely a lot cheaper. Compared to the Sennelier they are definitely not as pigmented, smooth or elegantly shaped, but for a beginner I doubt the difference will be that noticeable: for a beginner/student they are probably more beneficial. Overall I'm very happy with how these work. I definitely don't feel like the media is limiting me anymore so I can work on improving my skills. If you're looking for an introduction to oil pastels I'd say you can't go wrong with this set.