Review on 📔 Strathmore 480-5 Softcover Art Journal, 5.5x8 inches, White, 80 Pages by Doris Tran

I really like this album as it's easy to take anywhere with minimal tools. I use it for drawing and I hope to be able to fit most of my drawings into a book in 2017. This is part of my plan to paint more often, more easily and spontaneously. For that, this book is GREAT. I agree that there are MUCH better magazines out there: check out Apica if writing is your thing (their paper is like butter!) or Stillman and Byrne if you want to combine writing/drawing/painting. I have everything! In total I have over 20 brands of sketchbooks/toilet albums/diary entries. Let's just say I have a "collection". I only use it on dry materials and have other albums for wet materials. In my experience, if you're working on location, you should still carry 2-3 sketchbooks with you, even if you're traveling light. I like to carry around a simple/flexible book (this one) to sketch my first impressions, sketches and quick research; and 1-2 watercolor sketchbooks depending on how long I'll be gone. As a dry S/B medium, it is lightweight, easy to open in place (bound books are often not as good), compact (not just paper, but the whole BOOK is of the stated dimensions; each piece of the dimensions is a paper Strathmore is cleverly shrunk, each side measuring 1/4 inch so it fits easily in a range of tote bags). He can do it because he doesn't have a clumsy shell on it. The paper size does not suffer from this. It behaves like a classic moleskein, but I like the quality a bit better. I think these sketchbooks use 400 or 500 series paper. It's easy to estimate their stock by standardizing different papers. If you just want a sketchbook that you can easily take with you, you should seriously consider this.