Comments about Caran d'Ache Neopastel Sets:

I have purchased a 12,24, and two 48 piece sets of these Oil Pastels. They are incredible and very vivid. Each color is amazing, and they work very well with the following:
Pastel, Oil Crayon, Colored Pencil, Water Color, Water Color Pencil, and Graphite pencil work. This is a very nice product and I will continue to buy more. As far as lightfastness goes, my work has maintained it's vividness very nicely. I haven't had an issue with these oil pastels not being light fast.

Comments about Caran d'Ache Neopastels:

Neopastels are fun to use and blend wonderfully. However, be aware that Caran d'Ache rates several of their Neopastel colors as three stars (supposedly lightfast) despite the fact that they contain known fugitive (fading) pigments such as PY1, PG8, & PR48. If you care about the longevity of your work or especially if you do artwork for sale, be sure to do your homework and buy only the colors that have lightfast pigments. I would love to see this company replace the fugitive pigments with lightfast ones. It's otherwise a great product.

Comments about Caran d'Ache Neopastels:

I love oil pastels, and use many brands. My current favorites are Holbein, but these are just as good in quality and ease of use. Holbeins get a slight boost from not having labels, and for having such a huge range of tints. My only dislike with Neopastel is the labels, which are tedious to peel. But really, that's a quibble. These are great oil pastels at a reasonable price.

What I use them for: full color paintings on paper.

What I like: large color range, most colors blend easily, velvety texture is not too soft or hard for my taste, easy to build up layers of color, can work light over dark (with practice), good lightfastness, available in open stock

What I don't like : labels are hard to peel. Hey, Caran D'
Ache, why don't you use the same easy-peel labels as the ones on the Neocolor crayons??

Bottom line: fine product, highly recommend!!

Comments about Caran d'Ache Neopastel Sets:

These pastels are oil pastels....not powdery, but spread beautifully. The colors are as usual with Caran d'Ache products really beautiful....a great selection with the 48 colors. I use them to work on black paper and then photograph what I have done and bring the digitized image into my computer and further work and make collages.

Comments about Caran d'Ache Neopastels:

I love these much more than Sennelier. Yes, Sennelier are somehow softer, more slippery, but Caran d'Ache are much more saturated with color, pigment loading is much higher. They are less oily and leave not any oily traces on paper. Love this brand of oil pastel.

Comments about Caran d'Ache Neopastels:

Neopastels are beautiful oil pastels. They are not as soft as Senneliers, but this is an advantage in being able to layer OPs and achieve detail. Each brand has its advantages and disadvantages, and many oil pastel artists use a combination of brands. The Neopastels are known for their pure and vibrant colour, their creaminess, and lightfastness. The Sennelier full set has quite a number of transparent colours, which in turn have their own uses, but can be a little annoying when trying to layer. In contrast to this, the Neopastels are all opaque and cover well. If I had my time over, I would have bought a full set of Neopastels first, then supplemented with Senneliers, rather than the other way around. However, each artist has their preference, and the softness of OPs such as Sennelier can be more difficult to control in warmer climates, which may be why I prefer the handling of the Neopastels. The quality of these OPs is superb.

Comments about Caran d'Ache Neopastels:

While the texture of these pastels is different from Sennelier, there are times when I prefer these. It just depends on what kind of mark you need at the moment. Also they provide a different set of colors than Sennelier and that is often useful, the Caran d'Ache pastels tend to be lighter and brighter. I use both. Also, the pigments are much more light fast than a student grade product.

Comments about Caran d'Ache Neopastels:

These oil pastels are a bit waxy and not nearly as creamy and easy to work with as the Sennelier brand. They should probably be listed as student grade. They come in a nice box and the colors are nicely identified and they work - but I will probably not buy them again.