Caran d’Ache Supracolor coloured pencils – a closer look

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The Caran d’Ache Supracolor watercolour coloured pencil range has the same colours as the oil-based Caran d’Ache Pablo coloured pencil range.

However, while the colours are the same, when drawn on a white paper swatch, the Supracolor colours can vary from the Pablo colours. Particularly so when water is added to the Supracolor swatch, which provides vibrant colour.

You can see the colours of the Pablo range that were outlined in an earlier blog post.

Check out this course by artist Carole Massey if you want to find out how to use watercolour pencils.

Also, the Caran d’Ache video below shows how you can use these two pencil types.

How this post can help you

Like that earlier Pablo coloured pencil post, this post will help you save your time and energy. It will show you what colour family colours and neutral colours are included in the Supracolor coloured pencil range. This range of pencils, along with the Caran d’Ache Pablo coloured pencil range are amongst my favourite pencils.

Read to the bottom of the post. You can have an even closer look at the Supracolor colours. Sort and search the colour pencil swatches in an interactive colour chart.

Caran d’Ache Supracolor Aquarelle coloured pencils

This post has images which includes the colour name, number and lightfast rating of each pencil. It also provides a colour swatch for each pencil in the range.

The chart below shows all the colours in the range (including the colour wheel family colours, neutrals and metallic). They are shown clockwise.

The bar chart below represents 120 pencils. 20 are neutral, 2 are metallic, and 98 are colours that belong to the colour wheel colour families.

Please note that the metallic pencil colour Bronze is a red-orange colour when drawn on a white paper swatch. Therefore, it is included in the red-orange colour family. You can refer to this disclaimer to see how the analysis was done to decide on colour pencil colours.

The colour wheel colours

The 12 colour wheel family colours available in the set are shown clockwise below:

The Colour Wheel Clock

The colour wheel moves clock-wise around the wheel. The table below shows the colour family positions on the clock.

Of the colour wheel colours, the make up of each is outlined below. While the colours are of varying shades and tones, the predominant base colour belongs to the colour wheel family in which it has been placed.

Red – 12 o’clock

Starting with red at the 12.00 o’clock position, the image below shows that the coloured pencil set of 120 includes 4 red colour family pencils.

Red-Orange – 1.00 o’clock

The next colour family group is red-orange at 1.00 o’clock. This shows that the coloured pencil set of 120 includes 12 red-orange colour family pencils. Please note that this group includes one metallic pencil Bronze. This is because the colour swatch showed it to belong to the red-orange family and not a metallic colour family.

Orange – 2.00 o’clock

The next colour is orange at 2.00 o’clock. The coloured pencil set of 120 includes 5 orange colour family pencils.

Orange-Yellow – 3.00 o’clock

Orange-Yellow sits at the 3.00 o’clock position. The image below shows that the coloured pencil set of 120 includes 9 orange-yellow colour family pencils.

Yellow – 4.00 o’clock

At 4.00 o’clock sits Yellow. The coloured pencil set of 120 includes 6 yellow colour family pencils.

Yellow-Green – 5.00 o’clock

Yellow-Green sits at 5.00 o’clock. the image below shows that the coloured pencil set of 120 includes 13 yellow-green colour family pencils.

Green – 6.00 o’clock

The colour family of green sits at 6.00 o’clock. The coloured pencil set of 120 includes 10 green colour family pencils.

Green-blue – 7.00 o’clock

Green-blue sits at the 7.00 o’clock position. The image below shows that the coloured pencil set of 120 includes 8 green-blue colour family pencils.

Blue – 8.00 o’clock

Blue is at the 8.00 o’clock position. The coloured pencil set of 120 includes 11 blue colour family pencils.

Blue-Violet – 9.00 o’clock

Blue-violet sits at 9.00 o’clock. the image below shows that the coloured pencil set of 120 includes 4 blue-violet colour family pencils.

Violet – 10.00 o’clock

Violet sits at the 10.00 o’clock position. The image below shows that the coloured pencil set of 120 includes 10 violet colour family pencils.

Violet-Red – 11.00 o’clock

Violet-Red sits at the 11.00 o’clock position. The coloured pencil set of 120 includes 6 violet-red colour wheel colour family colours.

Colour wheel colour family – Summary

As you can see from the above images, the Caran d’Ache Supracolor Coloured pencil range has pencils in all the colour family colours. Additionally, like the oil-based Caran d’Ache Pablo coloured pencil range, the yellow-green, violet, red-orange, green and blue colour families have 10 or more pencils in each colour family (see bar chart below).

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Neutral Colours

Of the set of 120 coloured pencils – 20 are neutral, and 2 are metallic. These are shown clockwise in the image below.

The breakdown of these pencils are as follows. First there are the 2 metallic colours. Please note that the metallic pencil Bronze, is included in the red-orange colour group.

Next are the 2 neutral-black pencils.

Next is neutral-warm grey with 1 pencil.

Next is neutral-warm brown with 1 pencil.

Neutral-warm beige follows with 2 pencils.

Neutral-cool grey follows with 8 pencils.

Neutral-cool brown has 2 pencils.

Neutral-cool beige has 3 pencils.

Finally, white is the final neutral colour with 1 pencil.

The bar chart below shows the breakdown of the set’s neutral and metallic colours.

As you can see, the Caran d’Ache Supracolor coloured pencil set and range is made up of a variety of colours and neutrals.

As noted above, the selection is subjective and the reviewer has chosen colour by looking at the actual physical coloured pencil swatches. Nevertheless, you may find that particular colours belong in different groups or colour families.

Lightfastness

Of the 120 set of coloured pencils, 7 have the lowest lightfast rating of *, 68 coloured pencils have a lightfast rating of **, and 45 have the highest lightfast rating of ***.

Make your own colour chart

For your knowledge, it’s advisable to draw up your own colour chart so you can get to know the actual colours of your coloured pencils. You will then see how your pencil perfoms on the papers that you use for your drawings.

However, it takes a long time to make your own chart, and it’s usually something we don’t get around to doing.

If you’ve made your own charts – that’s great. But – as is practical, you might also have your charts in one physical place while you draw in another. You need to have access to the colours where you are – hopefully you’ll be there with internet access and your mobile device.

Interactive Supracolor colour chart

To help you with this, the colour charts used in this post were rearraged into a sortable and searchable format. The Supracolor set of 120 is outlined in the interactive colour chart below. This should help you choose your Caran d’Ache Supracolor coloured pencil colours. It will also help you get a better understanding of what pencils are available in the Caran d’Ache Supracolor aquarelle coloured pencil range.

Caran d’Ache Supracolor colour chart

The lightfast ratings for the Caran d’Ache Supracolor aquarelle coloured pencils are:

1 = *, 2 = ** and 3 = ***

The search button on the right hand side above the table is the global search button and it searches all columns within the table. The search bar above each column searches for information within that column.

When searching for information, first use the global search button. Then use the column searches to refine your search.

Please note that the single colours have a full stop ‘.’ at the end of their name. (This is to isolate them from the colour families with duplicate data).

Hint: Remove all data from the search boxes to return to the full colour chart.

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