The Faber Castell Polychromos coloured pencil range holds 120 pencils. Do you want to know more about the colours included in this range?
You have limited time and energy, yet you want to thoroughly know your coloured pencils. You know it will take time to make colour charts and to sort your pencils according to lightfastness and type.
This post will help you save your time and your energy. It will show you what colour family colours and neutral colours are included in the Faber Castell Polychromos coloured pencil range.
Read to the bottom of the post to have an even closer look at the Polychromos coloured pencils. You can sort and search the pencil colours, colour families, pencil names, pencil numbers and lightfast ratings in an interactive colour chart.
Join our mailing list and get access to an interactive colour chart showing all these pencils in colour wheel family order.
Deeper analysis
An earlier blog post explored the question which are the better coloured pencils and looked at four artist coloured pencil sets. Two were wax-based and two were oil-based. However, the analysis was limited to looking at four pencils in each colour wheel colour family.
It was further limited in that some coloured pencil brands had fewer – or more – than four pencils in a colour family when grouped by lightfastness.
You can access the colour pencil type and lightfastness comparison analysis by clicking the button below. The chart will help you to follow when we look closer at the individual coloured pencil sets.
Over the next few posts, we’ll explore each of the sets. Read this disclaimer about the analysis.
These are the wax-based Caran d’Ache Luminance 76 and Prismacolor Premier 150; and the oil-based Faber-Castell Polychromos 120 and Caran d’Ache Pablo 120.
Let’s start….
This is the second set of coloured pencils we will review. The first set we explored was the wax-based Caran d’Ache Luminance coloured pencil set of 76. Like the Caran d’Ache Luminance set, the oil-based Faber Castell Polychromos set of 120 represents the whole range of Polychromos coloured pencils.
Faber Castell Polychromos Coloured Pencils
This post has images that includes the colour name, lightfast rating together with a colour swatch for each pencil in the range.
When looking at the set as a whole, all colours (including in the colour wheel family colours, neutrals and metallics) are shown clockwise in the chart below.
The charts represents a total of 120 pencils, of which 20 are neutral, 3 are metallic, and 97 are colours that belong to colour wheel families.
Now to get a closer look, let’s separate these colours into two groups – the colour wheel colours, and the neutral 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.
| Clock Position | Colour Family |
|---|---|
| 12.00 | Red |
| 1.00 | Red-Orange |
| 2.00 | Orange |
| 3.00 | Orange-Yellow |
| 4.00 | Yellow |
| 5.00 | Yellow-Green |
| 6.00 | Green |
| 7.00 | Green-Blue |
| 8.00 | Blue |
| 9.00 | Indigo (Blue-Violet) |
| 10.00 | Violet |
| 11.00 | Violet-Red |
Of the colour wheel colours, the make up of each colour family 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 5 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 6 red-orange colour family pencils.
Orange – 2.00 o’clock
Next colour is orange at 2.00 o’clock. The coloured pencil set of 120 includes 4 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 10 orange-yellow colour family pencils.
Yellow – 4.00 o’clock
At 4.00 o’clock sits Yellow. The coloured pencil set of 120 includes 7 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 6 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 12 green colour family pencils.
Green-blue – 7.00 o’clock
Green-blue is at 7.00 o’clock. The image below shows that the coloured pencil set of 120 includes 6 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 10 blue colour family pencils.
Indigo – 9.00 o’clock
Indigo sits at the 9.00 o’clock position. The image below shows that the coloured pencil set of 120 includes 5 indigo (or 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 11 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 15 violet-red colour family pencils.
Colour wheel colour family – Summary
As you can see from the above images, the Faber Castell Polychromos coloured pencil range has pencils in all the colour family colours. Additionally, the violet-red, violet, orange-yellow, green and blue colour families have 10 or more pencils in each colour family. (see line chart below).
Let’s now look at the neutral and metallic colours included in the Faber Castell Polychromos coloured pencil range.
Neutral Colours
Of the set of 120 coloured pencils – 20 are neutral, and 3 are metallic. These are shown clockwise in the image below.
The breakdown of these pencils are as follows. First there are the 3 metallic colours.
Next are the 2 neutral-black pencils.
Next is neutral-brown with 1 pencil.
Next is neutral-cool beige with 3 pencils.
Neutral Cool-grey follows with 6 pencils.
Warm-beige follows with 1 pencil.
Warm-grey has 6 pencils.
White is the final neutral colour of 1 pencil.
The bar chart below shows the breakdown of the set’s neutral and metallic colours.
As you can see, the Faber Castell Polychromos coloured pencil set and range is made up of a variety of colours and neutrals.
As noted above, the selection of colour is subjective and the reviewer has chosen colour by looking at the actual coloured pencil swatches. Nevertheless, you may find that particular colours belong in different groups or families.
An almost complete lightfast set of pencils
Of the 120 set of coloured pencils, two pencils have the lowest lightfast rating of *, 16 coloured pencils have a lightfast rating of **, and 102 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 be able to see how your pencil performs on the papers that you use for your drawings.
However, it takes a long time to make your own chart, and it usually is something that 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.
Polychromos interactive colour chart
To help you with this, the colour charts used in this post were rearranged into a sortable and searchable format in an interactive colour chart below. This should help you choose your Faber Castell Polychromos coloured pencil colours. It will also help you get a better understanding of what pencils are available in the Faber Castell Polychromos coloured pencil range. Click the button below to access the Faber Castell Polychromos interactive colour chart.
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