Review: Fluid Watercolor Paper (coldpress 300gsm)

Big thanks to whoever sent me this a year ago. Yeah, I only go to using it now.

Fluid watercolour paper is made by manufacturer Global Art Materials, the same company that makes many other art products.

Fluid watercolour paper comes in two version, the cellulose 300gsm Fluid Easy-Block and the 100% cotton version called Fluid 100. The one I'm reviewing is the cellulose version.

The Easy-Block is glued at the top and bottom.

This is the pen and ink watercolour sketch I drew on the paper. You can view the 1600px version here.

I used wet on wet technique for the sky to test how the paint would move. The paint was able to spread out softly, which is great. Ink works well on this paper. Ink doesn't feather and edges are sharp.

Here I tried to charge the red into the yellow while it's still wet. Colours do diffuse but they do not diffuse as easily as on 100% cotton paper. This is pretty satisfactory in my opinion as cellulose paper. There are watercolour paper where the paint just won't move much on wet surface.

The coldpress texture is quite similar to fine grain cartridge drawing paper. Perhaps a bit smoother, but definitely not as sandy like those on Arches or Fabriano 100% cotton watercolour paper.

Pencil works nicely on the paper too.

Pay attention to how the colours diffuse into one another here.

You can achieve colour blends and gradations on this paper. It's easier compared to other cellulose paper I've used.

Overall, this watercolour paper performs well as cellulose paper and in its price range. I like drawing it with pen and ink. I enjoyed painting watercolour with it. It's able to handle a few glazes but I won't want to go above three. The paper surface isn't rough enough to handle so many glazes.

The paper is sufficiently white and colours appear to vibrant on it. It's a good paper to create colour swatches on, or just to paint on.

The 300gsm paper weight and glue at the top and bottom prevents the paper from buckling. And even though I've stored the paper for more than a year, there's no visible yellowing, and the sizing is still intact. The paper is acid-free and said to be archival quality.

Fluid watercolour paper comes in the usual watercolour paper sizes and there are square formats as well, which is sort of usual but I like it.

This paper is worth the money and I can recommend it easily to any watercolour beginners.

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