Sharpie Marker vs Oil-Based Paint Pen vs Water-Based Paint Pen | This or That DIY

Hi, welcome to the Woods fans. It's Melissa Woods. Welcome to my new series, This or That. In these videos, we're going to be comparing a couple similar products to figure out what one is best in what application for what purposes. So the first one is Sharpie paint pens, and I'm so excited to do this one because I am very familiar with Sharpies. In the past, I've made a lot of wood signs and I love to do hand lettering with different Sharpies, but I often get the question, when should I be using a water-based paint pen Sharpie? When should I be using an oil-based paint pen Sharpie? And why can't I just use a regular permanent marker Sharpie? So I'm going to be answering all those questions and comparing these different tools in this video. So I hope you guys learn something and that you'll share if this is of interest to you. The first question that I want to answer is why would you use a paint pen Sharpie over a regular? Well, the paint pens have actual paint in them. Regular Sharpies are a marker with ink. They can go onto almost any surface, certainly any surface that a regular Sharpie could be used. Regular Sharpies are mostly meant to write on paper. There are only a few circumstances I would reach for a regular Sharpie over a paint pen. One of them is when I made this sock bunny because regular Sharpies tend to bleed less on fabric than paint pen Sharpies do. Another is when I'm labeling on paper or cardstock simply because the regular Sharpie dries faster. This is also true for like plastic Ziploc bags if you're organizing. You would not want to use a regular Sharpie for writing on a wood sign. I write on wood signs a lot and the first time I ever hand lettered on a wood sign, I made one with my blog name, Welcome to the Woods, I tried to use regular Sharpie. I think I used like 10 or 11 markers because after a little while the Sharpie would dry up and stop writing. I don't know why this happens and Google won't tell me either, but it happens every time I've tried it. So stay away from using regular Sharpies on like painted wood or wood signs. There is a better way. Now let's talk about the paint pen versions and the difference between a water-based Sharpie versus an oil-based Sharpie. I'll start with water-based. The first instance in which I would use a water-based Sharpie over an oil-based is writing on this glass ho-ho-ho display that I did for Christmas. I wanted to write in a medium that I could later remove with Windex, so the water-based was less permanent. An oil-based marker would also write perfectly well on glass, but it would be harder to come off. Sharpie water-based paint pens also work well on fully painted surfaces like these painted white wood signs. The paint should be latex, in other words, water-based, and fully dry. An instance that water-based Sharpies don't work well for is writing on wood pieces. The paint absorbs into the wood pores and it can bleed. It also takes multiple, multiple coats to achieve opacity, like you can see here on my DIY clock. I'm writing with a light silver water-based Sharpie and it's just not going well. Oil-based Sharpies, on the other hand, only need two coats of paint to achieve opacity on wood surfaces, as you can see on my Minnesota sign craft. Especially on stained wood, I would choose an oil-based Sharpie because often stains are oil-based, and I want to make sure the Sharpie adheres to what I'm writing on. I choose oil-based Sharpies for projects that are going to be outside for the added durability. My plastic mailbox, for instance, was a great project that I hand-lettered with an oil-based Sharpie. They're perfect for painting rocks, outdoor signs, or decorating planters. Really anything where you want lasting performance against the elements. I also used oil-based Sharpie to hand-letter coasters out of these vinyl flooring samples. The vinyl flooring is a form of plastic, but I wasn't sure what would work best. Oil-based Sharpies adhere to the plastic and won't fade when water from condensation gets on the writing. They have amazing flow and opacity, as you can see in this hand-lettered sign I made last spring for my son's teacher as a gift. Light letters, like white, show up the best when you are using oil-based because oil-based is thicker than water-based, and sits on top of porous surfaces like wood. All in all, oil-based Sharpies are the most durable, opaque, and versatile of all the Sharpie options, so I use them the most. There you go, guys! Now you know a little bit more about Sharpies, why I like to use the different kinds for different projects, and their applications. Let me know in the comments below which one you're going to buy for your projects. Thanks for tuning in this week on This or That with Welcome to the Woods. We'll catch you again next time. Bye!