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Ohuhu is a brand of art materials that I really appreciate because they have products that are comparable to the really good but expensive ones but much cheaper. They're economically priced but - in terms of quality - they're not cheap. 

I bought a set of 60 water-based Ohuhu markers, that are double ended ￫ one end is a brush tip and one end is a fineliner, both of which I really like. The brush tip - because the markers are water based - is a bit like using watercolour paints, which is something I find very appealing, and the fineliners are really good fineliners, which are nearly always very expensive for good ones. I like using both. I also bought a specially made Ohuhu marker sketchbook. I was so pleased with the sketchbook because of how huge it is. It was delivered in this big box....I'm sure they could have actually fitted the markers and the sketchbook in a smaller box, anyway, but, the sketchbook is huge. It's A4 size, which is a big page size, but it's also really thick and heavy. 

Ohuhu just radiates quality....they give you really good quality storage containers, they have extra little touches like perforated pages - so you can actually remove an artwork if you want to (but the perforating isn't so pervasive that the page comes away really easy), they give you a plastic sheet to use so the colours don't bleed on to another page or your desktop, and they have extra little touches like replacement nibs, book marks in their sketchbooks, complimentary swatch sheets, etc etc etc

Just to give you an idea of the price difference, a set of 72 copic markers (which are like the industry standard, kind of like how photoshop is the industry standard for digital graphic design) which are alcohol based and have a fine tip on one side and a chisel tip on the other side, costs AU$443.99. That's just over $6 a marker. A set of 60 Ohuhu markers of basically the same type - alcohol based with a fine point on one end and chisel tip on the other - costs $44.99. 160 of the same kind of Ohuhu costs $110.99. That's around $0.70 per marker. and these are not 'dollar shop' quality (not that you can't get perfectly and surprisingly good art supplies from dollar shops). 

It makes me think of the situation with photoshop. You can't buy photoshop outright any more - you have to subscribe. If you want all the apps, it's AU$58.29 a month, or if you just want basic photoshop or illustrator they are $29.99 each a month. So, if you're doing a variety of things it's worth getting all the apps. But there are many other examples of software that, on their own, or in combination, you can use to do pretty much everything photoshop can do and they are much cheaper and, in some cases, free - paint tool sai (one off payment of AU$61, fire alpaca (free), Krita (free), Blender (free), gimp (free), clip studio paint (one off payment of $50), inkscape (free), Autodesk sketchbook (free). 

The different softwares are more suited to certain purposes. Gimp is more about editing photos, Krita is more for actual art, Inkscape is for illustrating, clip studio paint is for art generally but specially good for creating manga (it used to be called manga studio). Blender is probably the most complicated and difficult to use but it's also the most powerful. It's been used for special effects and CGI in movies (e.g. Spider Man 2) and TV shows, NASA uses it to create 3D models and it even plays a role in operating the rover, it's used in commercial computer games, for ads, and animated TV shows and films, so, in other words, it's professional standard. 

so, about both Copics and Photoshop, I would say, unless you're a professional designer or artist, you'd be much better off using the alternatives. Animation is a good example. Most digital art software programs allow you to do animation now. You can animate in Krita, Fire Alpaca, clip studio, and of course Blender, and maybe others as well (I'm not sure) but to animate in photoshop, you have to subscribe to the animation app (for AU$29.99 per month) or all the apps. 

Of course, if I was a professional designer, artist, animator or anything of that sort, I would definitely buy Copics and subscribe to the whole suite of Photoshop apps. It's worth it in that context, because these things really are better, and if you're earning good money for your creative work, the monthly subscription for photoshop represents just a couple of hours of work...same principle with Copics, and actually the same applies to all art supplies. There's a huge difference in the price of paints, but if you're a professional artist, you need to use the really good quality paints that will hold their colour over time and not degrade. 

From Ohuhu, you can buy a set of 24 x 12 ml tubes of acrylic paint, 6 brushes, and a canvas, for just AU$23.99! 

But what about the good stuff....Winsor and Newton has one of those water colour sets where the paint is in solid form and you add water - for 24 colours it's $214.84. One paintbrush costs $17.48. A pad of water colour paper with 20 sheets costs $49.75. A single 5 ml tube of Aqua Green watercolour paint costs $21.29. 200 ml tubes of oil paint are around $40 a tube. On the other hand, for $29.95, from Meeden, you can get a set of 48 different coloured acrylic paints. 

so it's interesting. someone once gave me a couple of expensive brushes and 3 small tubes of the more expensive watercolour paint, as a gift. I was used to using the acrylics and watercolours that come in packs of 12 for around $15. I wasn't able to really appreciate the difference. but then, I was never really very good at proper water colour painting. one kind of art supplies that I have noticed the difference in quality of the more expensive ones though, is coloured pencils. 

I was sceptical, but I wanted to try out prismacolor pencils to see what the fuss was about, and yes, they are substantively better even than the less expensive artists pencils. They're really good. Like any strength, it comes with a corresponding weakness though // because the core is quite soft, if you sharpen the pencil and then press down hard, it tends to break. speaking of pencil sharpening, I never would have believed this until I experienced it, but the better quality pencil sharpeners are much better than the cheaper ones. You don't notice until you use a good one. 

There's (arguably) an even better coloured pencil than the prismacolor though - the faber-castell polychromos. They're oil based, not wax based like prismacolor, so they won't have that weakness of breaking and they will be good for rendering details. Prismacolors are kind of soft and creamy, so they're a bit better at blending and (apparently) the colours are more vibrant. 

and here's an important point....as I mentioned earlier, if you want to actually sell your art, you need it to hold its colour over time, and prismacolors don't (according to a review I listened to). 

the reason I've been resisting buying polychromos is the price. Polychromos is the pencil equivalent of the Winsor and Newton paints. Prismacolor are $94.27 for 72 pencils, and polychromos are $289.95 for 72. I'll probably buy the 12 pack for $30.99 at some stage.