Friday, August 3, 2012

Tool Report: Nomadic PN-91 Sketch Kit Case

The PN-91 Top Open Pencil Case is one member of a family of useful and well-designed sketch cases made by Nomadic. This model has a deep mesh pocket in the top and an interior hinged flap with five elastic pen slots. The bottom compartment dimensions are about 7-3/4" x 3-1/4" x 1" deep. There is a dorky little pocket at the top of the main bottom compartment, but thankfully it does not interfere much. And can even hold a handy eraser, as you can see.

Here it is with 14 Caran d'Ache Supracolor watercolor pencils in the bottom compartment, 4 pens in the central flap, and two waterbrushes and a retractable X-acto in the left hand mesh pocket. It can easily hold twice that number of pencils (or pens or whatever) in the bottom compartment. If you are so inclined.

PROS:
-- Nice deep mesh pocket on the left and good sturdy elasticized slots for pens on the flap.
-- Well-made and padded throughout.
-- Can distend to accommodate stuff slightly bigger than the "resting" interior dimensions. See pic below showing my 8-1/4" long x 1/2" thick watercolor box all alone in the bottom compartment. It will zip closed with that in it!
-- Weighs nearly nothing empty.

CONS:
-- The innermost elasticized slot on the central flap is practically useless, because if you put a pen in it, it won't stay flipped over to the left.
--It's not inexpensive.

Possible Modifications and Customizations:
-- Add another strip of elastic slots to the backside of the central flap. This would hold oft-used pens up out of the bottom compartment. But it would diminish the capacity of the bottom compartment.
-- Add an elastic strip to the bottom compartment, across the full width of the compartment. This would hold all the pencils more snugly in the lower compartment. The pencils tend to roam around inside the case.

BOTTOM LINE: I like this case! It feels good in the hand, the neon green is a nifty color, and the interior layout and dimensions suit me.

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