I’ve become addicted to this style of brush and my collection just keeps getting larger and larger. I started off using with water inside and then using with my half pan watscolots, but then I began using ink and found these are so cool to fill with ink. They keep everything from drying out and you can just dip in a bit of water to get the correct shade. This set has synthetic fibers, but are pretty soft. They are nice for student artists who are learning the type of painting they will follow. These had only a few hairs out of place. I just cut them off, don’t pull out..