Hello! My name is Siren Song and my owner and I like to roam the help chat board. There are all sorts of questions that pop up but hardly a day goes by without someone asking about paint brushes. If users aren't wondering where paint brushes come from then they're asking how much their favorites cost or what can be bought with their budget. It wasn't too long before I tired of flying from the Marketplace to the Trading Post and then back the HC. Which was when it occurred to me I had a little piece of cyberspace just gathering dust like my old Tombola prizes. So I made over this page with the hopes of saving us all some time and effort. Now I don't pretend to know everything but I can share with you the basics and my rough price listing may help the more ambitious among you calculate how many games you'll have to play before your plain ol' neopets can turn into striking beauties like me. *Beams* Oh by the way, if you do spot a mistake or have any further questions then feel free to neomail my owner and me.

A paint brush is what you use to change the color of your neopet. However, not every paint brush works and even those that do will only paint a select few types of neopets. So before you empty out your pockets to buy one be sure to visit the Rainbow Pool under Shops to see which colors your neopets currently come in.

To use your paint brush make sure it is sitting free in your item box and not locked up in trades, auctions, your safety deposit box or the like. Go to the Rainbow Pool under shops and scroll down the page. You should see a section labeled Your Brushes which will let you choose which brush to use and which neopet to use it on. Remember that if your neopet does not come in that color you'll just get an error screen for trying. There are also a couple of paint brushes that don't work. Click here to check out which ones they are.

No, a neopet can only be painted in ONE color. If your neopet is currently darigan & you buy a pink paint brush and follow the steps to paint it then your pet will completely lose the old darigan look and turn pink. However, some neopet colors will bestow clothing on your pet AS WELL as an underlying color change. For example, let's pretend you make a green techo named LikesToEatBugs & paint him halloween. LikesToEatBugs' halloween look is actually made of two parts: one is underlying halloween "make up" (that is a color) & the other is a halloween "costume" (that is clothing) that together form the entire look. Both of these - the color & clothing - are granted to you the moment you painted LikesToEatBugs halloween. But let's say you later decide to paint him shadow. LikesToEatBugs will lose the halloween COLOR and turn shadow. However, he will KEEP the clothing (in this case the mummy type bandages) he got when you made him halloween. At a glance this gives the impression of a dual-painted pet - he will look shadowy black but still sport the tell-tale mummy wrappings you see on halloween painted techos. Regardless, LikesToEatBugs is only ONE color. But since you got to keep the clothing/accessories that came with his old color (you may remove the clothing if so desired) he looks like he's dual painted.

All retired paint brushes can still be used, with the exception of two paint brushes - Glass & Stone. These had their colors completely retired from the site so they don't work at all. For the other retired paint brushes, the "retired" attribute just is meant to signify that the item will become more rare - that is fewer of that item will be entering the Neopian economy. For paint brushes such as Faerie this was accomplished easily by removing it from the list of items that could be bought at the Hidden Tower. For the other paint brushes that were never sold there to begin with, it's more difficult to figure out exactly how they become more rare but in any case this increased rarity almost always means that the price for the paint brush will increase and they will be viewed as more valuable items.

The k stands for thousand so when you see a number followed by a k replace it in your mind with three zeros. For instance an item valued at 4k would be worth 4,000NP; an item at 20k would be 20,000NP and one at 500k would be 500,000NP.

Paint brushes are very popular, very rare, one-use items. This combination of low supply and high demand ends up making them super expensive.

• The easiest way is to buy them off of fellow users with the shop wizard, the trading post or the auction house. But first go to the Brushes link at the Rainbow Pool if you need to refresh your memory on what your paint brush is called and remember that because of the limitations of shops (specifically the fact that you can't sell an item in your shop for more than 99,999NP) you may have to narrow your search to the trading post and auction house to find certain brushes.
• The Hidden Tower also stocks a handful and the brushes found here (which are just the Baby, Maractite, Royal & Darigan colors) tend to set a sort of "ceiling" on the price other users will ask for them. Since it's known that players can generally just go to the Tower to get those colors users looking to sell these items generally tend to ask for a little less than the Hidden Tower's price to encourage users to come to their trading post lot instead.
• Random events - Sometimes, if you are very lucky, while you are wandering the site you'll come across a random event that gives you a paint brush. Usually, these make some mention of a mysterious character named Jacko but regardless these events are uber rare. There's not much you can do to encourage them to come your way although playing games like Cliffhanger or NeoQuest (I or II) that make you refresh the page often helps. Also, signing up for Neopets Premium increases your odds of having random events although it should be noted that it will still be very unlikely for you to find a paint brush in this fashion.
• Fruit Machine - Tucked away in a corner of Sakhmet, this unassuming kiosk usually doesn't give away much worth mentioning. However, on occasion you may a paint brush from here.
• World Challenges - Completing any of the various maps for this might get you a paint brush. Just check out the petpage of _Knight_Dog_ to see examples of past prizes.
• Wheel of Extravagance - each spin of this wheel is going to set you back 100,000NP but it's potential prizes include some of the rarest paint brushes out there. Before you give it a whirl I highly recommend visiting the awesome guide on Quebella's petpage to help you find out what it's all about.
• Wheel of Montonoy - This aptly named wheel has a paint brush as a potential prize.
• Contests - winning some of the site's contests sometimes means getting awarded a random rare item that might turn out to be a paint brush. Look the list of contests over, it never hurts to try and even if you don't get a paint brush at least you'll have a cool trophy in your lookup
• Test Your Strength is one of the terrible trio of games in the Haunted Woods that are rigged so that the odds are stacked terribly against you. However, winning a paint brush is possible.
• The Wishing Well is tucked away at the top of the Neopian Plaza. It's magical waters promise to grant the wishes of a handful of lucky users who toss coins into it's depths. Unfortunately so many users visit the wishing well in hopes of getting expensive items for a handful of NPs that the odds of you getting any of your wishes granted are slim to none.
• Tarla the owner of the Mystery Shop on Terror Mountain also spends part of her time giving occasional freebies to users who download the Neopets Toolbar. Although her prizes are usually small she does on rare occasion give out some pretty nice stuff including paint brushes. For more info on Tarla I recommend hopping over to Tronbonne's petpage.
• KeyQuest is probably your best shot at getting a paint brush outside of simply buying one from someone else. Gold keys sometimes unlock paint brushes but keep in mind that this is not an assured thing - some players end up having to use many, many gold keys before winning a paint brush.
• Alien Aisha Vending Machine - Odds are you will just get some gross food and a handful of neopoints but some super lucky users have gotten paint brushs from here. There are no specific nerkmids that guarantee your getting a paint brush but the odds are said to increase the rarer the nerkmid you use. Personally I would just save my money and buy a paint brush off of fellow users though...

No main shop stocks paint brushes. The only non-user owned store that has them is the Hidden Tower tucked away in Faeriecity. Only a few paint brushes can be found there and the cheapest one is 600,000NP!

The Rainbow Fountain is something quite different from the Rainbow Pool. To be able to use it you have to get something called a Fountain Quest which only appear as rare random events. However if you are lucky enough to get and complete one you'll have the chance to turn one of your neopets into almost any color. It would seem that the that the following colors are NOT possible: Ice, Magma, MSP, Robot, Royal, Sponge, Quiguki and Usuki. Also, like paint brushes the Rainbow Fountain is a one time deal - once you've used up your choice you will need to hope you run into another Fountain Faerie Quest before you can use it again.

Odds are that you made the common mistake of spelling paint brush as one word instead of two. The site's search engines can be rather particular at times so be sure you have the item's name spelled out exactly the same way as the site does. You may get the correct spelling off the Brushes section of the Rainbow Pool or (hopefully) from what you see in my guide below. Also there are also several colors that there is simply no paint brush for. To the best of my knowledge these are: Chocolate, Custard, Fruity Colors, Garlic, Ice, Magma, MSP, Mutant, Robot, & Snot. You'll need to turn elsewhere - ususally the Lab Ray - to have a shot at those.

The flask of rainbow fountain water is a rather expensive item that can be pulled out on rare occasion by neopets very skilled in fishing at the Underwater Fishing Pool.

This lucky find will turn any neopet that drinks it into a random color. Like paint brushes, this item will vanish after only one use. To find out what colors you have a shot at getting with this item take a moment to visit Bae's petpage for an excellent guide dedicated to this item.

The lab ray is the prize for collecting and turning in all 9 pieces of the secret laboratory map. You find the map pieces off of rare random events or buy them off of other users. Once you have them all click here or go to games, puzzles, treasure map, laboratory. You'll lose all your map pieces but in return gain permanent access to the lab ray. The ray is run by a mad scorchio scientist who will let you use it once a day on one of your neopets. The results are unpredictable but there is a chance your neopet will change to a cool color. To find out more about what the lab ray does I highly recommend the petpage of JustToClearThingsUp.

A few clever collectors have pointed out that certain neggs - those rare Neopian delicacies - have magical powers that can affect your neopet's color. Thanks to the Help chat board I have been given this list of a the ones that you may want to look (or watch out!) for:

Kaleideonegg - Eating one is like getting a shot from the lab ray. See my section on the lab ray for more info on what that can be like...

Plaid Negg - Rumored to either boost a faerie ability level (which is a bit pointless since leveled up abilities aren't any stronger) or to randomly change up your pet's color (not much info on possible outcomes though...)

Vortex Negg - Will paint your neopet red, blue, yellow or green (You don't seem to get to choose...)

Although a cool way to add a bit of extra dazzle to your neopets, clothing is beyond the scope of my page here. However, I can point you towards the petpage of Echoh who has coordinated a superb list of references you can use to make the best of this fun site feature.

I'm sorry but it would seem that it is no longer possible to get an ice bori. Ice bori were made avaliable a long time ago when the staff asked users to download a special toolbar. Those that did were allowed to create bori early (this was about a month before the species was released to the general public) as well as given the option to create their bori in an ice hue if they so desired. The staff made a comment at that time stating that this limited time offer would be the one and only way to get an ice colored bori. As far as I know they have not yet to changed their minds on this issue. The staff has even gone so far as to make it so that any ice bori abandoned in the pound will automatically change to blue. Although there have been some rumors floating around that an extremely lucky zap from the lab ray can turn your neopet into an ice bori. I haven't been able to confirm this rumor.

Magma does not have it's own paint brush. To get one of your pets to look this way you'll need to stop by the Magma Pool in the Moltara Caves. If you're lucky you'll catch the guard when he's sleeping & be able to dunk one of your pets into the scorching lava to turn it magma colored. There's a really spiffy guide on magma colored pets on Lihbea's petpage that I recommend you check out for more info.

Nothing. The Lutari Paint Brush does not (nor did it ever) work on any neopet. It was quietly slipped into the site back in 2004 during the promotion that surrounded Neopets Mobile. Back when it was released most veteran users believed that it was a precursor to a Lutari color that would eventually be added to the site. This lutari tonu plushie, in fact, may be a clue as to just what that lutari color would have looked like:

However the color was never added to the site & the staff has significantly down played the Lutari World since. It's doubtful that we'll ever get to see a lutari color at this point...

I last updated all the prices on December 25, 2011. If you're reading this quite sometime thereafter please don't hesitate to send me a neomail reminding me to review current p/b prices. Of course, updates are subject to delays depending on how busy my schedule gets.

If you ever come across a paint brush that has the word "plushie" in it as well as any other color in its name then don't be fooled. There is no such thing as a starry & plushie colored neopet. Rather these are TOY versions of the real things. They will not paint your neopet and they will certainly not paint any plushies your neopet may own. All you can do with these is play with them just like you would with a deck of cards. Unless you're a collector of plushies/toys then please stay away from these imposters!

Sparkly Blue & Sparkly Green Paint can not be used to paint neopets or petpets. They are part of the school supplies set of items which were added to the site a long time ago in anticipation of neoschools. Ultimately the staff decided not do neoschools which means school supplies merely serve as collectors items now or on rare occasion are requested for the completion of a quest.

Starter Paint Brushes can not be sold, auctioned or traded away. They come in newbie packs so technically they're free but as you're unable to move them from the account they came in it's not worth creating multiple accounts to get one.

Okay, first of all you should know that any item whose value is 100,000NP or more is sometimes called an unbuyable. This is because there is a restriction in shops that prevents users from pricing their items at anything higher than 99,999NP so very expensive items are 'unbuyable' from user owned stores. So the prices you see below have been gleaned off the Trading Post although you can also try hunting for these more expensive brushes in the Auction House. I have listed the average asking price I found users on the trading post would accept, which means you should be able to find a few prices below and above what I mention. Regardless, this should give you a good ballpark figure of what you'll be spending to get the precious paint brushes below...

A great big thank you to LeiaLissa whose petpage proved to be an invaluable resource for remaking my own.

A sincere thank you is also due to Gwillewyn who made the lovely banner that allows users to link back to me!

I can't forget to acknowledge the very talented and generous Scifi_crazy for creating an animated, alternative button visitors can now also use to link back to my humble petpage.

I very nearly took my petpage down but users like Petgirl__16 remind me that this place is still helpful and appreciated. Thank you so much for beautiful award!

I'm excited to announce that user Number_too has seen my little petpage fit to be included in his ever-so-useful petpage directory. If you're looking for a collection of helpful petpages please take a peek:

I can't let another day go by without expressing my gratitude to Dragon__master54082 for taking the time to give this handsome, personally crafted award to brighten up my petpage. Thank you!!

Wow! Thank you so much Gerber1229 for bestowing my humble page with an award.

Thanks too to Emmettfinneren for gracing my guide with an award!

I'm very grateful too to the thoughtful Keit915 who has seen fit to add my petpage to her directory:

And a big thank you to djalexutz for letting me sport this new, shiny and blue award on my page!