Art Tools
Hi my name is GeorgeXVII I am a Traditional Artist and, as you may have guessed, I love drawing! I'm here this week to 'help' you with some tips and advice about "how to choose and use tools" if your hobby is DRAWING.
I am often asked about the tools I use to create my drawings. Do I use traditional wood-cased pencils or mechanical ones? What type of eraser do I use? It would appear that many Artists have a fascination (and a vested interest) in the tools and techniques used by other artists... and I'm no different in that respect! So, what tools do I use?Let's Get Started
TOOLS you have to choose and use when you are a Drawing Artist
Brushes Pencils Progresso pencils Wood-cased pencils Natural charcoal sticks Graphite lead Indenting stylus Stumps and Tortillons Erasers White Pencil PaperI will begin by giving you some tips and recommending some of the best products to choose and use for your drawings.
BRUSHES
The above image shows the brushes that I use. Here are some details about them:
The first and second brushes I use to make shadows and the big surfaces. The third brush is smaller and is used to make shadows in small surfaces like ears, nose, lips, around the eyes etc. The fourth brush is a 'make-up' brush and helps me to make good shadows on cheeks when I do Portraits drawings. Sixth and seventh are the most little of all and, like the cotton swabs, I use them when I have to make more details .Never brush eraser crumbs or dust off your drawing using your hand. Keep a brush or two handy for such jobs so your drawing doesn't absorb oil from your skin. And don't blow dust off as you risk moisture marking the surface.
PENCILS
Almost since the day I started drawing in earnest, over 17 years ago, I have eschewed the use of conventional, cedar-cased pencils. They have their place and many artists use nothing else, but I use only one (6B) - and even then infrequently. Why? Well, there's little worse than using a tool that continually shifts its size and weight and I don't see any advantage in drawing with a tool that has to be constantly relearned. On the other hand the mechanical pencils that I use possess none of these faults and many advantages.
These mechanical pencils (known to me as Clutch pencils but also known as Drafting pencils or Lead Holders) remain a known constant at all times. Neither length nor weight change. Balance remains true, affording very precise control. Sharpening involves only the enclosed lead and not the outer casing, allowing needle-sharp points to be easily achieved when required. The only thing you can't do with a clutch pencil, that you can with a wood-cased pencil, is tuck it behind your ear. Most makes of clutch pencil even include a built in sharpener which, although rarely used, can be a life-saver during outdoor drawing trips. Depressing the top cap opens the clutch around the lead at the base allowing it to be extended or adjusted in length to suit the current application.
The green pencil at the top is from Faber Castell but most of mine are made by Staedtler. From the top downwards the grades of these three are F, HB and 2B. How do I know? Because each pack of leads include a colour end cap to fit on the holder. You will see that F has a green cap, the HB has its original chrome cap and a purple one is fitted to the 2B. If you're buying for the first time I suggest you purchase just three - 2B, HB and 2H - these will achieve almost all the effects you might need.
PROGRESSO PENCILS
Progresso pencils are solid sticks of graphite and are very versatile tools. Although I keep both 2B and 6B, I rarely use them except for outdoor sketching and for lightly washing tone over an incised area
WOOD-CASED PENCILS
Usually cased in Cedar, these pencils possess a lightness that can aid subtle shading techniques but suffer from a number of disadvantages. They shorten in use resulting in an ever-changing balance and weight; a variety of points can be achieved but very fine points tend to require the use of an emery board or other rough surface to achieve this while clutch pencils possess a needle-point by default. If dropped or bent, the graphite has a tendency to break internally. Clutch pencils support the lead internally with virtually no breakages in normal use.
Which pencil should I use for shading?
Generally, the B is good for medium to light shading, and the 2B for medium to dark, and you should be able to get a good range of tone (value) out of both, from quite light to dark. Try them both on a piece of scrap paper to see which suits you best. Many artists like to use one of these mid-range pencils for pretty much everything, controlling lightness and darkness by shading more or less heavily. However, at times you might want a bit more intensity, or find that you can't get your mid-range pencil to go light enough or dark enough.The 4B is good for darker shading. It is soft enough to give a good layer of graphite quickly and without blunting too fast. The 6B pencil is good for very dark areas, but it is very soft and blunts quickly, so it is difficult to use for detail. Because it blunts so quickly, the 6B tends to look grainy, skimming over the surface of the paper. When burnishes--shading very, very heavily--graphite can look very shiny. Harder pencils contain more clay, so look a little less shiny than a very soft pencil.
The harder grades of pencil - from HB, through H, 2H to 5H - get progressively harder, easier to keep sharp, but also more gray and less shiny because they have more clay in them. The harder pencils can dent the paper very easily. The HB and H can be used for fine, light, even shading.
Layering pencils: Try shading an area with a hard pencil to flatten and smooth the grain before shading with a soft pencil. Shade over an area of soft pencil with a hard pencil, to smooth and even out the graphite, and create a more even surface appearance between the different types of pencil. The Staedtler Mars Lumograph are my favourites, but i use KOH-I-Noor Hardtmuth too.
NATURAL CHARCOAL STICKS
[Vine]
What is Charcoal and How to Draw with Charcoal? Well technically speaking, charcoal is burnt organic material. Usually the material is wood. There are a few types of charcoal used by artists to create a drawing. These types of charcoal include vine and compressed. Vine charcoal usually consists of burnt willow wood. Vine charcoal is easily spread on a surface and is very easy to erase. As a consequence it is generally makes a lighter mark when you draw than compressed charcoal and easily smudges. (Which may be a benefit.)
Compressed charcoal is held together by a gum binder and is darker than vine charcoal. As a result, it is harder to erase and harder to smudge, but makes a darker mark. Compressed charcoal may come as a round stick, a square stick, or in a pencil (vine charcoal is almost always a round stick). Some compressed charcoal is pigmented such as with white compressed charcoal.
GRAPHITE LEADS
Staedtler 2mm diameter leads are available in tubes of 2 and packs of 12. The 12-pack (illustrated above) comes complete with a grade-dependent colour-coded end cap for your pencil. The leads are fully supported within the pencil by an internal brass tube.
A wide range of grades is available. The most useful, from softest to hardest, are 6B, 4B, 2B, HB, F, H, 2H, 4H and 6H. The softest I use is 6B, although I use it infrequently. Being coarse-grained, the individual grains of graphite tend to be visible, which can distract from the reality that I'm trying to achieve. In normal use my softest grade is 2B and my hardest 4H. Most of my drawing is achieved with just the three grades of 2B, F and 2H.
INDENTING STYLUS
Used for impressing a line into paper before drawing commences. It produces a clean white line with parallel sides and (with practice) a perfect tapering point. Uses include a cat's eyebrow whiskers. The tool is home-made and consists of a darning or sewing-up needle (round, not pointed, tip) with the eye snapped off and inserted into a spare clutch pencil. Once the lines are indented, I use the 2B Progresso pencil to lightly shade over the area to reveal their positions during later work.
STUMPS and TORTILLONS
Used for blending graphite. Stumps are generally double-ended, larger and bulkier than the finer single-ended tortillons. Both have their individual uses although I tend to use only tortillons - for coarse work I wrap paper towel around my finger and use that instead. Never use your unprotected finger to blend graphite. The natural oil in your skin will cause graphite to stick to your paper in irregular patches. It once took me two days to constantly tone and blend around such an area before it became unnoticeable...
SHARPENERS
If you are drawing with clutch pencils, the Staedtler sharpener (shown above, right) is a "must have" item. Made to sharpen the leads inside these pencils, it is capable of producing needle-sharp points if required. On top is a lead cleaner (a fibrous insert into which the sharpened pencil point is pushed to clean it of loose graphite powder) and, to either side of this, are two small holes — extend the lead into either to obtain a set length - one gives a sharp point, the other a standardised blunt tip. You can also save the waste graphite and use it with a brush for gentle toning--though I don't personally use the method, preferring the greater control offered by the gradual building up of lines of graphite for blending. The conventional sharpener shown above is used not only for sharpening wood-cased pencils but also to obtain very usable points on stick erasers.
ERASERS
A wide variety of conventional erasers exist but I only use those shown above. The main requirement is for a soft eraser that can gently remove graphite and not grind it ever deeper into the paper's surface. It is for this reason that I no longer use ink or typewriter erasers. Apart from the block eraser, I make most use of MILAN stick erasers. Of the two versions shown above I use the top one - although this is now unavailable the 528-55 refills for the 528-50 below will fit the old (and more comfortable and precise) holder. The eraser core is capable of being formed to a very fine point using a conventional pencil sharpener.
My Favourite is MILAN Kneadable erasers, an un-vulcanized rubber eraser with great adsorption power. Suitable for Fine Arts and for removing charcoal and pastel chalk strokes. IT IS AWESOME and helps me a lot... More info HERE!
But like you see I have some 'handmade' erasers done by me with the cutter .. take care when cutting an eraser !
WHITE PENCIL
(pastel)
I use Cretacolor for ALL of my drawings, since they help me when I want to get more light, especially when drawing eyes. Take care when you use them--you need to practice--I only use it in very small areas. But when I want to give more realism to my drawings, especially in my eye drawings (to put the white points and some small details), I use MILAN Correction Pen (seen below)
PAPER
Paper is paper, right…? Not quite! There are different types of paper made to be used with different mediums. This section will guide you through choosing drawing paper that is made for use with pencil. I use Strathmore 400 Series Drawing Paper :
But you have a lot of options to choose your perfect paper to draw. Some good brands are: CANSON, STRATHMORE, STAEDTLER, PACON, and OFFICE DEPOT
HOW TO CHOOSE YOUR DRAWING PAPER ?In essence, all we need to draw is a pencil and a piece of drawing paper. That sounds simple enough... but how, when you're standing in front of aisles and aisles of paper at the art store, do you possibly choose one?
A very good article about the 'Paper' HERE and another one HERE
Traditional Art Groups: Portraits-Drawings Traditionalists Pencil-Artists Traditional-Media ThePencilClubWe have now reached the end of my article and hope you enjoyed it!
I would now like to share with you some of my drawings done with the tools that i have presented in this article:
Be Devious.
GeorgeXVII
