Drawing with Colored Pencils

Colored Pencils

Do you like making pictures using colored pencils? They are fascinating art media; simple and easy to use, available in many colors, and can give out beautiful pictures. I love using colored pencils to make doodles on my sketch pad. 

I am not a good artist my self, but I'm always amazed by the amazing results of the colorful doodles. It takes time and experience to be able to draw beautifully. Since I'm not always free all the time, I practice drawing at home by copying the photos from books and magazines. 

If you also want to learn drawing with colored pencils, scroll down this lens and find out interesting facts and tips about this hobby. 

Pencils - Use the Right Ones 

There are many colored pencil brands available on earth. All you have to do is pick up the best ones that fit your drawing style. Some people like drawing or making not-too-detail sketches. For them, any kind of pencil tips are not a problem. But others are the other way around, they just live making detailed sketches and therefore need very sharp pencil tips. 

Selecting which pencil brands that can go well with a sharpener is very tricky. A well-known brand colored pencil may not always go well when it is sharpened by a sharpener. Sometimes it gets broken easily because the wood material of pencil is not strong enough. This can be both annoying and frustrating! 

So if you want to draw very sharp details, you must select the pencils carefully and examine whether they will go well with any kind of sharpener (not just cutter knife) and have strong wood material. This way, you can always have sharp pencil tip to give the best details in sketches. 

Another tip for selecting colored pencils is only pick pencils that are rich in pigments. These kind of pencils will give out brilliance color when used in drawing. Again, you must experience several brands before finally deciding which one has the most pigment quality. 

Papers - Smooth or Rough?

The texture of the surface of paper determines your drawing style. The roughness of paper is sometimes called ‘tooth’, the toothier the paper the rougher it is. Rough papers can take many color layers and solvents to blend the colors, but the price may also be high. They also give textures to your drawings and make them look artistic. 

Smooth papers don’t take too many color layers, but the price is usually inexpensive. So if you decide to make colorful drawing, you may consider buying rough paper while simple sketches may be drawn in any smooth white paper. 

One thing you should be aware is cheap papers usually get yellow or decay easily, and they don’t last very long. Expensive papers handle these problems easily, and since they are high in cost, only consider buying them if you want to keep you drawings for longer times or you plan to sell them someday. 

Brush & Eraser - Keep You Work Clean! 

Soft drafting brush, artificial water painting brush, make-up brush, or simply a desk brush, is must-have tool to clean your drawing from dust and debris produced after coloring. Meanwhile, an eraser functions to remove scraps you make when you draw. 

When you choose an eraser, imbibed and white vinyl eraser is a recommended one. Don’t use rubber or abrasive erasers, as they will effect to the paper’s roughness. Kneaded erasers also work well in erasing color pencils. 

Some others prefer using adhesive tape to pick up unwanted colors already drawn on the paper. You, too, can use this technique. Simply cut a small amount of adhesive tape and apply it on the targeted area, press down with a pen or pencil, then gently lift it up to remove the color. 

As colored pencil lead is commonly made of wax or oil, the color pigment will be glued to the tape. Be careful when you do this; as applying the tape to the same place over and over can “dull” the paper as well remove more color than what you need. 

Pencil Sharpener 

A quality pencil sharpener is a must for the maximum fun in colored pencil hobby! There are manual and electrical sharpeners available to sharpen your colored pencils. Those manual ones are usually hand-held while the electrical ones are operated by batteries.

Some people find their colored pencils broken after being sharpened by an electrical sharpener, but good electrical sharpeners surely keep you out of this problem! 

Vinyl Erasers 

Vinyl erasers give satisfactory result for cleaning scraps from your drawing!