Question for the Artists

[GhostWay]

Well, recently, I've started to get into sketching/drawing. So I had a question for the artists on the board: what materials (such as paper or other medium and type of pens/pencls/other) do you use/recommend? Particularly for sketching; I'm using a drafting lead holder with 2HB lead right now, but that doesn't always work out so well<br><br>Thanks in advance.

[Archaemic]

I use a 0.7mm Mechanical Pencil, but that's not so good for shading. Someone I know recommended charcoal, but I've yet to use the charcoal pencils I got.

[Tavis]

I've been using mechanical pencils of various sizes: I normally use a purple 0.7mm Pentel with either HB or B lead. The scales for lead hardness are tradeoffs between darkness and sharpness. For darker images, I try to go with softer leads in the B or 2B range, but I normally just stick to the all-purpose HB.<br><br>I also have a 0.3mm mechanical pencil, a Pentel 120 A3DX (or so it says on the pencil. <!--emo&:P--><img src='http://definecynical.mancubus.net/forum ... tongue.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tongue.gif' /><!--endemo--> ) for drawing in the finest details. I only have HB lead for this one, and the store I bought them from no longer exists, so I will need to find a new supplier if I want to refill it.<br><br>For inking, I have a small collection of 0.2mm black Uni-Ball Roller Grip pens. I like that you can get a sharpness that rivals technical pens in a form with the robust weight, size, and grip of something more suited for extended writing periods. They are relatively hard to find now that the company is veering more towards bolder pens at 0.7mm or 1.0mm, but they are worth the search. I like using the bolder ones to fill in medium-sized areas with solid black, but haven't found a good way to wash an entire panel-sized area in black.<br><br>For paper, I use ordinary typing paper, but just to make things better for scanning and to get the highest image contrast possible, I selected the brightest printer paper I could find. The stuff I found in their Platinum series is rated at a 113 brightness. In contrast, their recycled paper is only 84, and most printer paper supplies would be in the 92-100 range. The smooth surface is also good for putting in very sharp details. Unfortunately, I haven't tested them with pens yet.

[Muninn]

I try to use a softer pencil for sketching, so I can erase mistakes easier and draw over again. I then go over the desired finished picture with any normal pencil. Usually it's a 0.5mm or 0.7mm Pentel, depending on the thickness I want. If you want to really focus on shading with pencils you can probably get a special set of pencils from any art store.<br><br>I don't like inking much (because I can't do it very good) so I focus on pencils.<br><br>For paper I use the sketch books and pads I get from art stores.

[Supersmoke]

I'm practicing with a set of 2B, 4B, 8B, and HB graphite pencils. No wood. It's a whole stick of graphite, which works reallllllllllly well for sketching and doing guideline work.<br>And I have some black and some white charcoal, which, unless you know what you're doing, is kind of hard to get used to. It is very useful for shading, though.

[The_Sparrow_]

Well I wouldn't call myself an artist but I do draw useing a cheap mechanical pencils some kind of pen which I don't have on me at the moment so I can't tell you what kind it is, it's not expensive though and I draw on A3 sheets of paper which are optained from my mother (who is a teacher and gets supplied with A3 paper all the time but never uses it) I usually do several drawings on one sheet.<br><br>Hows that for a long sentance <!--emo&:blink:--><img src='http://definecynical.mancubus.net/forum ... /blink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='blink.gif' /><!--endemo--> <br><br>As for stuff I do on computer I put pictures on the computer useing a digital camera and colour/touch them up with a freeware program called "The Gimp"

[Sakie]

Mechanical pencils... ARE THE BEST HELL YA!!!! and COMPUTER PAPAER YAY!!!!!!!111

[Dr. Doog]

I suggest using a drawing utencil and a medium to sketch upoun. that's what I use.