CORE MATERIALS

• 60 sheets of A2 drawing cartridge or smooth bristol type paper

(Both these types of paper are available through my Local Customers Store - purchase by card online and pickup in class or purchase on the day in cash. I find the drawing cartridge, which has a little tooth, quite nice for creating soft broad marks with graphite or softer coloured pencil, and you can still get a sharp mark with the point. I find the smooth paper good for longer studies that we will do at the end of the term using harder pencils so that we can get more gradual, refined rendering.)

• Drawing board and clips to suit A2 drawing cartridge (we have drawing boards in the studio but you might like to have your own for flat transport of your work.)

• Graphite pencils - Hb, 2b/3b, 6b/8b (regular wood shaft or solid graphite eg progresso)

• Kneadable eraser (optional: Monozero eraser - this is a fine rubber eraser in a pencil holder)

• Sharpener or pen

Graphite Blocks - My preference is Grafcube by Caran d’ache (small or medium - these are lovely for gesture, creating broad, soft marks. When using a harder graphite block on a smooth paper you can get lovely smooth marks, or using on cartridge paper you can get a more textured mark)

Vine/willow charcoal

I suggest the fine sticks

Sanguine Conte chalk or Conte pencil

Can work well with a charcoal pencil for accents

Single coloured pencil: Dark mid tone in an earth colour - my favourite is Prismacolour Terra Cotta (PC 944) - coloured pencils don’t tend to smudge but on the other hand are difficult to erase.

I like to sharpen with a knife and sandpaper for a long point or use a pencil sharpened that makes a very long point, then use sandpaper to very slightly round the tip - this allows a slightly softer mark, as well as a sharp one when pull along the page.

This is probably the closest thing I have drawn with that can achieve a bit of an old master effect.

Set of three coloured pencils: a light, medium and dark tone in similar hue range - my favourite for this are:

Prismacolour beige (pc997)

Prismacolour burnt ochre (PC943)

Prismacolour dark brown (PC946)

(This allows you to vigorously lay in initial, longer marks in the lighter tone, move to the mid tone to refine and still have the darker colour to pick out accents or finalise your marks)

Pastel and pastel pencil:

A similar effect to using a range of coloured pencil can be created using a standard pastel in a light shade (eg Rembrandt Burnt Umber 409,10, a kind of pale cream) plus a pastel pencil in a dark shade (such as Sepia 617 by Conte a Paris)