I just did a video on Instagram unboxing some new products sent to me by Faber Castell Australia to use for this year’s #Colour4Life event. This is an annual competition in Australia with some very cool prizes (see below).
In 2022 I spent two months using the Albrecht Durer Watercolour Markers and the Pitt Brush Pen Markers but this year Faber Castell Australia has sent me a box of new stuff to use for the next few months.
Drum Roll…
A lovely leather roll with a selection of Polychromos and Albrecht Durer pencils (both of which I love) plus a few graphite pencils. The interesting thing about this selection of pencils is that it doesn’t contain any browns, grey or earth colours (ie. the hues I most use).
Shades of Grey set of the GoldFaber Aqua Dual Markers. I’ve been using these markers for the last 12 months (and love them) but it will be fun to only use the gray ones!
A fancy set of graphite pencils including both the standard Castell 9000 graphite pencils and the new Pitt Graphite Matt. I hardly ever draw in graphite so this will be a good challenge for me.
And finally… A 24 set of the Pitt Pastel Pencils. I have never used these before so I’m excited to try something totally new!
The #Colour4Life Competition …
Create it: Create an artwork using Faber-Castell products that represents what #Colour4Life means to you.
Snap it: Take a photo of your completed artwork.
Tag it: Upload that photo to your Instagram account, making sure you tag #Colour4Life, @fabercastellaustralia & your favourite art store, if they have a social media account.
Find out more here including details of the amazing prizes. Note: this is an Australian competition.
I’m really looking forward to using these new Faber Castell products. Have any of you used the new matt graphite or the pastel pencils? If so I’d love to hear from you in the comment section below.
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10 Comments
What fun!!! You might want to take a look at an English artist named Felicity House who does wonderful paintings and sketches using watercolor and soft pastels and particularly pastel pencils. She likes to sharpen them with a craft knife to get a sharp point. I also have not used my pastel pencils much except to push soft pastel around when fine tuning paintings but I decided to start using them to introduce more line work in my pastel paintings and for sketches with or without watercolor underpainting. You will see from her work how they can be combined nicely with a watercolor sketch. I don’t think they would smudge much if you use it in a hardbound rather than a wirebound sketchbook. Alternately you could give them a quick spray of fixative. I do soft pastel sketches a lot in a hardbound Strathmore sketchbook with their multimedia paper which is pretty similar to Alpha paper. I spray it once with a low odor fixative (outdoors!) and they are fine. This article has photos of her plein air sketching gear. Have fun!!
https://www.howtopastel.com/2018/08/felicity-house/
Thanks so much for that suggestion Patricia!
You hit the jackpot!!!
Yes it’s very special… though don’t know how I’ll cope without browns and greys in the pencils!!! 🙂
I am just a beginner, but I love palette challenges. Can you list what the color numbers were of the watercolor and regular color pencils you received?
Hi Sandra – I’ll list the colours later in the week – so keep an eye out for that!
So… what did you think of the graphite? (Did I miss your thoughts on this new stash?)
I love the new graphite matte but was annoyed to find the pencils are different thickness than the graphite aquarelle! (I’ve a small tin of 6 in my mobile ketching kit that I swapped 2 out for. The tin doesn’t quite close.)
Article on the graphite coming next week! 🙂 I didn’t notice the overall pencil was thicker!
Time for me to go shopping for these! Ha! Actually, I already own a lot of these so it’s really shopping in my own art supply cabinet. Good reason to use items previously binge purchased! Lol! I’ve always avoided trying pastel pencils in my sketchbooks because I’m concerned about them rubbing away, even with fixative. On the other hand, I’ve not actually tried it, so I don’t really know. I do like pastels. I also love Conte crayons and I’ve avoided them in sketchbooks for the same reason. Hmmm. Need to see what fixative can do these days!
Hi Janie – yes, getting these pastel pencils is a new challenge! 😉
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