Mechanical Pencil

My favorite and best mechanical pencil, which I use for anything and everything, is the Mars Staedtler 780.
It feels solid in my hand, is just the right thickness, and has interchangeable graphite refills. Most of the time I have an HB lead in mine. (That's a middle of the road graphite.) You can put hard graphite in the pencil, all the way up to a 4H, or the softer leads in the B's, down to 4B. (which would be very soft.)

My favorite thing about this pencil, besides the fact of the changeable refills, is the sharp point....

Which you get by using the sharpener, called a pointer, pictured below. You stick the extended point of your pencil into the hole of the sharpener, rotate it, and get a wonderful sharp point in seconds. You can take the top off to dump the graphite dust, or use it for drawing. (Dust drawing). The little white area on the pointer is for wiping off your point.

All of these are available thru Amazon, the links are in the sidebar.
And yes, I do get a small kick back (as an Amazon affiliate) if you buy thru one of the links here. Thanks!

My Current Favorite Pencil

So, we'll start with some basics. Pencils.

I adore pencils, and why not?...after crayons, it's our first tool. And when you want control, you can't beat a pencil. I have a lot of different pencils, and I'm sure that you do too. Graphite pencils, charcoal, colored pencils, water soluble toning pencils, watercolor pencils, and I'm sure there are plenty of others that I'm not thinking of at the moment. I'm also sure that you have your favorites, and that your favorites switch, as you might try something new.

My current favorite pencil for sketching is a Stabilo "All" 8046. It's a dense black pencil. It also comes in some colors (which I have not tried), and brown and white. It is water soluble, so you can make washes by brushing with water. I like this one because it's a hefty black, has almost a waxy dense color, takes punishment without the tip breaking, and has a wonderful flow on the paper. It's great for the way I like to sketch. And bonus, you can sharpen it in a standard pencil sharpener, so no fussing with Exacto knives.

Here are a few sketches I've done, and then the links to the pencils on Amazon. I am an Amazon affiliate, so if you buy through this page, I get a small kick back. (We have to say that.)

All the sketches below are done with Stabilo pencil in two different sizes of Piccadilly notebooks. They are cheaper than the Moleskine notebooks, but have much thinner paper. The paper is the same sort of smooth creamy buff color as what's in the Moleskines. You can see a bit of a ghost above, it's the next page's sketch showing thru. For my purposes though, quick sketches of people riding the Metro, it is a perfect sketchbook. The paper has a smooth surface. I've linked to the Piccadilly in the sidebar.

You can tell that I sketch "hard" with a lot of pressure on the page. Since you are very limited in time when drawing people on a train, these are not only hard, but fast and direct. The Stabilo just suits. Links below.


Black Pencil

White Pencil

Brown Pencil