- Ellie Taylor
April 2018 SketchBox and Review of Derwent Tinted Charcoal
The Basic SketchBox for April 2018 featured Derwent Tinted Charcoal pencils. In addition to these pencils, I had already purchased the large set of 24 Derwent charcoal pencils and this blog will be a review of the box and the 24 set of Derwent Tinted charcoal pencils. For those who want to try out these supplies for themselves, I have included my Amazon Affiliate links down below.
When you open the box here is what you see, except for the Pebeo enamel paint. That was a separate purchase for making my cabochon necklaces. (Incidentally, it works pretty well on metal pendants.)
The first item in the SketchBox was a 6 pack of Derwent Tinted charcoal pencils. These pencils come in packs of six, twelve, or twenty-four. The 6 pack is available for $11.90 on Amazon.
Next there were two kinds of erasers: 2 General's Magic Black Erasers and General's Extra Soft White Eraser. They are available at Amazon for around $6 per two pack on the Magic Black erasers and the extra soft for around $3.09.
Next there was a pack of 3 Derwent blending stumps. This pack has 3 sizes: large, medium, and small. This pack retails for about $9.97 on Amazon.
Then I received two Pentel Color pens. The colors were light grey and dark brown with a fine tip point. These are water based markers. You can get these in a pack of 36 on Amazon for $13.02.
Finally there was a Light Derwent charcoal pencil. This pencil is available in a 4 pack with two other shades of charcoal and one white pencil for $5.01 on Amazon.
Finally, there was a SketchBox sticker, the supplies list, an advertisement for SketchBox videos, and a print from the artist of the month, La'Roy Bodiford.
The artist featured on the April box was Valerie Cossette.
The Review
One of the supplies that I bought separately was some Strathmore Toned Tan paper. I bought the 9X12 inch size and the paper was 80lb (not very thick). This paper is available on Amazon for $8.99 per 50 sheets. Smaller and larger sizes of this tan paper are available. There is a grey toned paper available too.
I also purchased the 24 set of Derwent Tinted charcoal pencils. These are on Amazon for $29.58.
This tinted charcoal set has different shades of black, brown, blue, and green with one white pencil.
Doodlin' Time!
Here are the swatches from the supplies in the April 2018 SketchBox. The six Derwent Tinted charcoal pencils were Lavender, Forest Pine, Ocean Deep, Peat, Natural, and Burnt Orange. There was also a light shade of the black Derwent charcoal pencil. The Derwent blending stumps worked great in blending the colors together. The Factis erasers were very good and I really liked the Black Magic erasers because they were a little bit rough and erased very cleanly. The Pentel pens were nice for writing and labeling everything.
The 24 set of Derwent Tinted charcoal pencils has more shades of grey, brown, blue, and black. The pencils are labeled with their color name and number. This is the largest set that you can buy right now. The colors in this set are: Burnt Earth, Burnt Orange, Thistle, Forest Pine, Natural, Green Moss, Glowing Embers, Driftwood, Sand, Dark Moss, Sunset Pink, Slate, Medium, Elderberry, Burnt Embers, Bilberry, Heather Mist, Ocean Deep, Lavender, Peat, Mountain Blue, Dark, Light, and White.
'Looking for Eight'
by Ellie Taylor
This drawing is available for sale in my Ebay store at https://www.ebay.com/str/ellietaylorartist
I used the Strathmore Toned Tan paper for this drawing. This paper has a relatively smooth surface and is not very thick. Because of this, the paper couldn't take as many layers as cold press watercolor paper or other rougher surfaces. However, it works fairly well for a sketchy looking picture which is what I wanted. I used all the colors in this 24 set of Derwent Tinted charcoal pencils and they give a really neat look. They are not bright colors, but more muted like Conte crayons. I like these pencils better because they have softer leads and won't tear thinner papers like Conte crayons sometimes do. These tinted charcoal pencils blend together really well and smoothly. Overall, I like the sketchy soft look that I was able to achieve with these pencils. They do have a different feel than pastels pencils; kind of gritty like regular charcoal pencils.
I really want to do more pictures with these pencils and I love the look of the toned paper. However, I would like the toned paper to have more tooth and be a little bit thicker. I know Strathmore has thicker toned paper, but I need to find some with a little more tooth to it. Then it would be perfect! In conclusion, I would say a big thumbs up for these Derwent Tinted charcoal pencils!
If you want to check this box out, SketchBox offers two subscription levels: the Basic Box for $25 plus $5 shipping and the Premium Box for $35 plus $5 shipping in the US. Right now, SketchBox only ships to the USA and Canada. Check them out through my referral link. https://getsketchbox.com/refer/Elean-IFGGOHVY