There is no better time than now to start drawing. No need to make a huge shopping expedition, all you need are a few tools. The most obvious ones are pencil or charcoal and paper. Today I will talk about charcoal.

I believe it is easier to start with charcoal as there is no need to be as precise as with pencils. The marks can be more expressive and bolder, but then again your personality will dictate what your hand will do. Let’s look at the selection of different charcoals and a few other things you may need.

1. Playable eraser: Great tool for removing small or large sections of unwanted shadows.

2. Sandpaper: Keep all your sticks and pencils nice and sharp as well as cleaning the blending paper stumps.

3. Art blade knife: Excellent for sharpening your sticks and pencils.

4. Removable sandpaper on a stick: Has easy to remove dirty sandpaper strips; used for keeping the points of sticks and pencils sharp.

5. Different charcoal sticks and a metal pencil holder: I find the metal holder a bit too heavy to work with but if you like your hands clean it can be useful. Charcoal sticks are available in different thickness, they are very soft with an ability to cover large areas. Nitram brand comes in different softness and hardness, marked in the same way as pencils.

6. Compressed charcoals and pastel pencils: They are encased in the wood or plastic to keep your hands clean and for the ease of transportation, not as easy to break as the other sticks. Some of them come in soft and hard version.

7. Blending paper stump and erasers: Available in different thickness for blending small fine areas and the large areas. Very handy fine replaceable erasers for removing fine lines.

Suitable papers for charcoal drawing: Choose a paper that is suitable for your intention. If you are only practicing and having fun (without intention to keep your drawing for posterity), even butchers paper is good – really any type of paper will do.

If you are serious about your drawing and you would like to keep it for a long time, choose the right archival, acid free paper with a bit more weight. Approximately 160 gsm (grams per square millimeter) and higher would be a good choice.

Before you start check how easy it is to erase the charcoal from the paper you choose.

First decide on what you want from your drawing.

Is it going to be a very fine and detailed drawing?
Is it going to be loose and fluid?
Is it going to be bold with heavy lines and dark areas?
Will you be using both black and white charcoal?

For very fine detailed works I would recommend using smoother textured paper and charcoal pencils rather then thin or thick willow charcoal sticks. You will have more control in describing details. Very smooth paper will not hold the charcoal and you will have a problem creating dark areas.

More textured papers are very suitable for charcoal as they will hold the powder better and they are ideal for a looser type of drawing.

If you are planning to use black and white charcoal sticks or pencils then you will need coloured paper. I love using Colourfix pastel papers, which are acid free, 300gsm, hot pressed and suitable for many media including charcoal. They come in many colours.

Also Canson Mi Teintes pastel paper is good. I do prefer using grey and nature colours rather than very strong bright colours.

Happy charcoaling!

Let's Charcoal (Drawing With Charcoal)