Pastel crayons are very beautiful, but fastidious means of drawing. To use them, you need to specially equip the workplace, as well as purchase special paper. But the result will not disappoint!
What is pastel
Pastel translated from Italian means pasta. Currently, the definition of pastels is widely used as drawing materials, drawing techniques, or even a work made in pastel crayons or pencils. This type of material is released in the form of pencils or crayons. They have no frames. Materials are sold in the form of bars with a square or round cross section. The composition of pastel crayons for drawing includes:
- coloring matter;
- mineral filler (a special type of clay or chalk);
- a binder (gum arabic, mineral oil, wax, etc.).
All ingredients are finely ground and pressed into bars.
There are many shades of soft colored crayons, more than 1600 colors. They can be used both in painting and in graphics.
The pastel is produced in three varieties: dry, wax and oil.
Dry pastel
The dry appearance of the material can be hard and soft. It depends on the concentration of binder in it. The smaller it is, the softer it is. The mildest species do not contain a binder at all and consist solely of pigment.
Soft pastels are velvety to the touch and can crumble very easily. Moreover, her colors are very bright, due to the high concentration of pigment. Such material lays well on paper, with wide strokes. Soft pastels are easy to blend and blend. Soft pastel crayons for painting crumble quickly, and the pattern on the paper smears. In addition, it is difficult to control the direction and width of the stroke. And because of the high pigment content, the hands from the crayons get dirty. Therefore, to work with the soft look of the material, practice and increased accuracy are needed.
Hard pastels are less picky in their work. It is most often sold in the form of dry pastel crayons and pencils. Due to the high concentration of the binder, the strokes are sharper and finer. In this case, the colors are less bright. In addition, due to the lower pigment content, such pastel crayons leave your hands clean.
Oil pastel
This type of pastel is obtained by adding flaxseed oil to the composition. Oil pastel crayons are very soft and have a rich color. However, they are much more elastic and resilient than wax.
Working with such material allows you to create bright, textured images with deep colors. But with its help it will not work to blend the image or add soft overflows to it.
Wax pastel
Wax pastel crayons are obtained by mixing pigment and high-quality wax. They allow you to create vivid strokes of saturated colors.
Thanks to the wax included in the composition, images made with the help of such pastel crayons do not get dirty and are not erased. Therefore, the work of such material is performed on the finishing.
Which pastel to choose
To determine which set of pastel crayons to choose, you should decide what kind of result you need to achieve in the end.
If you want to create a bright image with soft touches, it is better to choose a soft pastel. In addition, it allows you to mix colors and finally create a bright and harmonious plot by rubbing chalk into paper. For drawing with oil crayons, neither additional devices nor special tools are required.
The trace of dry pastel crayons can easily be blown away, so you need to draw very carefully. The colors of this material are more airy and transparent, so the pattern as a result is transparent and light. To work with crayons, you need to stock up with cotton swabs or discs, with which you can shade the picture. Professionals can use a fixing pencil. It will help to avoid overwriting the drawn fragment. But erasing a pinned image is no longer possible.
For those who like to draw small details or just prefer to draw with pencils, pastel pencils are best. They help to clearly identify all the small features of the picture, which is difficult to achieve with crayons. In addition, they can be combined with paints and crayons to create an interesting and unusual pattern. An important advantage of pencils is that they do not get your hands dirty. A large palette of colors allows you to fully express your imagination.
Work rules
When working with dry colored pastels, it is important to remember that it crumbles easily, forming a large amount of colored fine dust. Therefore, when working with it, you need to follow some simple rules:
- Do not keep drinks or food near the workplace so that dust from pastel pencils or crayons does not get into them.
- No need to blow out small pastel crumbs. Otherwise, they will cause spots in various places of the house.
- When working with pastel crayons, gloves must be worn. The pigment contained in them quickly eats up into the skin, and you can wash it off by washing your hands several times. When working with pencils, gloves are not needed.
- After drawing, wipe all surfaces with a damp cloth and sweep the floor. Or, before work, you can spread newspapers or paper on the floor, and then gently fold them and throw them away.
- After drawing, the pastel needs to be cleaned before being put into the box.
- When working with material, you need to stock up on wet wipes and keep them handy in case of need.
- When working with fixing varnish or fixer, the room should be well ventilated.
Storage pastels
The pastel is very picky about storage conditions. This material does not like direct sunlight to fall on it. It also deteriorates when exposed to high temperature.
It is best to store the material at a temperature of + 18 ... + 20 ° C with a humidity of fifty to fifty-five percent. To prevent excess moisture from falling onto the material, professionals recommend pouring a little rice into a box of pastel.
To keep the pastel pattern longer, it is fixed with a special varnish - spray or fixer. Some use a simple hair spray for this. But such tools contribute to the loss of velvet and softness of the picture and distort it a little. Therefore, it is best to store pastel works in a frame under glass. In this case, the figure should not come in contact with the glass. Therefore, the frame should be chosen thicker so that between the glass and the work there is little space.
Paper selection
Plain paper is not suitable for working with pastels. Since the material crumbles a lot, you need to choose rough paper for drawing. There are several popular options for such paper:
- Pastel. Best suited for aspiring artists. It can be bought both individually and in sets. She has a lot of flowers, so you can give free rein to the imagination.
- Watercolor. Also suitable for beginners. A bit like pastel texture. The price is acceptable, so it’s not a pity to spoil it in the process of mastering pastel technique.
- Velvet. Suitable for professionals, since it is difficult to erase images on it, and not all pencils are suitable for this paper. In addition, the color is difficult to shade. But the work on such paper is soft and gentle.
- Velor Feels like velvet, but still more whimsical. Since the pile on it is short, it lends itself even less to shading. But if the sketch is dense, it seems that the picture was created with paint.
- Emery. Drawing on paper of this type resembles drawing on asphalt with chalk. It is impossible to shade the picture, but the drawings will turn out unusual and picturesque. Thick crayons should be used for drawing, therefore sheets should be selected in a large format.
- Handmade. Such paper is made from herbs and other components, and then painted by hand. It is very fragile, so the drawings on it can not be rubbed much. Images are obtained in very high quality. At the same time, paper is very expensive, it is difficult to find in stores. Therefore, it is best to order it from the master and wait until it is done.
- Cardboard and kraft paper. Thanks to a rough surface, pastel lays well. She is best suited for making sketches.
Advantages and disadvantages
The advantages of pastels mainly come from its composition. Due to the fact that it is easily erased, you can repeatedly resume work on the drawing, removing and re-applying layer by layer, as well as overlapping old layers.
This also consists of its shortcomings. The pastel is very sensitive even to minor damage, crumbles and erases very quickly. Therefore, to use it, you need to select special paper. In addition, if you use pastel pencils, you need to select them according to the degree of softness and oiliness, so that you can easily lay layers on top of each other.
Pastel painting is an art that takes time and patience. But the results are worth it.