Quote (Titch @ 9 Sep 2010 18:51)
i find you neednt go above 3H really, they just get too hard and scratch lines in your paper so that when you shade over they show up white
basically, youre alright on lighter pencils, just ghost your lines, and most shading will we around B or 2B, though a darker like 4 or 6 is useful or youll press too hard and get odd shiny spots.
depends what youre drawing really
but id say 6B, 4B, B, 2H and maybe a HB or H too.
and get a putty rubber.
agreed, imo 2H is just enough actually but mechanicals do same job mostly. still i would go even further with softer pencils - 8B is my limit here, now i have 4H which i don't need, 2H, HB, 2B, 4B, 8B and some mechs. kneaded eraser works perfectly - this is must, yes.
im practicing still portraits and i'm used to put a lot contrast in drawings lately so i prefer soft pencil like 8B for shading - gives perfect look to shades, eyes and such. also i got some weird paper blocks - they are like squared (or whatever the word is) but thick and that drawing paper surface - i actually enjoy drawing on these. also these cost like nothing, 50 pages was 1.2 euros and i bought few blocks of them. very nice, i like.