What pencils do you use?

I use Faber Castell Polychromo Artist’s Colour Pencils. Quite a mouthful. But don’t chew on them, they are too expensive. My set came from Amazon UK, when it was on offer. I think under £25 is a good price for the box of 24 pencils.

Normally I colour in front of the tele in the evenings with my pencils laid out beside me. Sometimes it is ambushed by an unhelpful cat who insists that plonking his bum down in the middle of the tin IS SUPER COMFY. It is lies.

How many pencils should I buy to start out?

I would buy a set of 24 pencils. I would then buy some single pencils to add to them. The set of 24 doesn’t come with a Caucasian flesh colour. I would buy a beige red, to cover that angle.

I would also buy several more white pencils, you use them faster than the other colours, and much much faster if you intend to colour on coloured card stock. As and example, I do a new pencil order every couple of months. I replace approx 20 coloured pencils and ten white pencils in each order. It costs between £25 and £35 pounds, ouch! And that’s a cheap option!

I buy all my single pencils from Cult Pens, and can highly recommend them if you are in the UK.

My good friend Stephen from Canada recommends Deserres.ca for individual polychromo pencils in Canada.

You could try Dick Blick or Jerry’s Artarama if you are in the USA. ( I have to plead ignorance though, they seem good prices, but I live across the seas and don’t have personal preference info to share!)

What blending solution do you use?

I don’t use any of the liquid blenders. I prefer to use a Derwent blending pencil. I got mine in a set with some burnishers from Amazon. Mainly I blend with my white pencil.

What sharpener do you use?

Mostly I have been using this kind of cheap plastic sharpener for all my colouring. The oil in the polychromo pencils pretty much render a sharpener useless in a few days of colouring, so there is little point buying something more expensive OR ANY of the electric sharpeners currently on the market. So for ease, just get a huge bag of 100 party favour sharpeners, job done. Occasionally running a normal HB pencil through the sharpener will help, but with these, you can just chuck them when they are done. I recognise that this is not ecologically sound so I keep trying new kinds of sharpener to achieve the ultimate sharpener dream!

Why are polychromos better than…*insert brand here*….?

I am not going to claim that Polychromos are better than any other brand, they are just my preferred brand. I like being able to mix colours like paint on my drawing, I like the smooth finish at the end of my colouring, I like using white almost like a resist for fur, they just suit me. Unlike a lot of other pencils they are oil based, rather than wax. They do not suffer from a wax bloom, they are easier to keep with a sharp point and they don’t need burnishing. I have tried all the other pencil types I think, and I have tried mixing them (perfectly possible with wax and oil bases) and now I just accept polys are my fav friend.

How do you colour fur?

Slowly! 😀 Check out my Stamp Anniething classes, several include some fur.

I colour fur the same way, whether on white or coloured card. Here’s a FREE! little demo post that shows you what I do.

You can also watch me colour fur as part of The Craft Cast where I was a guest on Koren Wiskmans channel.

How do you colour feathers?

You can find detailed instructions for feather colouring in my May Zany Holiday Colouring Course at Color Youniversity – here.

How do you colour curly hair?

Over at Color Youniversity I have a class called “Content is King” where I tackle three hair styles, two featuring some curly hair!

You can see a free demo on the Stamp Anniething Facebook page – here.

How do you colour knitting?

Quickly and in a scribbly fashion! I have done a photo demo of how I do it.

I have also done a quick knitting demo with Koren Wiskman on The Craft Cast and also colouring Kevin Resolutions for Stamp Anniething on YouTube.

How do you colour warts and bumps?

You can see a tutorial for this on the Dr.Digi YouTube Account Here

Or you can do it as part of the July Colour Youniversity Pencil Colouring Class Here.

How do you colour skin?

An easy white skin blend is part of the Pop Music Class of my Color Youniversity Zany Holiday Journey series. (As well as Red Hair and Bubble Wrap!)

And you can see a golden toned skin blend as part of the “Only Time it’s ok to say the word Moist!” class.

And you can see a freckled skin colouring as part of the “Oh Snap” class.

In the Content is King class, I cover three darker skin tones with an orange, golden and purple hue.

How do you colour Sepia or Monochromatic tones?

I cover colouring in sepia tones in the “Bubble Tea” class.

How do you add sparkle to your pictures?

You can see a tutorial for his on Dr.Digi’s YouTube Channel here.

How do you colour backgrounds? Floors? Scenes?

You can see lots of ideas for colouring a scene around your main digi in the Doorbell Day class. It will also be the next class in the Swatch Series, coming soon.

Where do you buy your pencils from? (UK)

Cult pens! Excellent products and customer service. Plus every order comes with free sweets and often super cute paper clips etc.

What paper do you use? What kind of Kraft card are you using? Where can I buy it?

I use a smooth kraft card stock called “Hessian Buff”.

If you are in the USA or Canada you can currently purchase it from the Stamp Anniething Shop Here.

Unfortunately I can’t find anywhere currently stocking it for sale in the UK/Europe. I buy it directly in large batches from the supplier. Please let me know if you are interested in purchasing some, if there is demand I will sort it out to be available in Europe too.

The Buff Smooth Card 260gsm from Papermill Direct is a good dupe.

Are you going to do videos?

Yes! My channel now exists. Please like, subscribe, watch etc, you have to reach certain targets to use the full functionality of YouTube and I need some help getting there, I need ALOT of views 😀

Check out the Tutorials page for some links to where you can find my videos elsewhere too!

Where can I buy your cards?

I post almost all my makes on my Cartway Cards Facebook page. Follow me on that and then send me a message if you would like to buy any of the cards I colour and share online.

Will you/Knitty Kitty Digis sponsor my challenge?

I am sorry Knitty Kitties is currently closed.