Experimenting with color pencil on sanded paper- Colourfix and Pastelbord

I received a great question in regards to using colour pencils on textured papers and boards. I had never taken the time to really give it a go, so I spent a week playing around with different surfaces and testing out what they could and could not do.
The eagle is available for sale at:
www.etsy.com/a...
And the swan:
www.etsy.com/a...
The surfaces I used were:
Art spectrum Colourfix (Original) paper in white. amzn.to/2f6vsy9
which is a very similar product to
Cansons Mi-tientes Tex (or branded "Touch"" elsewhere in the world)
Ampersand pastelboard (white)
I used my Polychromos, Luminance, Prismacolor and Procolor in these pieces and I found that the Polychromos and Procolour worked the best.
I used odorless mineral spirits to blend in these pieces.
You can find my works in progress on
Facebook: / cassandrahanleyart
Instagram: / cassandrahanley_art

[@BrendaFOBRocks]

i like using pan pastels with colored pencils so i've used the canson mi-teintes paper with colored pencils. Except i first lay down a layer of the pan pastels and then i layer the colored pencils, so ive never worked on the paper with just the colored pencils. i love how the second drawing turned out though so i'll have to try it out!

[@CassandraHanley]

+BrendaFOBRocks ooh I would love to give Pan pastels a shot! They look like a lot of fun!

[@BrendaFOBRocks]

you should try them out! they are really fun and not nearly as messy as soft pastels. colored pencils also layer beautifully on top of the pan pastels :)

[@cassandralyris4918]

"Weirdo covered in rainbow colored dust" is my aesthetic.

[@heinergebhardt8576]

Thank you so much for this Video. I draw on Clairefontaine Pastelmat Paper with colored pencils and get the best results. It is possible to draw more layers and very soft blendings. Also a good paper for me is Hahnemühle Harmony Watercolour Paper hot pressed grain satiné for colored pencils, graphite and charcoal. Kind regards from Germany.

[@missbox1083]

Danke für den Tipp😊

[@BeakerandBella]

I find myself using my Polychromos and Pablos pencils, which are harder, for quickly filling in areas. I switch to my Caran D'ache Luminance pencils for details. This is backwards from how I work when using watercolor papers.

[@CassandraHanley]

Ah! Interesting! I’ll have to have a play with that idea :)

[@katywuste9054]

I loved all 3 and you made it look so easy

[@CassandraHanley]

+Katywu Ste thank you! The first one really was a big experiment, but I really liked the last two pieces. The sanded texture is very different but lots of fun :)

[@MaryThompson63]

I'd love to see a full-length real-time tutorial doing a bird on the sanded surface with OMS. thanks!

[@CassandraHanley]

ooh I would love to make a real time video.. unfortunately my computer is a bit of an old clunker.. and rendering a video that long could take it weeks!! ( well maybe that's an exaggeration... but not by much!) I did purchase some more pastelboard, so I will be making a slower video featuring just one piece soon... and I do have a change jar slowly filling up to upgrade this old PC to something that can handle a longer video and maybe even some live streams. :)

[@MaryThompson63]

Cassandra Hanley There always the possibility of splitting a long video into short posts, say a 1 hr painting into 4 15 min videos. I look forward to seeing more work on the pastelbord. I use sanded paper lately, and have mixed emotions.

[@CassandraHanley]

+Mary Thompson hmmm that is a good idea! I had not considered multi part videos! Thank you for the suggestion!

[@deirdrewoolford7476]

Thanks that was so interesting

[@camilcurn]

I love the "check the mirror" comment. This is so me.

[@AnVoPhotography]

Interesting experiment. Thank you. Beautiful pieces - all three of them. Did you experience that you used more of the pencils than on other surfaces?

[@CassandraHanley]

+An Vo I thought I would... but I really didn't! The pencil tips wore down faster, but because I could use them much longer before I need to sharpen them that seemed to balance out. I also used a lot less layers to build up the same amount of colour. I would say i was using only ever so slightly more pencil on these surfaces

[@AnVoPhotography]

Excellent. Thank you. 😀

[@Kyomiibrown]

Have you tried the brush and pencil with the pastelbord?

[@CassandraHanley]

+Kyomii I have used the titanium white and touch up texture Combo, which works like a dream... I haven't tried the powder blender at all yet!! I really need to try that stuff out!

[@pitagoras833]

Yes... I have been wanting to ask you about that and see what you think. I really like the idea of mixing color pencils so easily. Let us know what you think if you try it.

[@attheranch873]

It’s 2019. so I’m sure you’ve found Pastelmat and Uart 88 papers by now 😀

[@CassandraHanley]

I have certainly found the pastelmat!!! Unfortunately the uart papers are even harder to find here in Australia, but next week I’m going to try out a different colourfix surface and see how that works

[@annaloph]

What kind of thinner liquid is that ? Can I use plain water ? Thanks

[@CassandraHanley]

It is odourless mineral spirits (the same thinner used in oil painting) unfortunately water will only work with watercolour pencils

[@Kyomiibrown]

Which piece was done on the Tex? Is the Tex exactly the same as the Touch?

[@CassandraHanley]

I didn't end up using the tex paper for this specific test.. although I did use it off camera, and found it very (very!!) similar to the Art spectrum colourfix paper that I used for the eagle and the rose. I used the colourfix over the Tex in these tests because my local art shop did not have any white tex paper and I wanted to keep my experiments simplified to a similar coloured support. but both the tex and the colourfix behaved in a very comparable manner when used with colour pencils The touch and the Tex paper, as far as I can tell are different brandings of the same paper used in different countries. Here in Australia, the paper is labeled Tex, where as on overseas sites I can only find it branded as Touch. I hope that helps :)

[@lenmey1]

Hi, what kind of fixative did you use? Thanks

[@CassandraHanley]

+lenmey1 it's just any old workable fixative, nothing fancy... I think I used the micador brand, but for this task any one will do

[@colleenbohan5168]

I went to the site "paintmyphoto" that is mentioned in this video. It is an unsafe site as far as I can tell and I wouldn't use this.

[@kristiofca1]

same here

[@samarberri8648]

It looks like this paper saves you a lot of time. That makes up for the price

[@doralevitt2879]

Wow- can you talk a little slower please? :)

[@CassandraHanley]

haha! ok, so I was slightly miffed at your comment, but listening back, I really did "come out of the gate" like a racehorse on that one!!! I think this may be a fault in my editing.... but either way, suggestion noted

[@karenrichardson6767]

uo can slow it down using the gear symbol. I have done that with other fast talking videos.