The Art Of Maria J. William - materials tutorial

1. Pentel mechanical pencil refills, from 2H to 2B.

2. General's white charcoal pencil (used for highlights on tinted paper).

3. Design kneaded eraser.

4. Acid-free artist's masking tape (good for a variety of uses, from masking an area to taping the drawing to a drawing board).

5. Twist-Erase mechanical pencils by Sanford, in 0.5mm and 0.9mm.

6. An assortment of various sketching pencils, mostly from Design and Prang, grades from 4H to 6B.

Here are the materials I work with most often.
I get most my supplies online at Dick Blick, or at the local Pearl Paint.
Some of my brushes come from Trekell, a small company in Nevada.

1. Pencils and drawing tools.




1. Aluminum palette (any brand will do). 2. Fluid Acrylic in Burnt Umber by Golden (for underpainting and ink drawings). 3. Odorless oil paint thinner by Winsor & Newton (used baby-food jars work great for me to keep small amounts in so I don't have to deal with a big bottle). 4. Gouache colors by Reeves. 5. Winton oil colors by Winsor & Newton. 6. St. Petersburg pan watercolors by Yarka. 7. Soft cotton cloth to wipe brushes.



		3. Surfaces.

	1. #1 cold press, 40-ply, extra heavyweight illustration board by Crescent (for oil paintings). 2. Bristol Vellum drawing pad, #120 by Borden & Riley (for mixed media work, although after having used it for a few graphite drawings I admit I might go 100% Bristol). I've also used Bristol pads by Strathmore (not pictured), which are just as good. 3. Sketch pad, #116 by Borden & Riley (for graphite and colored pencil drawing... even though it says "sketch", the paper is hardly "sketchy", it's thick and has a very nice texture).


1. Prang colored pencils, medium-soft leads. 2. Berol Verithin colored pencils by Sanford, hard leads. 3. Pigma Micron pens by Sakura in black and brown, line width of 0.45mm and 0.20 (for occasional outlines in graphite drawings and line art). 4. Prismacolor colored pencils by Sanford, soft leads.

		2. Painting tools.



	1. Large hog hair brush by Loews-Cornell (for gessoing). 2. Red sable hand-made brushes by Trekell, sizes 0 to 16. 3. Steel palette knife by Dick Blick. 4. Dick Blick's purest red sable Masterstroke series, sizes 0 to 2 (for detail work). 5. Professional Gesso by Utrecht (I usually apply 3 light coats to illustration boards prior to painting).

		3. Working surfaces.

Not pictured here:

1. For most of my watercolor paintings, I use Strathmore series 500 lightweight illustration board (the board only comes in sheets of 22x30" and is rather pricey, but well worth the price).

2. I clean all my brushes immediately after painting with warm water and Original Brush Cleaner And Preserver by B&J.

3. For my tinted drawings (such as this one) I use Canson's Me-Teintes double-sided drawing paper #426 (Moonstone). I also use Fabriano Tiziano pastel papers in Blue-Gray and Pearl Gray, which are similar in texture and quality to Canson's. The only downside is that they come in really large sheets and have to be cut.

4. I protect my finished work with a workable fixatif by Krylon (for drawings and mixed media work) and with Damar Varnish by Winsor & Newton (for oil paintings). With oils, I usually wait at least a year after completion of a painting before I apply the varnish.

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