Quite Unnecessary but Fun Art Supplies

Got your essential art supplies down? Want to try some that are a little more out there? Take a look at these.

This stuff’s fun, but to be clear, you don’t need this stuff for art. Check out my essentials video for all you need for your traditional practice. But sometimes it’s fun to try new things, and these are some that stuck for me. Links in the resources page in the description.

Let’s start again with paper. Stay cheap, but in addition to a regular sketchbook, get a tiny one. Something that can fit in a bag that you take with you. When you’re out and about, you can draw! You might not use it a ton, but it’s great to have an “emergency drawing kit” when you realize you got to your appointment an hour early and want something to do. I love to use mine on the bus, even though it’s kind of hard to draw there.

Charcoal pencils! Formal art courses will have you using these a ton for value studies, but on your own you might not encounter them much. But they’re pretty fun! They have a nice feel when drawing, make super dark marks on the page, and blend really nicely. But they’re stupid messy. Charcoal gets everywhere: your fingers. Your desk. Your clothes. It washes out… but aaaaaagh. One thing that pairs well with charcoal? Blending stumps. Literally little sticks of compressed paper that you mash onto the page to smear charcoal around. Sounds kinda silly but works really well and keeps your hands mostly clean.

Now for one of my favorites: this gigantic lead holder. Hard to tell in the picture but it’s FAT. 5.6mm lead, no idea why it’s that specific, but these are starting to be more and more popular and they’re so fun to draw with. It’s just like a regular lead holder, but bigger. I love doing my warmups and gesture studies with this. It’s got HEFT. It could probably be used in self defense. But I’m pretty sure it’s for art.

Got some cool pencils or paper you like, or another favorite art tool that you don’t see used a lot? Share in the comments! It’s great to see what people like to create art with. We’re gonna stop at this for the moment, I realize I keep making long videos oops oops oops. But thanks for watching anyway! There’s more to talk about here and that’ll be up very soon. Go find something adventurous to draw with today, and I’ll see you back here.