My Darkest, Darks

Here I go, starting to lay in some of the darkest darks. I do not start putting the darks in until I am positive that what I have so far is correct. Once you lay that dark in there, it's very difficult to lift it back out if you make a boo boo. The darkest darks are absolutely essential to make everything stand out and really pop. 

  I use, what I affectionately refer to as my "Fat Boys". Basically it is a 9XXB pencil. It's a hybrid, a graphite and carbon mix. Very soft and dark and as a bonus, they don't leave that nasty graphite shine that plague us pencil artists but they do have a drawback. They are grainy. In this case, I am liking the grainy texture for this piece but it doesn't work for all applications. 

 My hubby, a great pencil artist in his own right, doesn't care for the Fat Boys and really won't use them. They can be difficult but I seem to have figured them out. Well, back to my drawing board to see just how far along I can get on this guy today.