General use of charcoal?

Question

I've decided to try out drawing things with charcoal but I'm new at it so i don't really know if there's any special tricks or whatever to use it because i tried it once and it was really messy and I noted that if I used a 6b pencil i can actually blend it and it appeared darker then the charcoal. Can you just tell me if there's any certain times you should use charcoal like in a picture is it only used to fill in large dark areas? Thanks.

Answer 1

You can definitely use charcoal for entire drawings. It's a fantastic media to work with. It IS very messy, but the messier you get the better the drawing usually. Try vine charcoal for different sizes, & use your hands/fingers to blend, be prepared to get covered in black. =0) You of course can use a 6b (and other) pencils to blend, but charcoal is great for all kinds of effects. You can use is lightly for different shadow affects, you can use it to fill in a large area like you said, you can even fill the entire paper with charcoal, then subtract areas with a kneaded eraser that makes a fantastic drawing. Check out the links below for pic's of this kind of charcoal drawing.