Koh-i-noor mechanical pencil, the best mechanical pencil for drawing 2020 – 2021.
This Koh-i-noor mechanical pencil is one of the most appreciated by medium-large scale drawing professionals and woodworkers, highlighting its firmness, simplicity, comfort and durability, aspects that have been missing in recent years with an infinity of poor quality fine art products that reduce production costs in order to be constantly replaced.
I work on din-a3 and din-a2 paper formats and I usually fit and make the composition with the mechanical pencil freehand, with the board almost vertical. My sketching style is somewhat erratic, with many lines and I tend to leave a lot of margin to the final definition with the ink, so I use a sufficient hardness so as not to dirty too much the areas that I will have to erase and that will remain blank. These vices when it comes to fitting are difficult to change when a cartoonist has been doing it in a certain way for years, which is usually the way that has worked best for his or her purpose. It is acceptable to polish and try to eliminate some aspects in which the materials we use are decisive.
Compared to other mechanical pencils, Koh-i-noor’s is sturdier and heavier. This helps in several ways; the grip between the fingers really feels, making strong lines requires less hand pressure, and fine lines barely need the mechanical pencil to slide across the paper. When drawn with a light, thin pencil, it produces the sensation of drawing strokes in the air. There is a tendency to clench the fingers too tightly and there is a kind of distrust in gestures, and in not being able to use the inertia that generates a little more weight and balance.
The optimum lead thickness for this mechanical pencil is 5.6 mm, which allows us to make an angle to our liking and will withstand a lot of pressure without breaking. It also supports 5.2 mm without any problem. The lead is held tight and strong, does not wobble and conveys security. I personally love working with this thickness because I don’t have to keep an eye on the latter. A cartoonist who likes to take advantage of his gestures, energetic strokes, sketching plots, etc. will know what I mean. An interruption or curb to expressiveness is what can result from using fragile mechanical pencils and very thin leads, which would be more suitable for reduced work and for getting into fine details.
However, if it is precisely fine and detailed work that you are interested in doing, in other years when I was drawing on a smaller scale, the mechanical pencil that I liked the most was the Stadler Silver series. I’ve never liked plastic for materials in general, and this one is aluminum, it’s firm and solid. It has similar characteristics to Koh-i-noor but for thin mines.
Finally, as an eraser I use Faber Castell moldable erasers. These erasers are familiar to all of us because they were also used to stick posters on the walls in school, but they make excellent erasers, especially for charcoal and pastel work. The moldability property is perfect to adapt it to the effect we want to give to the erasing, and if we simply want to erase everything, it can be flattened to cover more surface and erase. Another positive aspect is that it is not aggressive with the paper as hard rubbers are, which can sometimes wear it out.
