Review: ArtGraf 22cm Pencils

This longer than usual pencils are made by Viarco, the Portuguese company that makes all sorts of graphite products. I've featured several of their products before on my channel and their watersoluble products are nice.

I bought these pencils because I wanted to find out what's the big deal with them. They are even more expensive compared to the Palomino Blackwing pencils, which are already expensive pencils.

The pencils I bought came in a set of two. One's watersoluble, the other is not.

The first thing I don't get about these pencils is why they are so long. If you wanted the pencils to last longer, you can buy a few more pencils. If you want a longer pencil, you can get pencil extenders which are reusable.

One significant downside to these pencils is they don't fit the standard hand-held blade graphite pencil sharpeners. The hexagonal bodies are slightly bigger compared to typical graphite pencils and that extra thickness is enough to make it too big for standard sharpeners. So you'll have to sharpen these with cutting knives which is something I find inconvenient. The good thing is the graphite core is strong so these can be sharpened easily without breakage.

The white watersoluble pencil looks very much like HB. Above are washes created by scrubbing the paper.

The Cretacolor and Derwent watersoluble pencils are easier to dissolve, maybe because they are softer.

If you apply pressure when drawing, those watersoluble lines will take time and scrubbing to dissolve, and even so they may not dissolve completely.

These pencils aren't really worth the extra price over other brands of graphite or watersoluble pencils.

Unless you really need a long pencil without a pencil extender, yeah, go ahead. But otherwise, for your money, you can find lots of better pencils out there.

My pencils were bought at Overjoyed
https://www.overjoyed.xyz/product/artgraf-water-soluble-graphite-pencil…

Try searching Amazon and Jackson's Art (UK).

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