How to Paint Landscapes with Pastels - Learn to use Pastel

Hello and welcome!

In this introduction lecture we will mention the materials used for the pictures. To watch a video showing materials that we use please see the following lecture.

All of the materials can be purchased on our store if you are having trouble obtaining them locally. We have a bundle available on our store with all the materials you need.

Pastel Sticks

In the projects Colin uses the 24 Set of Faber-Castell Polychromos Pastel Sticks. If you purchase this set you will have all the colours you need for all 3 pictures. The colours in the set are:

• 101 White

• 104 Light Yellow Glaze

• 107 Cadmium Yellow

• 115 Dark Cadmium Orange

• 219 Deep Scarlet Red

• 226 Alizarzin Crimson

• 123 Fuchsia

• 160 Manganese Violet

• 137 Blue Violet

• 157 Dark Indigo

• 247 Indanthrene Blue

• 120 Ultramarine

• 110 Phthalo Blue

• 153 Cobalt Turquoise

• 264 Dark Phthalo Green

• 266 Permanent Green

• 167 Permanent Green Olive

• 168 Earth Green Yellowish

• 132 Light Flesh

• 283 Burnt Sienna

• 177 Walnut Brown

• 272 Warm Grey III

• 233 Cold Grey IV

• 199 Black

Pastel Paper

For all pictures I use White Clairefontaine PastelMat Paper, this is a fantastic pastel paper that can hold many layers. The pad size that I use is 18x24cm.

You can choose to use the same paper as me or any other pastel paper you wish.

Blending Tools

I use Colour Shaper blending tools now in all my pictures. These have a rubber tip and can achieve some incredible effects. They blend and manipulate the pastel almost like a paint brush and are very easy to use.

Throughout the courses I use an Ivory Chisel End Shaper - Size 2.

Other Notes

I recommend taping your pastel paper to a piece of hardboard so that you have something sturdy to press against.

Outline Drawing

In Part 1 of each course you will find the Outline Drawing and my finished picture to work with. You can choose to transfer the outline to your pastel paper via your preferred method. To see how I recommend transferring your line drawing see the lecture "Transferring the line drawing".

If you have any questions about the materials please do feel free to get in touch.

In this lecture I explain the materials used in the courses.

In this lecture I explain how to transfer the outline drawing. Although you can use a tracedown graphite carbon I found that using tracedown left marks on the paper. I demonstrate this alternate method as it was a cleaner result for me.