Holds up to 12 pencil leads in one go = the total contents of a typical STAEDTLER lead tube, allowing you to work longer without refilling How it performed: Fine on light graphite lines, not good at dark graphite lines and not great on coloured pencil. Fine on removing the graphite under pigment liner pens and didn’t lighten the ink. Removed the graphite under the watercolour with a bit of damage to the paint. Harder pencils can make grooves in the paper which cannot be erased.- It turns out that the hardness makes it hard to erase even when lightly applied. How it performed: Fine on light graphite lines and worst on coloured pencil. Fine on removing the graphite under pigment liner pens and didn’t lighten the ink. It didn’t remove too much watercolour paint but didn’t erase the graphite at all so was bad at that task. Our products are available in a variety of designs, colours and sizes. In our product range you will also find multifunctional combi erasers that can erase not only pencil markings, but also different kinds of ink. All STAEDTLER erasers ensure excellent erasing comfort, convenient handling and clean erasing. Spare erasers for our mechanical pencils are also available in this category.

b. Gum erasers (also called art gum erasers) – Designed to crumble very easily as they collect up the graphite so they do less damage to the paper. But since they crumble away they don’t last as long. Very soft. Dustless (dust-free) eraser crumbs are larger but can build up under the eraser in an interfering clump. a. Rubber erasers (they used to be made of natural rubber and now some are synthetic rubber)- middle in the scale of firmness. A few contain abrasives like pumice – but those are usually just the rhomboid-shaped school erasers. The abrasives are designed to erase biro ink. Rubber erasers feel a bit powdery to the touch and this bothers some people a great deal. It’s not always easy to tell some synthetic rubber erasers from plastic erasers if they don’t say anywhere, in that case, I go by the powdery feel. A lead tube (STAEDTLER Mars micro carbon 250 or Mars micro color 254) is simply attached to the end of the mechanical pencil and tipped up. All 12 leads fall into the barrel in one go, conveniently allowing you to continue writing with your pencil. This feature is supported by the Mars micro and graphite 779 models. Thanks to its ergonomic triangular shape, the pencil sits comfortably in the hand ensuring relaxed and easy writing. It is particularly suitable for those who spend a lot of time writing with a pencil.

Many people find coloured pencils hard to erase and usually impossible to erase completely. They think the best you can do is lighten an area enough that you can colour over it. Most of the time plastic or rubber erasers smear it so it enlarges the problem. Kneaded erasers are not very good for completely erasing an area. If you need to completely erase an area – first use a kneaded eraser to lift as much graphite as possible to prevent inadvertently pushing dark graphite farther into the paper, then use a firmer eraser to finish erasing completely. First kneading: a bit stiff, had to twist it to get it to move, held together like gum except when I stretched it more than 2cm then would form fine threads that had little bits caught in it that fell out like snow, so I felt I was losing bits of the rubber. This was prevented by only using a twisting or pressing motion, not a stretching motion. Then it was fine. Second kneading of small piece next day: fine. Our high-quality plastic erasers offer the following advantages thanks to their high-quality product features:

Faber Castell Green Dust-Free Eraser (‘dust-free’ means that crumbs clump together) (phthalate free) We are constantly updating our ranges to meet the needs and requirements of the artists who shop with us. We have a selection of new erasers which are all suitable for different styles; some are great for precision erasing and adding highlights to pencil drawings, while some are great for erasing large sections of graphite. The STAEDTLER karat art eraser is primarily used for hobby and artistic applications. This special-purpose art eraser is easy to knead, allowing you to create shading effects by lightly dabbing, for example. This eraser is particularly suitable for use with soft pastel chalks. Kneadable putty erasers work by absorbing colour, they do not wear away. They can be very soft or quite stiff, but are not abrasive. Faber Castell Latex Free Eraser, Cream and Grey, natural rubber (two sides: one for graphite and colour pencils and the other for ink.)First kneading: very smoothly, a bit like chewing gum, was easy to start, easy to knead, held together very well. Very soft. Second kneading of small piece next day: gooey, very soft. I like these but found the brushes on the ends weren’t very good, for a small area a soft paintbrush works better and for a large one a dusting brush is better. Plastic erasers seem cleaner than rubber erasers because their crumbs are not as fine, the rubber eraser crumbs are so fine it is a bit harder to get rid of them all. Rubbers and erasers help to keep your writing accurate. If you're using pencils at home, work, or school, chances are that you'll need an eraser! Not only are they great at fixing unwanted errors, but they can actually help improve your reading and writing skills. This type of rubber is the best choice for erasing highlights in charcoal or pastel because plastic and rubber erasers leave pieces that can smear the drawing when you rub them away, but a putty rubber collects the charcoal or pastel inside itself without leaving any crumbs to brush away.

How it performed: Fine on light graphite lines and same as the others on coloured pencil. Fine on removing the graphite under pigment liner pens and didn’t lighten the ink. It didn’t damage the watercolour paint but didn’t erase the graphite at all so was pointless at that task. This was one of the easiest to use and performed well at subtractive drawing with charcoal and at the two-step coloured pencil erasing as well as some graphite erasing – if you are just doing those things then this might be a good choice. The best method for removal of coloured pencil or a large amount of dark graphite is using a 2-step process. The more easily a graphite mark will smudge – the more easily it will erase. So no matter how lightly you draw with a hard pencil (6H) it will be harder to erase than a soft pencil (HB or 2B). From now on I will use a lightly applied softer pencil for any sketching that I wish to erase after watercolour or ink have been added. You can carve into firm erasers to create a printing stamp similar to lino cutting but with the carved eraser you can print just by pressing down, like a rubber stamp.

Eraser

Caran D’ache Artist Soft Eraser – Recommended for Drawing Paper (phthalate free) – extra soft, non-abrasive, not for ink Drawing Companion Set. A set of drawing tools for sharpening, blending and erasing. Includes a putty rubber and an erasing shield. (This product has now been discontinued – this is a close alternative Jakar Drawing Companion Set) Faber Castell Perfection Pencil, Single Ended Eraser (soft for graphite, coloured pencils and charcoal) Phthalates are a chemical additive that makes plastic pliable (like a squeeze bottle) instead of hard (like the keys on your keyboard). There is more and more evidence that this chemical group affects the human body in negative ways as phthalates interrupt the hormonal system. Many brands of erasers have stopped using them. These plasticisers are in many plastics we use every day, I think they are of particular concern in rubbers because rubbers crumble and this must help expose more of the chemical to the air and skin.