Putting White Fur Over Dark Colours with Pastel Pencils

One of our members Michelle sent us her picture of the Siamese Kitten that she had completed using our course. As a member she is able to receive feedback on areas she found challenging. Here's Michelle's email:

Hi Colin and Steve,I followed the tutorial on this kitten and really enjoyed it, my most challenging places were the little white firs on the face and the ears. I am keen to learn more techniques, this tutorial helped me to not overload the paper, this is also a challenge so I have watched your tutorials on holding the pencils and how to avoid/ redeem this.Really enjoying the course thank you.Michelle

To listen or read Colin's advice see below:Hi Michelle. I'm looking at your lovely picture of the Siamese cat and I think you've done a great job. I'm really impressed. You have a problem with the white hairs and I'm not surprised this is difficult because unless you have a really really sharp point and I mean it's got to be like a needle sharp when you zip them in.Now I've mentioned this before zipping if you try to draw them in it won't work. It just drags the colour. But if you zip them in, it cuts through that colour. Worth practicing on some spare paper really put a bit of bark colour on to the paper and then just try to zip the colour into it you find it will work.Another thing is that I recently started using the general white charcoal pencils. These are available on the Internet just type in on your search "general white charcoal" (or click here for Amazon Link) and you you will find them very reasonably priced.I think they're very very low postage so it's worth getting a couple of those and those two pencils will last you quite a long time. And you can sharpen them with a pencil sharpener they actually come with a pencil sharpener so you can use the pencil sharpener they give you. You can get a really superfine point and that will cut through the colour better than even our very sharp white pencils.Anyway I think you've done a great job and I look forward to seeing more of your pictures.