Faber-Castell Tin of 60 Pitt Pastel Artists Colouring Pencils, High Colour Ideal for Drawing, Sketching, Professional, Hobby Artist, Coloured Pencils Presented in Tin

Excellent pastel pencils. Good price, work best on textured paper/card (=Pastelmat). Blends easily with either a blending stub, a finger, or a cotton bud. With pastelmat I find I can put up to five layers before the pastel mat is too loaded to take another layer (I am heavy handed when drawing). It does cover well and you get a good depth to the drawing as you add more layers. The 60 Pitt pastel pencil tin gives a good choice of colours and the tin holds the pencils in two layers that easily lift out for easy access when drawing. Like all pastel pencils they quickly blunt a pencil sharpener. They are a bit firmer than a Derwent pastel pencil so in a sharpener you are often able to a good point, but I find the pencils last much longer if you use a sharp pocket knife to remove the wood and then either use the pencil as is, or use sand paper to get a point on the pastel core for detailed work. For pet whiskers they work best with the pastel rubbed on paper/sand paper to give a flat headed screwdriver shape at the tip - this shape gives a longer lasting edge to last the full whisker. A sharp point tends to snap, or give a fatter line the further the drawn line lasts (giving a thin to fat whisker). The pigment is very vibrant and photographs extremely well (colours 'pop' out from the page). On an almost finished drawing I do sometimes use Caran D'Ache (=expensive) pastel pencils to add the the last fine details (these hold a point better for finer lines). Caran D'Ache work well over the top of multiple layers of Pitt Pencils. Also, Pitt pencils blend well with Derwent pastel pencils if you want to mix the different colours available from different manufacturers.

I'm obsessed with these. They're so nice to draw with. I haven't used other types of pencil pastels in the past. These are the only ones I've used but I have no reason to reach for anything else because they work exactly how I hope they would. The only thing I added to the collection was a set of stick pastels that I can use to lay down background colors in wide swaths so I can save these to use over top.

Really good, especially fpr the price.

Great quality pastel pencils, durable and not as soft as Carbothello pastel pencils.

Arrived well packaged and on time. I'm still getting to grips with them, because I'm usually a coloured pencil artist,and these are a whole different ball game in the way they are used. Loving the way they blend and they are also very forgiving, in that they can take many layers and it's easy to correct any mistakes. The only downside, and this isn't a fault with the pencils, is that they are difficult to sharpen without a lot of the pencil disappearing in the process, because the 'lead' is so soft. I've tried quite a few sharpeners and even one specifically for pastel pencils, to no avail. Now using a blade and sandpaper to do the job, which is time consuming and can spoil the flow of work. If you are prepared to put up with that though, I would recommend them.

So good

These are a delight to work with. You can layer the colours and the colours can be as vibrant or as soft as you wish. I highly recommend the faber-castell products, they really provide a wonderful pop to a black & white drawing or for a complete soft but vibrant drawing. You can layer these beautifully & they are extremely responsive to pressure to create colour. They are difficult to sharpen & I would recommend a manual hand crank pencil sharpener as I used an electric sharpener & hand sharpener but both were ruining the pencils until I found a mechanical crank sharpener.

I bought at an unbelievable price of £48 on Amazon. Used with Colin Bradley YouTube tuition. These are excellent hard pastels. Can be sharpened to an amazing sharp point with a swordfish rotary sharpener and thus draw in the finest details. Don't use handheld sharpeners they are no good for pastels. You can sharpen with blade but this is very time consuming. Colours layer and blend well.

Excellent colors and easy to sharpen.

Good pencils

As described. Good quality. Quick delivery. Slightly harder than the Carbothellos so good for lines and edges. I use them together. Decent colour range.

These are by far the best pastel pencils on the market! I love them so much. The seller was great and got me my stuff on time without any issues. Would definitely purchase from them again.

I had been using Stabilo Carbothello pencils for years but decided I wanted to give Faber Castell Pitt Pastel Pencils a try. When I see a reveiw on Amazon for pencils and art supplies, the first thing I do is look at the artwork of the reviewer to see if they are amateurs, beginners, or truly advanced artists who know the material they are using. The artwork and quality of the strokes or use of the material tell me a lot. As a professional artist (40 years in film, animation, gallery artwork, and professional art instructor for a state university), I believe I can give a fair evaluation of these pencils, having explored their capabilities and limitations. Pros and Cons on the Faber Castell Pitt Pastel 60 pencil set I purchased: It has a nice range of colors overall well balanced, with some decent nutrals for subduing. Color indicators on the ends of the pencil match the lead color nearly perfectly. Pleased that they have a good range of portrait colors Good range of vibrant bright colors for landscapes, still life, and florals, etc. Leads do break easily when sharpening and can stand up to some decent drawing pressure Not waxy Not "chalky" Generous pigmentation The pencils apply well on smooth or even rough "Pastel" sandy paper. Can be used over dry watercolor painting for accents and detailing. Soft leads, and can also be lifted with a kneaded eraser. In spite of the soft lead, they hold up excellently under hand razor sharpening. Good details with fine tips are possible. Blends easily with each other and with Stabilo Carbothello pastels. Can build up about 4-5 layers before it can't layer anymore (just no more paper tooth to grab it) Will bleed if smearing with water (even though they are not advertised as aqua/watercolor pencils The storage case is metal and well made. It is stacked in two layers with pinch positions to lift the top tray out easily. Cons: Color codes do not have the actual color stamped on the label (ie., "black", "sky blue", etc. You have to go to the website and download their chart and block in the colors for yourself to get it down. It would be easier to locate colors if the pencil was colored on the outside with the color on the inside. It would be less time looking for the needed color. Wish for: More colors in this Pitt-type pastel pencils. Larger sets! Side note: Faber Castell does make an 120 oil based pencil set (Polychromos) but they are oil based and do not blend, hence perhaps the need for more pencils in that set. That being said, I would still enjoy an expanded version of these Pitt-Pastel Pencils, beyond the 60 in the set. Comparison to Stabilo Carbothello "Chalk Pastel Pencils": I cringe at the word "chalk" in the Stabilo brand but I will make the comparison of Stabilo and Faber Castell here. The "chalk" in the Stabilo brand (not Faber Castell) is not chalky unless you consider the soft crumbly aspect of the pencil to equate with the word chalky. There is a small measure of chalk-like consistency but not as far as the color being pale or diluted. Since both pencil brands advertise as Pastels, I will make the comparison of the two here. The FC pastels are more durable. They are not as crumbly as the Stabilo pencils and do not break as easily as the Stabilo pastels. Faber Castel Pitt pastels also hold up under pressure and do not need as much sharpening to keep their shape. More pigment in FC perhaps? They also appear to have the same quality of pigment in them, perhaps a little bit more than Stabilo chalk pastels. That being said, I will still use BOTH brands because of the diversity of colors I get in one that the other may not have. BOTH blend well with each other. Faber Castell comes out slightly ahead in the comparison. They sharpen well without crumbling, they hold up under drawing pressure, and they have a rich pigment, more bang for the buck you might say. I also like the fact that these can be applied to dry watercolor paintings in order to enhance the details and ambiance of the paintings. They CAN be wet and reapplied on wet if needed. So in this regard, they have a good variety of applications in my opinion. Wish list: Please Faber Castell, come out with a larger set of these Pitt-pastel pencils and I'll be the first to buy them!