Comments about Derwent Graphic Pencils:

These are my favorite graphite pencils. The best! Smooth and dark. They sharpen well without breaking too.

Comments about Derwent Graphic Pencils:

These pencils are so smooth. Easy to blend. Love them!

Comments about Derwent Graphic Pencils:

I am a beginning artist,however, I have been buying Blick art supplies for my son who has been painting and drawing since he was 9 (30 years). We used to have a retail store in PA . It's so easy now to order and purchase. I always know where my order is in transit and I can keep track of any back orders. Thanks Dick Blick. I find all my needs there.

Comments about Derwent Graphic Pencils:

We use these pencils for black and white portraits. I love the quality of this set. The different shades gives just the right dimensions.

Comments about Derwent Graphic Pencils:

Perfect pencils / my 14 year old love them

Comments about Derwent Graphic Pencils:

I kept having problems with the lead in the pencils I was using,they were to grainy; however, now I have the Derwent pencils from Blick and can draw with smooth perfect lines and great to blend. I also love the fact that I am able to buy my favorite pencils separately instead of just in the set boxes!

Comments about Derwent Graphic Pencils:

I bought these pencils for a college Intro Drawing class, and they worked really well. The pencil doesn't break randomly, and is nice to grip and work with. I would recommend these to anyone who is going to do a lot of drawing.

Comments about Derwent Graphic Pencils:

I like to use the harder Derwent Graphic Pencils for faint sketching for my watercolors. I've never been disappointed with these pencils.

Comments about Derwent Graphic Pencils:

These graphite pencils have just the right gradation and, since they are in the softest range, afford me the control of values with ease.

Comments about Derwent Graphic Pencils:

My main pencil is the Staedtler Mars Lumograph, but I've been trying many different brands lately--not really to replace the Staedtlers, but to just get a feel for what is out there.

These Derwent pencils are great. No complaints at all (well okay, I'll give just one below). They draw smoothly, the hardness grading is accurate and well-distributed over the range, they lay on the paper and blend nicely, and they erase well. I won't really say they are better than my Staedtler pencils, but they are certainly no worse either. I'd rate them as very close.

Things I liked about them: well... they glide on the paper very well. And I REALLY like that there is a 9H in the line (it gives a nice flat shade). This is in fact a temptation for me to start using them much more often. Also, the 9B pencil is still a real graphite pencil. I REALLY liked that too. My Staedtler 8B is something besides graphite--it draws more like a prismacolor pencil and is noticeably different from the rest of the set because it feels very waxy and, even though it is nice and dark, it has a flatter sheen than the other pencils. This was NOT the case with the Derwent 9B. They were consistent from 9H to 9B as far as real graphite and a real graphite look on the paper. This is a BIG plus, because several manufacturers (as with Staedtler) market their 8B and 9B pencils as "graphite" and they really are not the same graphite used in the rest of the pencils, if they are graphite at all. They should be marketed as something different (as Kimberly does with the 9xxB pencil). So, I give a big thumbs-up for Derwent's consistency through their hardnesses.

Thing I didn't like so much: the hardness label is on only one facet of the pencil--let's get that printed on all six sides or at least three, folks!

I will say the pencils have a slightly more "waxy" (maybe that's not quite the right word, but just different: maybe "softer"?) feel than my Staedtlers (just VERY slightly, though)--that's not really a good or bad thing. It's just a matter of getting used to it and personal preference. It didn't affect the performance at all, and I could go with it just fine.

All in all, these are great pencils and I would put them far ahead of most manufacturers. I'd put them in the "great pencils" class with Caran d'Ache, Staedtler, and Tombow (although Tombow has a little problem with their hardness rating scale). Ultimately, you can't go wrong with Derwent pencils.