...and not a sign of any airplanes. But also shaded with your usual, and enviable, attention to a smooth application. Gap-free, too.
They do, don't they. Almost perfectly. I should mention that's a method I have successfully used, BUT it cannot be relied on. Maybe always test an unimportant area first.The middle portion of the exercise shows a soft over hard and a hard over soft application, and these pencils demonstrate the "graphite resist" beautifully.
That - to me - is very interesting, because it's not something I ever head mentioned. It just evolved as a way of working over the years while I was drawing. I've no doubt many artists think they "discovered" a technique or method, too. I certainly thought I'd discovered indenting, maybe 40 years ago, and pre-Internet... but I subsequently met other artists who also thought they's discovered it. Seems we artists are an inventive bunch.The lesson to be learned or reinforced here is that hard graphite is always applied over soft. This lesson is taught in every art instruction method that I am familiar with, academic or not...
That, to me, seems to be the perfect approach. Having that accurate reference is an excellent way of showing the brain what it's aiming for. If I hadn't used it myself in the past, I'd say it was genius on your part....and rotate it 90 degrees counter-clockwise, and compare it to the computer-generated 9 value scale...
It looks as though you've found the ideal pencils for you in your location. Congratulations. And don't be put off by the brand being unknown to you until now. I was in the same position when I found Ivorex paper. Subsequently, I found it was available in some art shops - but its Mellotex and Conqueror offspring were not. They're both archival offset-litho printing papers. And they suit the way I work, and served to mould it too.In all honesty, I rather like these pencils, they sharpen well, keep their point for a very long time, blend nicely and the application is very smooth, and they are readily available here. I prefer them to the lead holders and the UNI leads, at least for these exercises...