A Case for Pencils: Interview with Cartoonist Tom Gauld

I like pencils -- real wooden ones that you need to sharpen. I have a small collection of them in various hardnesses, mostly for note-taking and working out ideas. I'm not an artist; I don't sketch with them, excluding simple flowchart-type diagrams.

They always work, the lines don't fade or bleed, they can write in any position, when you use them up the stub is biodegradable, not a plastic shell that will sit in a landfill for 200 years.

I think pencils for everyday writing and refillable/fountain pens for stuff that really needs to be indelible are the best combination.

> Tool I wish existed: A paintbrush with an undo setting.

Amen brother.

As regards the role of pencils in the creative process, the author seems to primitise it’s role as a tool for development, less so for authorship. I can concur. Working things out seems so much easier in pencil than in digital anything. For me, this is a tactile thing… graphite is after all, a lubricant, and paper is pretty much a skin.

Anything past the development (sketching) stage is pretty much post-Morten. For the last 100 years, finalization has required mediums which reproduce effectively using photo-reproduction: pen, ink and suchlike.

What's funny is that several of his New Yorker covers are - amazingly - more than simple drawings.

For my analog fans and family. Check out Blackwing pencils. Get the sampler or the 602 (most popular).