Absolutely beautiful pastel drawing Helen. You use those pastels like a pro! Stunning work. I'm sad to learn they don't excite you because that drawing is outstanding. ❤

I avoid all those dusty media because I can't stand the mess, but I never thought of using a vacuum cleaner to clean up while working! Great idea!

Absolutely love this drawing, just gorgeous. I especially love the grasses in the foreground, keep up the beautiful work!

I can see how those would be nice over watercolor for sure. Thanks for this b

Pastels do seem like they take a lot of work to me but your drawing turned out really beautifully😍 Thank you for sharing and your review🙏🏼

Thank you very much for sharing your process and final results. I like the picture very much.

I am just exploring the world of soft pastels - this video was so helpful. I will ensure I have my hand held vacuum before I start as I can’t stand mess. 😂 Beautiful drawing/painting.

such a gorgeous piece, might have to give these a go ☺☺☺

So beautiful! I love watching pastel paintings!

I love watching you color with pastels 🥰 and thank you for the review

It’s a really beautiful piece of art x

Beautiful end result.❤

Thank you for your Pastelmat Pad review! I was looking for pastel paper and this one seems very nice. 😊

What a fabulous drawing in pastels !

How lovely - I like the softness of the overall effect which possibly would not be possible with watercolours. I’d like to see the same picture done in watercolours though. 👍🐨

Thanks so much for this. I just received some Nyoni colored pencils and am really enjoying them. Thus far they seem very similar to Polychromos. If I get into pastels, I just might check out their pastel pencils, too.

So funny Helen. I got close to the end of your Timelapse process and thought to myself: I wonder how long it’s taken her to do, she gets bored if it’s too long a process… 😆 But the effort involved was very worth it - the final piece is gorgeous. Though I completely understand re not enjoying it if you end up spending more time than youd like to. 😘

Hi Helen, I am sorry you didn’t enjoy your painting process with pastels. We artists always have our likes and dislikes, our favorite materials that we love and feel comfortable on using. All that said, you handled both the soft pastels and the pastel pencils like a pro and your painting is gorgeous. You did everything right, graciously and with utmost patience. Bravo! Even though watercolor paper can technically and successfully be used as a substrate for pastel painting, the different types of sanded papers are a godsend for artists working in this medium. Also, should you attempt in the future another painting like this, using pastels only, maybe you would like to consider taping your paper on a board and working vertically, on a easel, with either a piece of paper, or aluminum sheet, placed like a “tray” underneath the board - to catch in it all the pastel dust falling off your painting. Best if the angle of the board is slightly off vertical line, inclined towards you; then the fall off will not land on the surface underneath, to contaminate and smudge your painting. Thank you so much for your videos, they are always a pleasure to watch. Warm hugs from California ❤🥰

Thanks for the overview Helen. Pastels are not a material I'm overly familiar with..so it's so very helpful seeing them in action.

Lovely finished piece. Alot of pastel artists I watch on you tube have their work on easels that are vertical or even slightly forward so the dust falls off. I'm guilty of just blowing it across the room 🙈 I always find sets of any kind so tricky (even if they are landscape) because I definitely have a favoured colour palette and it means I have swathes of unused red/orange/pink supplies but regularly run out of my favourite light blues, greys and muted greens, and am almost neurotic about having back up yellow ochres - the curse of rural landscape painting in Scotland 😂

Fantastic video and work Helen! And very nice to get your perspective on both the specific materials as well as the process in general . Did you do a piece of this particular spot awhile back? In watercolor, maybe? It’s a beautiful view and a lovely little church. Even if you found it a bit boring, you did a great job of it. Thanks.

Good morning Helen , this was a joy to watch . Pastels have become my "go to" medium over recent times and have many , mainly Derwent , I am not familiar with Nyoni and I can see that they are harder than Derwent also I can see the advantage of that when finer detail is required . My blender is a shaped cork ( not the plastic variety ) which also provides me with a good reason to open another bottle !! Mainly for reasons of economy , for some time I have been preparing my own card , ie cereal packets , which I coat with a mix of chalk paint and PVA . Mean , moi ? Thank you Helen . Mike in Exeter xx

I’m glad you said how long the painting took you, I was curious about that because it looked like a rather long process! It turned out beautifully, but it definitely felt like it was a LOT of work to get there! I have a small set of 12 pastel pencils (Faber castell, maybe?) and I enjoy using them on top of watercolour, but have never attempted anything beyond that. I would like to get some Derwent pastel pencils someday since I like the Derwent drawing pencils so much.

I am sorry that you didn’t take to pastels and the pencils variant, but you still produced an excellent painting. I like the the way you did the grasses and the bush. I love using pastel pencils (Faber Castell PITT, Carbothello and Caran d’Ache and PanPastels for under painting). Derwent are not bad, but when they need sharpening, they frequently break. I hope you will try them again and you have a good paper in Pastelmat.

I liked this scene when you did it in watercolour. As I‘m trying to finish a kingfisher with F.C. Pitt pastels on Canson Ingres paper I to itch to return to watercolor. But, find it‘s good to try other mediums. Thanks

No greens or blues ...😮

Your pastel piece turned out great but they do require a lot work and re-working.