Blending is a great technique! But here is a artist's secret; they blend with their fingers. The warm, oily finger makes the blending a ease. It just glides right on. I think this is one of the best techniques I have ever used!

Using Rubber cement to protect white areas is an old commercial art trick. The best way to remove the rubber cement is with rubber cement. Take the lid of an old margarine tub or some similar plastic top, and drop in a blob of clean rubber cement about the size of a quarter. I do this when I am applying the rubber cement mask. Then let it dry. I leave it there as long as I am working on the drawing. Then when I am ready to remove the rubber cement, I simply roll the rubber cement blob off the lid and into a ball. Rubbing this ball against the rubber cement mask quickly and completely removes the mask. While many people keep these blobs around, you can alway make a new one.

To keep white areas crisply white, I apply color to those areas LAST. But during the drawing process, one needs to keep that paper clean and free from pencil "crumbs". To do this, I apply a layer of Rubber Cement to the areas I want white. After the Rubber Cement is dry, you can start shading in your piece. Once ready to apply color to the white areas, simply rub off the Rubber Cement using your fingers or a tortillon/stump in a circular motion - be careful not to smudge the previously shaded areas while doing this. Once the Rubber Cement is off the paper, you can finish your drawing using your white or very light colored pencils! This works for most medium, just be very careful when removing the Rubber Cement!

To acheive a nice velvety texture and superior color saturation with the Soft Core Colored Pencils, I lightly layer my color. Using a soft Cross Hatching technique, apply the color layer by layer (be it one color or multiple) until you see no more paper surface and get the desired color saturation. The lighter the layer, the easier it is to blend with other colors or degrees of lightness. This takes a good bit of time and patience, but the end result is worth it! I do not use any blenders, stumps, tortillons, or mineral spirits... just my Prismacolor Pencils.

'Botanical Painting with Colored Pencils' by Ann Swan Published by Barron's

I have three free colored pencil tutorials on my website. If you'd like to see them please see the link below. http://www.scottdtillett.com/tutorialentrance.html

Since I make art quilts I'm always looking for new ways to use colored pencils. Color Prismacolors directly onto plain cotton fabric, then paint on a fabric medium, allow to dry & heat set according to the fabric medium directions. Your fabric colors are permanent.

When you want to apply an intense color over one light color (for example blush in a girls face) try the following: 1. In a piece of paper make a circle with the marker with the intense color you want to apply. 2. When the color is still wet, pass the colorless blender over the circle with the intense color. This will make the colorless blender get some pigment of the intense color. 3. Carefully color over the light color with the colorless blender (it will have some pigment or tint of the intense color) starting with the darkest part and continue to the lightest part; this will make a beautiful soft gradient. Hope it's useful! :)

Using these marker's are the greatest. Even if you do not get the color right you can go over and over them and the blend so wonderfully!

Take a stylus tool and a small piece of scotch tape, lay the tape down on the colored spot you did not want(or a mistake) and rub the tape with the stylus tool and gently lift up the tape. The tape should pick up the color where you rubbed it. Becareful with the tape not to put it on a big area because it will lift off any color it touches. Great to use this tip in small areas using the corner of the piece of tape. Try it on a scrap paper first, it has helped me in many situations.