When beginning a journey, one must be well acquainted with one's instruments. Some of them may be a lifesaver in tricky, complicated situations. For example, a small flashlight might clear one's way. Applying the same analogy to making art, one must be well acquainted with one's flashlight in the dark; in this case, a pen, pencil or paper to create beautiful imaginations of art.
In 2019, I was preparing for my journey to Italy for my masters in Transportation Design at IED Istituto Europeo di Design. I wanted to be well prepared for my first few days at school, so I decided to purchase a sketchpad from home. I was unaware of the type of paper used for sketching cars. I had been practicing on cheap, simple photocopy paper and was ready to level up.
Being cautious about the environment, I decided to purchase a "Daler Rowney Eco Drawing Pad". The branding displayed, Recycled paper, acid free, 120 gsm, A3, 50 pages sketchpad, made in England. The cost was equivalent to 9.75£, which I purchased for a fifty percent of that. It was pretty economic, I think. I had tested the by making a sketch, but wasn't so impressed by it. Turned out, that this paper wasn't fit for Car Designs. I hardly ever used it.
3 years later, I began sketching animals, human portraits, anatomies of humans, erotic drawings with Stabilo color pencils. The paper turned out to be really good, compared to the smooth paper used for Industrial Design. The sketchpad was sturdy, and really good for pencil art. It had a good grain and the paper wasn't destroyed after hard scribbles. I began using graphite pencils and tried a bit of watercolor pencilwork. Graphite work turned out to be excellent, but the water color wasn't forgiving to the recycled paper. Although, it wasn't too good with shading, since smearing with a cloth would run the sketch. On the other hand, the paper worked very well with pen and ink illustrations. I didn't use pastels, so nothing to comment on that.
Final thoughts, the paper is good for sketching, illustrating with pen and pencil, and not good with water mediums. An inexpensive, sturdy pad with recycled paper makes this my favorable surface for me to sketch. I'll rate this one 4/5.
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