How to sharpen fading sticks! (EN)

      Today, the post will be quite simple but could help few of us. If you make drawings with pencil, you used probably fading sticks. You know, it's the sticks you used to blur the pencil strokes and have a nice drawing?

      A fading stick is OK, but a clean one is better. Indeed, it gets dirty very quick and unfortunately there are only two tips. There are some tricks to make them clean again as described just after:

• Throwaway fading stick, bad for the planet and for your wallet!
• Sharpen the fading stick with pencil sharpener. This will torn the fading stick during sharpening and the surface aspect will be poor!
• Sharpen the fading stick with a cutter. It will be clean again but the surface aspect will be poor. Moreover cutter is a dangerous tool, mind your fingers!
• Sand down the fading stick. This is my favorite and the surface aspect is quickly nice!

This technic has few advantages:

• We can adjust the angle of the tip manually!
• It's getting clean again very quick!
• The surface aspect is nice!
• It's safe for your fingers!

To make this cleaning trick, you will need some components:

• Ideally a box you can close with a hinge (similar to compass box for example)
• Sheets of sandpaper
• Double-face scotch whether the sandpaper is not glued on the other side.

      Next steps are quite easy, you apply the sandpaper inside the box, on the cover. You can use the sticking side or double face scotch. Then you only have to scratch the tip of the fading stick on the sandpaper to remove dirt parts. Once you have finished your session, you can close the box thanks to the hinge, so the dust will go inside. You can clean up the box with your trash can or vacuum! When the sandpaper is overcharged, you can remove it and add a new part!

Good to know: Fading stick's dust is easily volatil! If the box closed, you can avoid some accidents like sneeze / air flow!

Good to know: If you add some oil on your fading stick to make shading, sandpaper may by overcharged quicker!

If you learned something or simply this article, please like it and add a comment on my Facebook page "Un tour chez Max". Thanks & Banzaï! -Max-