Da' Butcher Block: My drawing tools

I got a very nice letter this week from a fellow artist following my blog. He asked about my tools and it's something that's really taken a number of years to get materials I like to work with, everyone is different, half the fun of being an artist is trying new tools! When I was a kid the art store was my church, I can spend hours perusing a good art store.

My digital tools.

I draw on a Wacom 21X Cintiq.
Windows 7 PC- Intel Core Q9450 @ 2.66 GHZ
4GB of memory
Second Monitor is a 24" Dell Ultra Sharp
I use Photoshop CS3
I use Jaime Brushes *you can find them by googling Jaime Jones Photoshop Brushes. It's a great tool set and I've found it has everything I need.

Overall with all my tools I've tried to keep it simple over the years. I usually have 1 or 2 tools in any medium that I do 90% of the work with. The same is true with color and paint, the best workflows are simple.

My layout tools

Eraser sheild for cleanup of my layout
Helix Auto Eraser
Staedtler eraser
Color Erase for rough layout
Staedtler 2h for shading and roughing in the line
Mechanical Pencil with a B lead, I use the manual one for fine details.
I use Staedtler Pigment Liners .01-.05
Standard Sharpie fat and thin markers
Any 'white out' type marker for ink corrections
A standard toothbrush for splattering *not pictured here

My painting tools
I use the Creative Mark brand of paint brushes
I use 2 flat sizes for 90% of my painting a size 4 and 6
I use rounds size 1 for detail work
The palette knives are for impasto FX which is what I use the Impasto paste for, I use a flat and a angled blade.
I use Derivan Matisse Acrylics and mediums.
The types of mediums (the white jars) are a Retarder (keeps paint wet longer), Acrylic Painting Medium, Impasto for building up the surface, and the Varnish is a final coat application when a piece is done.

Surfaces- I like to paint on 3 ply Strathmore cold press (rough texture) Bristol Board, it has a little round stamp on the corner you can't miss it. I've also taken to canvas recently, but Bristol is my standard.