I discovered you can create an abundance of line marks by using different thicknesses of charcoal, but also by holding it at a different angle or having a different hand hold on it. Obviously the firmer the hold the deeper the line. Also, I noticed that if it is a brand new piece of charcoal it can be quite sharp at the end, despite being a medium or thick piece, and therefore you can produce very fine lines before it starts to wear down. Once it has worn down the marks thicken.
The thicker lines are intense and dark - and can be so easily smudged, as I've noted in my sketchbook. The darker blocks of different shades came out very strong but the lighter shades were rather streaky looking - something that perhaps would depend a lot on the type of paper?
Blending is fairly easy, you can go from as black as the night to really close to white with a steady hand. Charcoal is very good for making something jump out of the page in 3D with the right sort of shading and blending.
The putty rubber is a great tool to lift off some of the charcoal (and only works marginally better than the bread to be honest). It helps to blend in marks and to highlight areas. Very useful.
I was asked to put a small piece of charcoal onto its side and drag it across the page creating curved and straight lines. It worked really well. It picked up the texture of the paper beautifully. The edge of the lines appeared to be darker than the centres, but the centres running down the lines were the parts with all the texture.
I tried one square using a charcoal pencil, which for some reason I didn't find as satisfying as using the sticks. To try and explain it is difficult but I think it may be because perhaps it feels more predictable than the sticks as you seem to have more control over the marks your making. It feels more like a felt pen, whereas the sticks feel maybe more like a dip pen and ink..? The charcoal pencil is very effective for blending though, and a much better cross hatching tool I think.
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