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A fixative is designed to enable artists to lose the least amount of their work, especially when it is important to conserve as much as possible. Let’s explore more how fixatives for charcoal, pencil, and chalk can help or hurt our art.

Why Would You Use Fixatives for Charcoal, Pencil, and Chalk

Our art is precious to us. It represents our thoughts, emotions, and interests, directly from our hand. Drawings are a great way to create and express ourselves. They also allow us to study objects, develop beautiful scenes, and make wall art that suit us, our friends, or our customers.

The last thing we want is for our art to be compromised in its quality and ruined by smudging, flaking, or smearing. Chalk and charcoal in particular are very prone to being disrupted, with particles falling at the smallest bump or movement. Even blowing on powdery charcoal can make it fly everywhere.

What is a Fixative, Exactly?

A fixative comes in a spray can that projects a type of varnish which affixes particles together, sort of like a very thin and invisible glue. Fixatives are meant to be as unnoticed as possible, designed for easy use and no hassles. They are not meant to add to artwork, but to be applied as an invisible aid to the artist.

There are two types of fixatives. One is a workable fixative, the other is a final fixative. They each have their own place, but some artists might want to rely only on one.

Workable Fixative

A workable fixative is meant to be used throughout an artist’s process. The fixative itself is applied between layers of drawing. This helps the artist make changes throughout their practice, without disturbing or disrupting the charcoal, pencil, or chalk. The fixative itself can help accept the medium, acting as a sort of invisible ground that holds the particles to itself.

Final Fixative (non-workable)

A final fixative is meant to hold a drawing together at the end, without further work being done on top of it. Some artists just use a workable fixative throughout and ignore a final fixative, as it might feel redundant. A final fixative, however, can bring an overall harmonious quality to the end product, whether the artist wants a satin or matte finish to interact with light in a consistent way.

Which Do You Choose?

This comes down to the preference of the artist and their working methods. By reading how fixatives work you might get a sense of how you could use them. Just be sure to understand that a final fixative will not work well as an in-between layer of protection. It is meant to be final.

Cons of Using Fixatives for Charcoal, Pencil, and Chalk

The most common frustration for artists when it comes to using fixatives for charcoal, pencil, and chalk is a change in coloring of the paper. When you spray the paper with the fixative, it does alter the way the paper looks, even if only slightly. That might be enough to bother some artists.

However, some of this may be due to faulty use. While there will probably be some change in the color that is unavoidable, there are good practices to prevent it from being overwhelming. Make sure to have the artwork at a vertical angle, not on its back. Otherwise, puddling and oversaturation can happen, making the color-changing worse.

Another thing that may affect coloring is holding the can too close when spraying the surface. This results in a heavy spray, without much finesse and control. Make sure to hold the can far enough away to prevent this from happening. Starting with a small amount helps. Testing on scrap paper also gives you more clarity as to the effect the spray will have on the paper.

Alternatives to Fixatives

Even with practice and a good understanding of fixatives, some artists will not like using them. There are some other solutions that can make for successful drawings and displays.

Paper Choice

First, starting with a paper that has a lot of “tooth” can help from the get-go. This won’t prevent all issues, but it can make things easier from the start. Choosing a paper with texture will help the particles of charcoal, graphite, or chalk remain embedded in the fibers of the surface. This helps the drawing stay together when the paper is moved or jossled, but won’t always help with smearing or smudging.

Framing Behind Glass

While putting the artwork behind glass isn’t a perfect fix in its own right, thinking about the distance you can put between the glass and artwork with matboard helps display the art without problems. Choose a thick matboard to frame around the art and make sure to clean the glass before framing, on both sides. Cleaning the glass with cleaner reduces static, which might interact with the drawing.

Hairspray, a No-No

Do not use hairspray to affix a drawing. In the past, this was something artists did if they didn’t have fixative handy. However, it is harmful to the paper and not acid-free. Avoid it.

In Summary

Fixatives for charcoal, pencil, and chalk are a mixed bag. However, with the proper methods you may end up happier using them than foregoing them. This is especially true if you find yourself frustrated by your drawings smudging or smearing or losing delicate powdery parts.

Ultimately, you are going to have to decide what is most important to you. As technology improves, I’m sure there will be better options eventually, but for now we have to decide based on our own preferences.

Charcoal Supplies at Dick Blick

Pencil Supplies at Dick Blick

Chalk Supplies at Dick Blick

Fixative Supplies at Dick Blick

Interested in Learning a Painting Medium? Read This First

Need More Help?

I am always open to taking on private lesson students. I offer one free half-hour to get an idea of what your goals are and how we can get you to them. Then I design a specific lesson plan for you and we go from there. You can hire me for your personal lessons here at SuperProf or here at LessonFace.

Note from Adam: I asked my friend Beth to write up a guide through her process. I’ve known Beth for over a decade now (time flies!) from our days in Grad school at DigiPen. She’s a talented artist and I’ve been consistently impressed by her pet portraits which have such amazing artistry and character to them. I would highly recommend giving her Instagram a follow (@sit.stay.sketch) and visiting her website (Beth Reidmiller). I hope you enjoy this fascinating look at her process. 🙂

Written by Beth Reidmiller

Hello there! My friend and fellow grad-school-survivor Adam asked me to write up a bit about my process, so if you like pets and art….read on!

I have dabbled in a lot of different mediums during my time as an artist. My undergrad degree is in painting where I mostly did acrylic abstract pieces, my graduate degree is in digital art where I 3D modeled characters but also really got into figure drawing. Now I digitally color comics in Photoshop as a day job, and I’ve been taking pet portrait commissions for the last few years mainly in ink and color pencil. All mediums have their perks, their challenges, and their limits. But it doesn’t matter what tool is in your hand, you’re still using the same decision making processes with the basics of color theory, form, contrast, value…ya know, the things your middle-school art teacher probably tried to teach you, but you were busy drawing Sailor Moon.

What I Use

So as I mentioned, I’ve been doing a lot of pet portraits over the last few years. I’m a huge dog lover, so I find a lot of joy in the various pets people entrust me with. And because of this, my physical-media collection has grown quite a bit. Here’s what I use:

Copic Markers: These are alcohol-based art markers, and they are top-shelf. They may seem expensive, but you can replace every single part of them as they wear or run out, so in the long run they are actually quite economical! There are lots of rip-offs, but in my experience, if you’re going to commit to using them, they’re worth the investment. I personally like the “Sketch” series, because I use the brush tip almost exclusively.

The unique thing about these markers is, well, they’re markers. The color is set. Since they’re alcohol-based, you can do some blending (depending on the strength of your paper), and depending on the color, they are relatively transparent. But similar to watercolors, you have to commit to your strokes, and if you go too dark, you’re kind of stuck. This is also where the cost comes in – if you need a specific color, you can’t just mix it, you have to go buy that color. (Although apparently you can mix your own ink colors using the refills, which is pretty cool, but their catalog is so huge I don’t think I’d ever need to do that…)

Tombow Markers: I used to use these a lot more (their greyscale set is killer). I still use the black more often, as it’s a stronger black than the Copic marker. But for a greyscale project, these are really lovely. I love the brush tip, but they do not blend.

Faber Castel White Pens: I. Love. These. Pens. Faber Castel makes a white pen in multiple sizes and nib types. The brush nib is slightly transparent but can be built up. But if you want a really strong white line…

Gelly Roll: You heard me. Gelly Roll size 10 is shockingly, in my opinion, the best white ink pen on the market. (Don’t go any smaller than 8, as the ink is too thick to flow.) I love this pen, and you’ll see below that I use it to great effect.

Color Pencils: I use the same color pencils I was given nearly 20 years ago, as I only use them for accents. I don’t have a single brand I love, but I tend to like softer pencils.

So here is my setup when I’m working on a portrait. Reference photo on the screen, all my supplies in front of me, and the piece I’m working on taped to my LED lightboard. I do the initial sketch digitally, print it out, use the light board to transfer it to the paper with pencil, then go into more details by sight. Due to the nature of the Copics, they will smear pencil, so I rub a kneadable eraser over the finished sketch before I start.

You’ll see in the photo above that I have a color chart for the Copics. This chart is so dang handy for many reasons – first being the plastic caps very rarely show the true color of the ink, and second, it helps me stay organized.

Most pet portraits I do are on toned paper (either brown or gray, depending on the color of the animal). I really like how white ink and light color pencils make the subject pop off the paper, so although I do offer portraits on white paper, the most common is the brown paper.

Much like starting a painting with an underpainting, starting on brown paper helps me set the mid-tone. When I start on white, I work more like watercolors with the lightest areas first, and build up layers of color. When I’m working on toned paper, it’s a little more like painting with gouache, as I know I can lighten some things up later with white ink or color pencil. I keep a scratch piece of paper next to me so I can test marker colors to make sure they’re what I’m expecting (some of the lighter colors don’t show up at all).

My Process

So for this portrait, Pepeiao, the client requested he wear a lei. A couple years ago I did their two dogs with leis, so they wanted to complete the collection.

I started with the darker outlines for him, since they’re so obvious and striking, and helped me keep track of the form. I had to make sure the black ink I used wouldn’t blur or smear when interacting with the Copics – always test your materials! Good news: Tombows and Copics can be friends.

Next I went in with various warm grays and browns to build up his tabby coloring. This brown paper really lends itself well to tabby coloring!

Then I tackled the pinks of his nose and ears, and his green eyes. This portrait is a little more straight forward “cat color”. I recently did a black cat that was a lot of fun because I got to play with more blues and purples.

Once I was happy with the cat in general (we haven’t gotten to the color pencils yet!), I tackled the Maile lei. Being that I do mostly animals, my green selection of markers is limited, so I’m glad that dark blue worked to bring the depth. This is a situation where, when working quickly, you can blend (or at least blur) the inks if you overlay a lighter ink on the darker. Laying down the dark blue, then immediately the lightest green helped take the edge off.

Now here’s the fun part – the white pen and color pencils! I used my bright green pencil to highlight the eyes and sharpen the edges of the leaves, and then the blue-gray pencil to cool down the leaf highlights. The light tan pencil (my favorite, as you can tell by how shaved down it is!) is the perfect warm highlight for animals this color. I brightened up the patches around his eyes, his stripes, and the hairs in his ears. Then the white brush pen added the white to his nose and a couple highlights here and there. The Jelly Roll pen added absolute white highlights (eyes, nose) and his whiskers. The white outline is a style choice I made a while ago and have stuck with it, because I think it makes the whole portrait pop more.

So here he is in his final glory! Thanks for following along, and I hope you learned a technique or two you can take with you in your own work!

I wish I could say that you could commission your own pet portrait, but I’m about to go on maternity leave, so go to Instagram and follow @sit.stay.sketch to get news of when I’m back!

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Fixatives for Charcoal, Pencil, and Chalk; Is it Worth It?