Touchups using colored pencils - colored pencils vs watercolor pencils

PaulD · August 2021

I'm a brand new member. Charlie -- thanks for your introduction. I'm located in Los Angeles.
I have collected vintage posters for about 50 years. Now I've been putting some of them at auction. But restoration costs have been awful.
I'm thinking of doing some minor touchups myself, primarily folds, creases, minor scuffing and small tears. I have done drawings in the past so I am not afraid of using pencils.
At this point, I'm favoring using high-quality colored pencils rather than watercolor pencils. I think that using colored pencils to gradually achieve the right color might be easier. I am NOT looking to fill in large areas. The folds seem to be the major problem.
Your opinions and recommendations would be appreciated.
Specific recommendations:
Brands of quality colored pencils that are not prohibitively expensive. I've seen good reviews of Arteza & Prismacolor
Is a 72 color set worthfhile or a larger number
I particularly need very light colors to clean up margins
BTW, I have NO desire to getting in involved in anything more than touchups. Removing posters from old linen backings and rebacking posters is not anything I would care learn.

One last question (I'm getting to be like Colombo). I have some posters that have paper loss in the margins. Any suggestions where I could find vintage paper to fill in some missing areas of the margins and glues that can be used to adhere the added paper.

Charlie · August 2021

You may have seen Eisenhower’s and my restoration threads.

If they are backed and already covered in paint - colored pencils might fly. It’s already too late for that poster to be “reversible” or truly conserved. But like you said acrylic is the only way to get coverage vs. water colors. If the poster has a lot of acrylic paint or sealed with fixative etc. there may not be enough tooth for water color pencils.

If they are raw posters I would stay far away from colored pencils. Water color pencils are just as effective for touching up raw folds. The only trouble you may run into is trying to, for example, cover up a sharpie in a white area. Else, dry water color pencils should do an excellent job and you could even get away with wetting the tip of a water color pencil for darker coverage. No brushes needed.

Fabre Castelle Albrecht Dürer Watercolour Pencils are hands down the best. We exclusively used the 3-tray 120 pencil set when we were touching up linenbacking projects and never had problems except as mentioned above.

Dario might also chime in - our restorer member in Canada. He turned us onto these pencils. I also remember him being worried about colored pencils (especially economic sets) leaving oils…

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00AJE9WRE/ref=psdcmw_12896751_t2_B000OV4MPE

Charlie · August 2021

You could buy period lots from EMP for sacrificial posters.

Eisenhower · August 2021

What Charlie said; Albrecht Durer are the best for touching up fold lines. 120 colors = enough colors to match and blend to find the right shades.

Bruce · August 2021

Charlie said:

You could buy period lots from EMP for sacrificial posters.

A lot of people wonder WHO in the world buys 50 1940s one-sheets in fair to good condition, mostly from lesser titles.

Often the buyer is a restorer, professional or amateur.

Touchups using colored pencils - colored pencils vs watercolor pencils

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