The Derwent Lightfast pencil range is an enjoyable range of coloured pencils. This post will have a closer look at the colours available in this lightfast range of 100 coloured pencils.
How this post can help you
You have limited time and energy, yet you want to thoroughly know your coloured pencils. You know it will take time to make colour charts.
This post will help you get to know your pencil colours a bit better without you having to sit and swatch out your colours – especially if you need them in a hurry. This post will also help you to choose the colour combinations you need in your creations.
The pencil names, and each pencil’s lightfast rating are written on the pencil. However, this range of coloured pencils have no identifying numbers.
To help you, we have developed a slim interactive colour chart in which you can search and sort all the 100 pencils in the Derwent Lightfast range.
Read this disclaimer about the analysis.
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Let’s Start…
This post has images of hand drawn colour swatches for each pencil in the range.
The 100 Derwent Lightfast pencils have a lightfast rating of I or II.
Let’s separate these pencils into two colour family groups – the colour wheel colours, and the neutral colours.
The 100 Derwent Lightfast Pencil range Colour Wheel Colours
The Colour Wheel Clock
The colour wheel moves clock-wise around the wheel. The image below shows the colour family positions on the clock.
In the image below, you see a pie chart showing a count of the colour wheel colours, and neutral colours we have identified in the Derwent Lightfast range of pencils.
This information is also shown in a line graph below.
Of the colour wheel colours, while the colours are of varying shades and tones, the predominant base colour belongs to the colour wheel family in which it has been placed.
Let’s get a closer look at the colour wheel colours. The image below shows that the range has colours in all of the 12 colour wheel colour family groups.
Let’s look at them one by one.
Red – 12.00 o’clock
We will start with red at the 12.00 o’clock position.
See this short video and post about how you can use monochromatic red and Derwent Lightfast pencils.
Red-Orange – 1.00 o’clock
The next colour family group is red-orange at 1.00 o’clock.
Orange – 2.00 o’clock
Next colour wheel colour family is orange at 2.00 o’clock.
Orange-Yellow – 3.00 o’clock
Orange-Yellow sits at the 3.00 o’clock position.
Yellow – 4.00 o’clock
At 4.00 o’clock sits Yellow.
Yellow-Green – 5.00 o’clock
Yellow-Green sits at 5.00 o’clock.
Green – 6.00 o’clock
The colour family of green sits at 6.00 o’clock.
Green-Blue – 7.00 o’clock
Green-blue is at 7.00 o’clock.
Blue – 8.00 o’clock
The colour wheel colour family blue sits at the 8.00 o’clock position.
Blue-Violet – 9.00 o’clock
Blue-violet sits at the 9.00 o’clock position.
Violet – 10.00 o’clock
Violet sits at the 10.00 o’clock position.
Violet-Red – 11.00 o’clock
Violet-red is the last colour in the Derwent Lightfast pencil range that sits at the 11.00 o’clock position.
100 Derwent Lightfast Pencil Range – Colour Wheel Colour Family – Summary
As you can see from the above images, the Derwent Lightfast range of 100 pencils holds pencils in all the colour family groups. The range has more than 4 pencils in most of the colour wheel colours, excluding red (2 pencils), and orange (1 pencil), however, it has a strong range of 17 red-orange coloured pencils. It holds a wide range of violet-red, orange-yellow, and green-blue pencils, all which have 10 pencils each. The bar chart below shows this breakdown.
Now let’s look at the neutral colours included in the group of Derwent Lightfast coloured pencils.
100 Derwent Lightfast pencil range – Neutral colours
This pie chart shows a breakdown of the neutral colours available in the Derwent Lightfast range of 100 pencils.
Another way of looking at these numbers is provided in the bar chart below.
The Derwent Lightfast pencil range has 11 neutral pencils.
The range has metallic coloured pencils. However, they are identified as colour that belong to colour wheel colour families. This is because they are not noticeably metallic.
Also, while the range provides a ‘white’ pencil, when drawn, it appears yellow. It is therefore, included in the yellow colour wheel colour family.
There are five neutral family groups.
There is neutral-warm grey.
Next follows is neutral-warm brown.
Next up is neutral-cool grey.
Neutral-cool brown follows next.
Finally, neutral-black is available.
Colour summary of the 100 Derwent Lightfast pencils
As you can see, the collective Derwent Lightfast pencil range is made up of a variety of colours and neutrals.
While lacking in red, and orange, colour family pencils, these are made up with a strong representation of 17 red-orange pencils.
As noted above, the selection of colour is subjective and the reviewer has chosen colour by looking at the actual coloured pencil swatches. Nevertheless, you may find that particular colours belong in different groups or families.
Lightfastness
This is a set of pencils with excellent lightfast ratings. Of the 100 set of coloured pencils, 52 have a lightfast rating of I, 48 have a lightfast rating of II.
Make your own colour chart
For your knowledge, it’s advisable to draw up your own colour chart so you can get to know the actual colours of your coloured pencils. You will then be able to see how your pencils perform on the papers you use for your drawings.
However, it takes a long time to make your own chart, and it usually is something that we don’t get around to doing.
If you’ve made your own charts – that’s great. But – is as practical, you might also have your charts in one physical place while you draw in another. You need to have access to the colours where you are – hopefully, you’ll be there with internet access to your mobile device.
100 Derwent Lightfast pencil range interactive colour chart – slim
To help you with this, we created a slim interactive colour chart where you can search and sort all the 100 pencils. You can search and sort this range of pencils by pencil name, and lightfast rating. Also see hand drawn colour swatches for these pencils.
Want to see this post later? Save it to your ‘lightfast pencils’ board on Pinterest.
This post was originally published on 18 November 2020. It was updated on 24 June 2021, 16 August, 2021, and republished on 10 November 2021.