Colored PencilsThe majority of graphite
pencils made in the United States are
painted yellow. According to Henry Petroski, this tradition began in 1890 when the L. & C. Hardtmuth Company of Austria-Hungary introduced their Koh-I-Noor brand, named after the famous diamond. It was intended to be the world's best and most expensive
pencil, and at a time when most pencils were either painted in dark color or not at all, the Koh-I-Noor was yellow. As well as simply being distinctive, the color may have been inspired by the Austro-Hungarian flag; it was also suggestive of the Orient, at a time when the best-quality graphite came from Siberia. Other companies then copied the yellow color so that their pencils would be associated with this high-quality brand, and chose brand names with explicit Oriental references, such as Mikado (renamed Mirado) and Mongol. Not all countries use yellow pencils; however, German pencils, for example, are often green, based on the trademark colors of Faber-Castell, a major German stationery company.
Pencils are commonly rounded, hexagonal or sometimes triangular in section.
Coloring pencils (i.e., those with a colored lead) are generally the same color as the lead.
Unlike wax-based
colored pencils, these can be easily erased. Their main use is in sketching, where the objective is to create an outline using the same color that other media (such as wax pencils, or
watercolor paints) would fill or when the objective is to scan the color sketch. Some animators prefer col-erase to graphite
pencils because they don't smudge as easily, and the different
colors allow for better separation of objects in the sketch. Copy-editors find them useful too, as their markings stand out more than graphite but can be erased.
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