Pepy Graphite Professional Drawing Pencils - Set of 12 4B Pre-Sharpened Black Lead Pencils; Perfect for Drawing, Sketching and Shading, Graphic and Fine Art

Good Product. I needed a soft pencil to write on a slate.

In a quest to find some odd grades of soft graphite pencils, Pepy Aero "Journal 1777" appeared in a general Amazon search for 7B pencils. The slightly lower price caught my attention but the packaging graphics turned me off as a cheap knockoff brand I'd not heard of. However, since I have been going a bit heavy on the Japanese and German pencil makers lately I thought I'd give their 7B a try. After one day, I bought the 5B and 9B.The graphite is comparable in thickness with Staedtler but not quite that of a Mitsubishi Uni. The darkness is very close to the Castell 9000 - 5B, 7B, and 9B comparable. Often, the sound of the graphite on a given paper surface gives information about the feel of a running line. The Aero 1777 Journal, both 7B and 9B, sound (and feel) very much like a Toison d'or 1900 6B, close to a Blackwing Eras "Soft", but not as warm as the Staedtler Mars Lumograph 7B. While the Journal 1777 5B, 7B, and 9B lack the buttery feel of the Mitsubishi Uni line, they have a nice balance between that soft chalky and smooth oily flow kind of reminiscent but short that peculiar balance found in the Gekkoso 8B. And speaking of balance, it feels very evenly balanced physically which is why many artist pencils lack an eraser that tilts the weight away from the writing/drawing surface contact. I can't tell what type of wood is used but it is very light and sharpens easily.The Aero Journal 1777 is intended for general office use and would excel easily in that environment. The slightly lower price than most specialist pencils makes them appealing. They sharpen easily. I'd prefer if they didn't sharpen them before placing in the box since I would rather do that myself. They look goofy out of the box with the straight collar at the coating and uneven collar at the graphite. The physical lightness is a bit unusual and may take some getting accustomed to. The marketing department for these pencils needs to update their fonts, and box design - it looks like a Soviet era branding and not very Austrian. The red paint coating lacks the consistency found in higher end pencils and with my 30 pencils lined up, I can see variations of color intensity suggesting minor quality control issues in their paint application. I don't like how the hardness is only viewable on the barcode side. Also, the box is generic to the Journal 1777 with a sticker applied to indicate hardness and, sometimes, manufacture date. This is an obvious manufacture cost saver and I am sure that if they up-market this pencil box, it will justifiably share a price point with the other more expensive pencils I have compared it to. Until then, grab 'em while their price is now at the time of this writing - December '24. This is a much better pencil than what I expected.

I ordered these for music writing. A 2b isn't dark enough for me. These are darker. They are also softer, so a lighter hand is advised or the lead will break more easily. That's ok, because even with a lighter hand, the result is still darker. I also liked that they were made from sustainable sources, unlike many of the cheaper alternatives. There is no eraser (as is apparently standard with this type of pencil), so you need to get that separately. I recommend this for music manuscript writing, and imagine they would also be excellent for sketching.

The pencils are not smooth? Its like writting on sandpaper. I like that the lead is super light but i end up pushing so hard, I can see the indent even if i cant see the pencil. I may repurchase or try a different brand bc the way it writes is annoying (not smooth- are there rocks in the lead?)

Works good for drawing on veg tan leather

Would buy again.

Love the dark writing and it helps

What I like about this pencil is how much graphite goes on the paper. The pencils seem to be more a 2B than a HB. Overall I would give the pencil a 5 star rating.