Workshop: Oil Pastels. Drawing & Illustration Techniques
A 50-minute workshop for illustrators, sketchbook lovers, and anyone curious about this strange, colourful, stubborn medium.
Oil pastels have a reputation for being unruly. Many people avoid them entirely—too oily, too sticky, too smudgy, too thick to control. They smear across the page, they refuse to fix properly, they’re awkward to scan, and they seem to fight back the moment you try to use them for detailed illustration.
This workshop turns all of that on its head.
I’ll walk you through a set of techniques that make oil pastels surprisingly practical—light, controlled, blendable, and beautifully expressive. You’ll see how this medium can enrich your visual vocabulary, open new stylistic paths, and bring texture, depth, and movement into your drawing practice. These methods don’t require any fixing, they scan cleanly, and they’re simple enough for beginners and even children to try. After this session, oil pastels will feel like an accessible, versatile tool rather than a material to avoid.
Standard Price –
£50
Special Offer 60% – £19Offer valid until 31 March 2026
Lifetime access — learn at your own pace!
What you’ll discover inside:
A focused 50-minute workshop where you’ll learn:
🌟 How oil pastels actually behave—and how to make them work for you, not against you
🌟 How to create thin, delicate layers without the usual heavy waxy build-up
🌟 Blending methods that don’t require turpentine or specialised fixatives
🌟 How to combine pastels with pencils, graphite, pens, and other dry media
🌟 How to achieve controlled lines, soft transitions, and translucent colour
🌟 Techniques that produce clean artwork suitable for scanning and digital use
🌟 Small, practical exercises you can use immediately in your sketchbook or illustration work
Why join?
✔️ You’ll finally understand how to use oil pastels without frustration
✔️ You’ll gain a compact set of reliable techniques you can return to again and again
✔️ You’ll learn a medium that adds richness and individuality to your style
✔️ You’ll discover a fast, intuitive approach that suits both sketchbook play and professional illustration
✔️ You’ll walk away with a toolkit that expands your expressive range using very few materials
This course is for you if…
🐝 You’ve always been curious about oil pastels but never knew where to start
🐝 You tried them once, hated the mess, and don’t want to repeat that experience
🐝 You want a fresh, textured, vibrant element in your illustration work
🐝 You enjoy experimenting with materials but prefer simple, practical techniques
🐝 You work in sketchbooks and want a medium that brings immediacy and joy
🐝 You want something accessible enough to use with children or with absolute beginners
Materials You’ll Need
✨ A small selection of oil pastels (any brand works; I’ll explain my favourites)
✨ A couple of coloured pencils
✨ Graphite pencil
✨ Cotton buds / cotton disks
✨ A tiny amount of odourless mineral spirit or linseed oil
✨ Sketchbook or mixed-media paper
Took this course and loved it!! Very inspiring and well done!! Thank you Elina for creating it!! 👏❤️
Elina, thanks so much! I already bought it and finished doing the workshop ❤️ it was great! Never new oil pastels are so versatile 😊
🔥☺️ This course is awesome, thank you so much! It’s a pleasure! I’m drawing and enjoying it!
I discovered Elina Ellis’s recorded oil pastel workshop through Instagram, and the introduction immediately resonated with me. Until now, I hadn’t really found an entry point into oil pastels. I always felt they were too messy, and I struggled to achieve the textures and results I was aiming for.
This course is very approachable and easy to follow. The techniques and possibilities of the medium are explained in a playful, hands-on way, and it’s genuinely enjoyable to follow along with the demonstrations and examples. I also really appreciated the length of the course (about one hour). The content never feels overwhelming, but instead sparks curiosity and makes you want to actually try things out yourself afterward.
The section at the beginning covering materials and different brands was especially helpful. When learning a new medium, I often feel overwhelmed by product choices, so having specific oil pastels introduced along with their pros and cons made the learning process feel much more accessible.
One aspect I found a bit odd was the quiz at the end. I’m not sure if this is due to the course being quite new, but the quiz currently consists of only one question, which felt somewhat unnecessary. I hope this section will be expanded with more meaningful content in the future otherwise, it might be better to omit it altogether.
I purchased the course at a discounted price of around €18 (about £14), and at that price point I found the content very worthwhile. However, at the full price of nearly £50, I personally would not have bought it based on what is currently included. While I absolutely value the creative expertise, video production, and accessibility of the recorded format, 50 minutes of instructional content and a minimal quiz don’t quite justify that higher price for me.
Overall, I do recommend the course especially if you can get it at a reduced price. If the structure remains as it is, I’d suggest waiting for a sale before purchasing rather than paying full price.
I purchased your lesson, and it is really amazing! Making oil pastel drawings into some kind with watercolour effect.
This morning I did your workshop! Thank you very much, I loved it! I love the happy colours of the pastels and you have the techniques I was looking for for a long time! I’ll be playing with this the whole Christmas holidays! Happy Christmas for you as well, kind regards, Eva
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I have a full set of Sennilier oil pastels and, though I love their creaminess on the paper and their colour range, I have not used them to their full potential. I mostly like to work in sketchbooks and even with copious amounts of fixative I find they stick to and mark the previous page if I don’t interleave them. So they have lain virtually unused for a long time. I was intrigued by the preview of this course and signed up for a reduced price of £19. I think this is about the right price (I don’t think it is worth £50 as is claimed for the value or full price). Having said that, it has opened up so much potential and I am now looking at my pastels with new eyes. It was easy to follow the course in real time. I am not an illustrator but I was able to apply the techniques to my own style and subjects and, without giving anything away, I was particularly thrilled with the way I can now use my pastels without them smudging and no stickiness… and even more how I can use them my other art materials in my mixed media work. Thank you for this short but very insightful course and bringing my oil pastels back to the table.