Venus Col-Erase Carmine Red

The Venus Col-Erase is another one of those no longer made pencils from yesteryear (as in half a century ago or something) . The Col-Erase brand continues on, but it has nothing on the original Venus from decades ago. Not even the Faber Castell Col-Erase pencils, which I’ve discussed before, can compare.

[Pictures coming later]

What sets the Venus Col-Erase apart is the absolutely lubricated lead. Seriously, these things glide on the paper and they wear down very slowly, and maintain a point. They were popular with animators and designers/architects, and I can imagine that the lot that I bought came from draftsman — who else would have the myriad of reds, blues, and yellows. There were many brands in there:

• General’s Quality — nice name. 😐 Good pencil.
• General’s Color-Tex — now, that’s better. Good pencil.
• Eberhard Faber Colorbrite (these were amazing — super  saturated reds)
• Superflex — a little lite colored
• Eagle Verithin — Good pencil.
• Ruwe Woodhue — Not good. The lightest of all of them.
• Venus Unique (which seem very much like the Col-Erase and they erase, too, and use the same part number for the Carmine Red — they are too much the same. I don’t know what’s going on here)
• Dixon Thinex — Good

But what did this connoiseur have the most of? Col-Erase Carmine Reds. Above all else. It’s like the world is trying to tell me something. Previously, I had purchased dozens of yellow Venus Col-Erase pencils, but I could never use them on anything. The yellow doesn’t stand out well enough on the white paper I tend to use for drawing. I had a project to draw and make black life-size cutouts a few years back and these pencils didn’t apply very well, didn’t make a good mark. It happens. The Verithin yellow ochres were excellent though. Anyway…

Having so many reds, makes me want to start marking up some kind of text, crossing out words and…do people still mark up paper with colored pencils?

Here’s a piece from the Pencil Neck Geek (opens in a new tab). The writer refers to how popular these were with artists and emphasizes the differences between Venus and later companies/brands/whatever that inherited the Col-Erase name.

The Venus Col-Erase (and the Venus Unique) are very special pencils. Strong, very lubed, and go on in layers so you can develop intensities.

To finish it off, here’s advertising fragments from old ads (found using Google Book search, but only in clips):

[…] And the right pencil to be wrong with is the Venus col-erase. If you or your secretary makes a mistake you simply rub it out and re-do it correctly. You don’t have to start all over again. The Venus col-erase’s smooth break- resistant lead erases…

Finally! Color lead that Venus’ remarkable new lead formula gives you colors that are smoother, sharper, more brilliant yet erase without a trace. Quick. Clean. Complete. And Col-Erase pencils have all the strength of black lead pencils.

See how beautifully our color pencils erase? As you can see, you can’t see. And if you think this blank page is just an empty promise, we’d like to send you a VENUS Col-Erase*test kit. Then you’ll be able to not see for yourself. Gentlemen: …

This is the new Col-erase pencil from Venus -the first ever coloured pencil whose mark can be erased as cleanly as a black lead pencil. Venus have made this possible by producing an entirely new coloured lead formula which offers the …

THE VENUS PEN and Pencil Corporation is introducing to business and industry, color … color lead formulation are called Venus “ColErase” and are being enthusiastically received by engineering and law firms, …

And you think I was overselling it.