Pastels are a wonderful medium to work with. You only need to look at Degas’s sublime use of pastels in his ballerina paintings. You can work them delicately or with boldness and the colour is always powerful. The pure pigment in artist’s quality pastels is a pleasure to behold. It is a pity then to use poor quality paper on which to paint. I have tried many papers over the years of varying quality. Recently I tried out two pastel pads from Canson. Their Mi-Teintes pastel paper pads and Touch pads.