What's in the pencil case?

There have been quite a few posts kicking around showing the contents of people's bags, which I absolutely adore since I'm always a little nosey curious as to what people consider everyday essentials.

But I thought, 'hang on, I can give this my own little spin!'.

There's a running joke between me and my mum about the size of the pencil case I use. It is HUGE! It's not even a pencil case, it's a makeup bag that I won in a party game a couple of years ago, and has gradually found its one true purpose as a penholder.

For the sake of lugging it around all the time, I've been considering investing in a smaller case for the absolute essentials (not that I don't think all of the crap in here are essential), but not having to lug this around all the time may benefit my spine in the long-run.

Posh Pens

These get kept together as a little bundle with an elastic so that I can grab them from the darkest depths of the pencil case pretty easily (or more so than when they were roaming free in there).

From left to right we have Staedtler Pigment Liners (size 0.8 and 0.05), Tombow ABT dual brush pens, a Copic fineliner (size 0.3, unfortunately I don't have the exact name because it's rubbed off) and finally a Letraset twin-tip Promarker. 

I'd recommend any of these, but it's worth testing them out on paper types before you use them on anything you've spent hours working on, as some (Promarker, I'm looking at you) have a tendency to bleed through).

As for where to buy them, I think that all of these, bar the Copic, came from a London chain of art shops called Cass Art. I really can't recommend them enough; they're reasonably priced (plus offer a student discount and have frequent sales) and really high quality products. I've never shopped online with them, only in a couple of their shops, so I'd love to hear what people have to say about that too! But if you happen to be in London, it's well worth popping into one of their branches.

The All-Rounders

These are all pretty standard really (apart from the note-tabs, I suppose). As a hoarder and a sketchbook nut, I like to keep a glue stick with me in case anything interesting happens to crop up that I can stick straight into my book.

I like to keep a few different colours of pens for various jobs, like my planner and revision (which is now over, yay! But results tomorrow, eek!) because it just makes things clearer for me to break up huge lumps of black text with a splash of red or blue.

Coming back to the note tabs, they found their way into the bag over the revision period and are a godsend when it comes to marking pages in books for reference.

The Weird Bits

Now this is where we hit the little graphics-student niche. That thing on the left is a bone folder (actually made from some fort of plastic, not dead animal, don't worry animal lovers!) and is used for getting a nice crisp fold for book binding. It's also great for killing vampires, just for the record.

The scalpel's a regular thing for graphics, I kept forgetting it so stuck it in my pencil case, but take note I keep it in the card envelope because it's quite pointy. And I'm very clumsy.

As for the two scissors, I thought I'd lost a pair, bought new ones aaand then found the old ones. Typical. This two-scissor thing isn't a new habit though. Once while travelling abroad I made a point of taking them out of my pencil case, only to be pulled up at x-ray at Gatwick airport by a bag searcher who had miraculously produced another pair from my handbag. Oops. 

Lastly, the mechanical pencil. This is one of many hidden away in there. I find them easier to use than pencils for most of my work because they've got a good sharp point and can be popped out quickly and easily (the ability to sharpen a pencil without breaking it baffles me), but being tight a student I get WHSmiths own brand packs of 10. To be fair, they're not the most durable but I've never found any mechanical pencils that are.

What are everyone elses' pencil case essentials?