by Jane Maday
Published by North Light Books on February 22nd 2017
Pages: 128
Goodreads
"Cute creature expert Jane Maday has created her first grayscale coloring book. Use the gray toned images to guide you through completing a picture and producing a "painterly result". Tips, instructions, practice pictures and an inspiration gallery will ensure that you are set up to full enjoy coloring the 48 pages of adorable animals."
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Adorable Animals – Grayscale Coloring Book Video Review
I hope you enjoyed the video review of Adorable Animals Grayscale Coloring Book illustrated by Jane Maday.
Adorable Animals – Grayscale Coloring Book Review
I have been waiting for this book for so long to be published …  I thought that the day would never arrive when I had it in my hot little hand.    Last year Jane Maday started teasing us with beautiful greyscale images of adorably cute animals.    Jane draws gorgeous, cutesy animal styled coloring books but this was the first hint at a greyscale coloring book.
A greyscale coloring book with cutesy animals is right up my alley. Â Â Â As I haven’t colored greyscale, I decided that I would hold off attempting anything greyscale until Jane Maday’s grayscale coloring book was published. Â Â Finally, Â I’m no longer a grayscale virgin!
The great thing about grayscale coloring is that the artist has already shaded the art work for you.  All you  need to do is to follow their shading “directions” where they have shaded dark, you go  dark color, where they have shown highlights you go light and so on.  Like all things, some instructions, tips and practice will help you achieve better results.
Cover & Layout
The cover of Adorable Animals Coloring Book features cute kittens in a country style scene. Â Â The illustration has been partially colored to indicate to the casual browser that this is a greyscale rather than outline based coloring book.
On the rear of  the book you will see two thumbnails showing greyscaled images and the colored version of the image.   They are so adorably cute, that if you are a fan of whimsical art you will probably start swooning at this point in time.   Of course, anyone that knows me, knows that if it has a bunny in it, I find it very difficult to resist any coloring book.  Adorable Animals has bunnies in it!
The glossy cover on Adorable Animals is great for resisting smudge marks and finger prints.
Adorable Animals Coloring Book measures approximately 27.5 cm x 21 cm (approximately 10.7 in x 8.5in)
Ancillary Pages
A plain text title page starts the book with a table of contents over page.
It is rare that we see a table of contents in a coloring book, but there is a very good reason why this one has it, together with page numbers.   The table of contents shows  an introduction and “about the author page ” and  that there are three chapters in this coloring book.
Following the table of contents page the front cover art has been reproduced in grayscale for you to color in. Â Â This is where I started coloring in this cute coloring book. Â Â So far I have used my Colleen pencils that go on like a dream and my Polychromos. Â Â Both work on the paper very well. Â As this was my first time coloring, Â I promptly ignored the Instruction page, useful tips and just dived in. Â Of course, later I went back and read it like the good girl that I am deep down, and learned some useful tips, which I should have read from the start!
An elaborate nameplate page follows filled with lovely flowers and butterflies in grayscale to color in.
Next we have the Introduction page.  If you are new to grayscale coloring make sure you read these two paragraphs as as they contain tips on how to color grayscale.  There is a lovely practice image as well on the page.
The first chapter sets out tips and practice images on how to colour grayscale.    This is great for a novice like me.   Jane eases you into grayscale coloring by discussing coloring tools and then it is off to practice with 5 pages of practice sheets and an additional page of tips and another  page of practice pieces.
My only niggle with the entire book, which is only a minor gripe, is the practice pages.   On each of the 5 practice pages, there are examples of coloring the greyscale image and one greyscale image for you to color in (as shown in the part example page below).   Jane allows you to copy each  of the pages so that you can practice further.  What I would have really liked though, is for a whole page that has each practice image on it, so I could copy one page instead of  five.  It’s a minor niggle, in an otherwise well thought out book though.   At the end of this practice session,  you are provided with a page with four different greyscale images to color in (just like the one that I would have liked lol!)
You will also find that there are other practice images in the book. Â Â At the rear of the book you will find a cute fox that leads you to an Inspiration Gallery. Â Â Even the copyright page has cute little animals on it and a hedgehog closes the book. Â Super cute and lots of practice pictures.
At the end of the book you will find all the greyscale images that have been included in the coloring book proper in color.  If you are like me, and can barely color co-ordinate what you are wearing each day, then this will be the best news!  The images are just stunning!  They are sooooo incredibly pretty that it immediately makes me want to have a set of colored note cards or something that has these lovely images on it.  You can use the colored inspirational pages to drool over like an art book, inspiration for your greyscale color palette,  or choose to ignore them completely 🙂
Layout
The ancillary pages have been printed in color and on both sides of the paper. Â Â The coloring book proper, has been printed on single sided, perforated, white medium quality paper. Â Â All of the images have been orientated portrait style throughout the book.
All of the illustrations have been beautifully centered and positioned on the page, with an allowance of white space around each margin for ease of coloring. Â Â The images have been placed approximately 1 cm away from the perforation mark.
Adorable Animals – Grayscale Coloring Book Images and Illustrations
As you would expect from the title of this coloring book the animals are all adorable. Â Â You will find cute kittens, puppy dogs, frogs, bunnies and even little ducks. Â Â They are all delightfully cute and beautifully drawn.
One of the things that I was not expecting from this coloring book, which was a delightful surprise is that the adorable animals are placed in a scene.  For some reason, in my mind,  I had thought they would just be a lone bunny on the page.   In this coloring book all of the animals are in a scene with a lot of background and foreground elements.   There are detailed baskets, varieties of flowers and leaves, watering cans, bird  houses, boots and tea cups.   All of these additional elements add another layer of cuteness.
The greyscale scenes in the book all have a country style theme to them with wicker baskets, roosters and gum boots (galoshes) reinforcing that theme.
Colorists that have minor visual impairment may find that coloring grayscale is challenging as the values of the grayscale may not be enough to distinguish  areas to be colored.   Grayscale does not have the sharp, crisp outlines that most coloring books feature and, for this reason, it can be difficult if you have a visual impairment.  Fortunately, grayscale is very forgiving, and you can color wash over areas if they are too challenging.  If you haven’t colored grayscale before,  I would either try some pages from Jane’s Etsy store or check out the free grayscale coloring pages here.
I hope that there will be another Adorable Animals Grayscale Coloring Book, Â maybe with more bunnies (there is never enough bunnies for me!) Â and some hedgehogs as well!
Please click on an image to view more detail
[foogallery id=”7382″]Where to buy Adorable Animals – Grayscale Coloring Book
| Amazon US | Amazon UK | Amazon Canada | Book Depository |
Happy coloring x
Lea
Another to top of wish list..may go right into cart..lol
Thank you much Lea
Connie
mmm Connie if you haven’t already tried grayscale you may want to download one of the free pages and give it a whirl. Because it is shades of gray and no clear outline you may have trouble seeing all the individual bits. Of course, you can color wash if it is a problem..but I would just have a play with a practice page first x
Where would I find one of the free pages. I do love grayscale
Where would i find kne to try. I do love grayscale, Lea
In my free pages directory http://coloringqueen.net/free-coloring-pages-directory/ – I see that Ali has some free greyscale ones here. Often in Facebook coloring book groups section in files/albums you will also find some free ones that the artists have submitted. Try and pick a free page that is something similar to Janes ie all over gray scale to see if you are challenged coloring it. Happy coloring x
Good review! This was also the first grayscale book I bought, and I LOVE it. I’ve only been coloring for about 3 months, (after about a 60 year hiatus) and yet these are coming out beautifully.
I liked it so well, I bought a couple of others….. bad choice! They were listed as being 60 pound paper. I later found out that in the publishing world, that actually translates to 24 pound paper. And, the other books, you can tell, are amateurish at best. I’ll head for the Nicole Stocker books next. They’re getting rave reviews too.
I do have a question though. In the darker shaded areas, I see people getting vivid color results….. mine aren’t as bright as I’d like. I have the complete set of prismacolor soft core pencils. (I also have a heavy hand, and im working on that) Any advice for getting those nice bright colors?
Hi Teri, if the paper is very important for you and you like greyscale artists like Bennett Klein and Nicki Burnette for example have their books also as pdfs that you can purchase. You can then download and print on the paper of your choice 🙂 Nicole Stocker’s books have a very good reputation (I don’t have any) and I”m sure you would be pleased with them. Prismas because they are so soft and waxy need a lot of layering, like 5 or 6 layers. When you apply the layers you have to be incredibly soft so you are really just brushing the surface of the paper rather than laying all the color down in one or two goes ..it needs the 5 or 6 🙂 Start with the darkest part then your light then your medium colors, keep layering and building the colors until you achieve the look you want. I am incredibly heavy handed as well, but when I do take the time to color using this technique I get the result. Happy coloring x