Jasmine Becket-Griffith Halloween Coloring Book
Jasmine Becket-Griffith Halloween Coloring Book Review
I’ve had the Jasmine Becket Griffith Halloween Coloring Book on pre order for months. As soon as she announced that she was publishing a Halloween styled coloring book I knew that I had to have it. Jasmine is such a talented fantasy artist. Her art work that is well known has such a distinctive style about it that you can’t help but to recognize it whenever you come across it. The eyes on the girls that she paints and draws tend to focus in on you, you can feel them boring into your back even when you have put the book away. There is something incredibly soulful and compelling about her art work that draws you in.
Her first coloring book, filled with those strangelings stole my heart. This is one of the things that I really appreciate about coloring. It has made beautiful art accessible to all. Many people could not afford to own an original piece of art by Jasmine Becket-Griffith, but most of us could afford the coloring book and the joy of creating our own beautiful colors within those lines. Of course, my beautiful Halloween book by Jasmine Becket-Griffith came when I was sick, so this is the first opportunity that I have to had to play with it.
Cover & Layout
Following the same format as Jasmine’s previous coloring book this book has a dull black textured dust jacket with fold out flap. The cover features a beautiful girl with bat wings, colored in deep shades of purple complimenting the orange and red of the title text. On the back of the book there are 6 partially colored thumbnails of images from the book. The coloring in these images is very inspiring. There is nothing to color on the cover or the reverse. The actual book is protected with plain kraft style card.
The book measures 21.6 cm x 27.4 cm (approximately 8.5 in x 10.8 in) which is roughly A4 sized.
Inside there is a surprisingly plain title page with copyright information on the reverse. An introduction by Jasmine Becket-Griffith follows. I would have loved to see a nameplate page adorned with Halloween elements, but sadly one has not been included.
The paper used is a medium quality, cream paper. You will need to put spare paper underneath your project when coloring in order to avoid any damage to the next page. The illustration has been printed on the right side of the book and on the left side information about the original painting is printed. This is very handy if you wish to recreate Jasmine’s art work look or get inspired by her original pieces. Of course, you are free to color the picture however you want, and Jasmine encourages you in her Introduction to do so.
All of the illustrations have been positioned well on the page. They are all framed in a fine border ensuring that there is no art work near the spine of the book. The way that the illustrations have been laid out makes it easy to color them within the book. The illustrations are all orientated portrait style.
Illustrations
Jasmine Becket-Griffith is renowned for her distinctive artistic style. As these illustrations are reproductions from her original art work the outline art of that style. It is then up to the colorist to bring these drawings to life.
Generally, the art work fills the whole of the page and comprises either background, foreground or additional elements to create a finished piece. There are only a handful of images that you could add background effects to, if you wished. There are 3 pages that have 4 images to a page. If you could bear to part with them they would look lovely made into note cards.
The illustrations in the Halloween Coloring Book comprise beautiful girls accompanied with skeletons, pumpkins, skulls, wolves, cats (presumably black). Some are inspired by a series of Vampire paintings and others by a series of Wolves paintings. The imagery on the whole, does not scream out Halloween with garish detail, many are more subtle and Gothic in nature, making it suitable for coloring in all seasons.
Although Jasmine’s work has a lot of detail it is not tightly packed in the image. This leaves many areas of open space making it easy for colorists of all skill levels and those with visual impairments to color.
Whilst you can have a lot of fun coloring Jasmine’s art work with limited skills, to really bring the pictures to life, some blending and shading techniques are required.
The line art has been drawn in a crisp black and is a medium weight for the bulk of the book with some fine lines for detail. Those delicious eyelashes on the girls, which is a part of Jasmine’s art, are in solid black. A couple of the young ladies lack eyelashes to suit the style of the image.
Jasmine Becket Griffith Halloween Coloring Book Video Review
Enjoy the video review of the beautiful Jasmine Becket Griffith Halloween Coloring Book below:
Where to Buy Jasmine Becket Griffith Halloween Coloring Book
This coloring book may be a little more expensive than what you are used to paying which is a reflection on the premium qualities of the book. There are 46 pages of beautiful art works to color which has been printed on art paper and bound with a dust jacket. All of these things add to the cost of the publication of the book which is reflected in the list price.
See my Pinterest board of Jasmine Beckett Griffith art for inspiration, if needed, when coloring.
Happy coloring x
Lea
