Marty NoblePaisley Designs Coloring Book (Dover Design Coloring Books)

Wow! Early this year (2012) I decided to get back into coloring, and discovered I am not a "peter pan" but a "Colorist". Whew! What a relief. That allowed me to enjoy this coloring book even more! I purchased it along with 3 others from Dover Publishing, and a very nice set of Prismacolor Premier Soft Core Pencils, which I also highly recommend! The paisleys on each page are unique. I was very impressed with the detail and complexity of each page. A few pages are simpler, or have large white areas as background, which will work for beginners or those still learning to color tiny areas. They're also a break from the more complex pages. I enjoyed coloring in the backgrounds as well as the actual designs, and have done 3 pages so far. Of all the Dover coloring books I've purchased (gotta love that 4 for 3 promotion!), this is one of the 3 or 4 very best 'abstract' type coloring book. I enjoy abstract coloring rather than specific images for many reasons, #1 being the freedom to experiment with color. Yes, I could paint a tree trunk pink if I wanted to, but my more logical side cringes at that wild carelessness with reality. :) There are many opportunities to experiment with color theory, various materials (media-pencils, pens, gel pens, markers, permanent markers, fine line pens, etc.) & color layering/shading. This book will challenge you, whether you are an experienced artist or colorist or a beginner. It would also work for kids old enough to appreciate a challenge, and with the patience to spend several hours on detailed coloring. Each chld is different, so I don't recommend a specific age range, just make sure the child has the necessary fine motor skills, or is working on improving them to avoid a frustrating experience. One negative aspect, and this applies to almost all of Dover's coloring books, is that it is printed two sided, different images on the front and back of each page. This can be frustrating when you want to color EVERY page, but it does keep costs and paper use down, so I understand why they do it. I usually make a photocopy (strictly for personal use) of each page, and the image on the other side of that page, before i begin to color. I also test how much bleedthrough I'll get with various media before coloring by quickly filling in part of the title page, which usually has a design on it, with whatever pens or pencils I want to use. If there's lots of bleedthrough, I color my copy instead. Colored pencils give the detail necessary without bleedthrough, but you will probably want a 'blotter' behind the side of the page you're coloring, because even small amounts of pressure can cause the ink of the opposite side to leave a visible impression on the next page. So far I've only done pages with colored pencils & gel pens/markers/permanent markers. The colored pencils & MOST of the gel pens did not bleed through, both types of markers did. Even with the inconvenience of not being able to color all the designs without extra care, this gets 5 stars for creativity, price, and intricacy of design! I love it. I read a review recently which had an excellent suggestion for how to beat the back of the page bleedthrough problem. I'm sorry I can't remember what book that review was posted for. Please comment if you are the person I should give credit to! This person suggested buying 2 copies of each coloring book (especially with Dover's excellent prices), one to color the designs on the front of the pages, the other to color the designs on the back of each page. Brilliant! If you hate mistakes and prefer to start over, or if you enjoy coloring an image multiple times, that's probably the best idea I've heard for these awesome coloring books! Paisleys are back! for me, and I'm digging out my shirts with paisley prints on them just for fun!

"The paisley motif derives its name from the town of Paisley in Scotland, where, in the nineteenth century, machine-woven woolen shawls were manufactured to imitate the luxurious, extremely expensive Indian shawls..." - from Paisley Designs Coloring BookDid you know that? I did not. That is the note from inside the first page of Paisley Designs Coloring Book by Marty Noble. Just reading this tidbit I already feel I made a good decision to buy. This beautifully drawn, Dover-publicated book has 30 pages of bird, butterfly, flower, Indian tapestry and even peacock inspired paisley designs. Flipping through the book, it is initially very appealing and my first impression is that it is a keeper!Marty Noble has come from a long line of artists. No wonder she has the talent she does. Her work in Paisley Designs Coloring Book is quite different enough from her Creative Haven Mehndi Designs: Traditional Henna Body Art Coloring Book to warrant owning both books. I thought they were going to be the same, even similar. But they are quite the opposite.While some of the designs are similar in their first appearance, I feel that each page is truly unique. The line work ranges from moderately thin to thick throughout the book. Some of the spaces are tiny so a fine tipped pen or sharpened pencil will be the tool to use. On individual pages I felt the images were varied enough to not get repetitive and they were not too small to be tedious nor too large to be boring.The price per image in Paisley Designs is around $0.133. A great deal.The Pros: - 30 individual drawings - Very inexpensive for the quantity - always seems to be in stock The Cons: - the pages are double sided so bleed-throughs can ruin the back sides and possibly the following page. - if you press too hard on the line work on the front of the page, the line work from the back side can slightly come off onto the next page - the pages are not perforatedI would recommend the pages in this book be used only with crayons or colored pencils. I used Prismacolor Colored Pencils on my page. I really enjoyed coloring page 21.My bottom line is that if you like the paisley image, this is defintely one to buy. Marty Noble's work through Dover's publications will always have a permanent place in my coloring book collection. I hope they will be in yours too.

Paisley Designs Coloring Book is my second coloring book with the paisley motif that I have done. The first being Mehndi Designs, Marty Noble is the author of both books.I did not find myself enjoying this book as much as I did the first. This may largely be because of just starting out with this morif. As it does seem to be more advanced to this colorists eye in comparison to the Mehndi book. As the design elements in this book appear to be layered.This meant smaller details, and reason for working with a magnifiers. For me this detracts from the relaxing benifits of a project.This book differs also from the first book by having double -sided pages which also limits the media you can use without ruining one of the pages. Dover Books are known for their use of double -sided pages. (I myself was aware of this fact. I mentioned it in this review for those who might not be.) When I know that the book is a subject where both pages appeal to me , I purchase two copies.Color the projects I want and keep the other pages in folder when children visit. I am uses this book as learning experience and may buy future copies when I gain more experience with paisley at this skill level and update my review then .For now my opinion is it's suited for more experienced colorists and okay for those looking to explore a new area in a less expensive book

You really do need a wide range of felt tips for this one - there's tiny weeny spaces and really large areas and everything in between Wax crayons wouldn't cope. Pencil crayons would be fine - excellent opportunities for shading. Because of the teeny weeny spaces to colour, I'd say it's for the relatively dexterous - some of the saw tooth edgings are very fine. I liked that the outlines vary in width, it adds to the design.A really good range of all different types of paisley pattern, some large, some small and not exact repeats within a design, which adds variety.An added bonus was the full page repeat in grey outline of one of the 30 designs on the title page, which was fun (despite the title wording interrupting the pattern). The designs apart from the title page have borders and are 24.5 x 18.5cm.As with all Dover Colouring books -- you get images on both sides of the paper - 15 pages = 30 sheets to colour (+ the title page little one).- there's a good variety of designs with no duds, none of that 'ack I really don't feel like doing that one'.- felt tip pens do bleed through to the other side, but that doesn't bother me, I don't want to display my pages anywhere, I just want to kill some hours...- it's one of the Tree Friendly ones - cover 100% recycled, innards 50% recycled card/paper.

Rien de special c'est assez joli

This has turned out to be one of my favourite colouring books and I have a sizeable (and growing) collection.That the pages are double sided is fine as I use pencil crayon so no bleeding issues and the paper is of good quality. I just took out the staples & have a folder full of easy to use sheets.I recently travelled with a few pages and I am glad I left them together as doubles with 4 colouring sides. Every time I took one out someone was excited and it was so easy to just divide the pages & share the pleasure.Grandma got to leave colouring on the fridge after the visit. I earn my living as an artist and THAT page was more fascinating to my 4 year old Grandson...he gets colouring! My other stuff "Could come from a store!" *laugh*For the price category this is a great book!

I bought this as a sort of mind calming, meditative aid for myself as I really find reading womens magazines quite depressing with all the horrifying stories, this is like a colouring book for adults although theres no reaason children wouldnt benefit from it too! Im terrible at drawing, so colouring in a beautiful pre-printed picture like this suits me just fine! As the title suggests it is filled with paisley designs which are beautiful and each one is different, and the possibilities of how you colour them are endless! Im going to be borrowing my 8 year old daughters colouring aids, she has so many pens and pencils of differing types, but I do think that they would look fab coloured using gel pens or proper artists colouring aids, ifyou're neat enough, you could even frame frame your favourites, they are double sided though, so be careful if using pens that they dont leak through to the other side.

Bonita presentación, muy corto, son 15 hojas, con dibujos por delante y detrás. Cada dibujo está enmarcado, con lo que puedes colorearlo estupendamente, sin que estén justo en la unión de las hojas. Muy cómodo para dibujar, ya que se mantiene abierto muy bien, al ser muy poquitas hojas. Calidad de papel, muy fino, recomiendo sólo utilizar lápices de colores, para no traspasar, bueno, como mucho con rotulador finito y sin marcar casi. El tamaño de cada dibujo es 18 cm x 24,5 cm aproximadamente, grandecitos. Yo lo he comprado por 2,97 euros. A este precio está muy bien, pero no pagaría mucho más, ya que insisto, en que es muy finito, y trae sólo 30 dibujos. Vienen bien entintados, y se pueden colorear muy bien, por su tamaño. Me gusta mucho que sean los dibujos tipo cachemir, le da un aire retro y bonito. Poco más que decir. Buena compra.