Daily Archives: January 7, 2016

This is my third coloring book by Jason Hamilton. I have become a real fan with his wonderful representations of cats (on quilts and with Santa in previous coloring books.) I am extremely pleased with the gorgeous designs in this new book.

The artist has created a unique coloring book in that he has three levels of design levels. Each of the levels has ten designs. The first level is Simple Illustrations and includes women from: Korea, France, Polynesia, Spain, Italy, Southeast Asia, Canada, Morocco, Native American, and Western USA. The second level is Illustrations with Additional Detail and includes women from: Bride, Southern Belle, USA, UK, Japan, Pakistan, Peru, Nepal, Jamaica, and South Africa. The final level is Challenging Illustrations and includes women from India, Kamchatka, Victorian Lace, USA, Russia, Mexico, Norway, Brazil, Switzerland, and Ireland.

In addition to the three levels, the artist has included seven designs which are zoomed in images of other of the designs already mentioned above. The zoomed shot gives the colorist the opportunity to add more detail and shading to their project.

All of the designs stop well before the binding. The designs are printed on one side of thin white non-perforated paper that is typical for books published by CreateSpace. The binding is glued but there is plenty of room for you to cut a page out if you choose to do so. All of the designs have a framing line around the outside. I really like this as it gives me a natural stopping point, saves ink/pencil, and also gives me a more finished looking project when I color.

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I am updating my original review of this book as of 01/07/16. I loved the artwork by Kerby Rosanes but really disliked a good number of things about the printing of the book. I became curious about the UK printing once Amazon merged the books into one item number and reviews for the UK book were consistently higher than those for the US book. I purchased a copy of the UK book to do a side-by-side comparison. I also purchased a second copy of the US version to have a clean copy to compare as I had already colored in my first book. I am including a silent video which shows a flip-through of first the UK and then the US version of the book. You may notice that I have some problems paging through the second, US version. It is because the pages are so thin, it is hard to just turn one page instead of several. Also, my photos will show a comparison of the books. The UK book is to the left or to the top of the photo as applicable.

The clear winner in all categories is the UK printing of the book. The sad thing is that the follow-up to this book Imagimorphia is being printed by the same US company (Plume). Keeping the adage of fool me once in mind, I will be buying the UK version of the second book rather than the US one. I still rate the book as 4 star on the basis of the UK version (which is also included for sale in this SKU.) The US version drops in comparison to a 2.5 star. I highly recommend spending the little bit extra and waiting a little while longer to get the UK version shipped to you.

Here is the data I used to come to that conclusion:

1. Size and Weight approximate and listed in similar measurements for consistency and ease of comparison:

UK Version: 9 14/16 x 9 13/16 x 6/16 inches weight 1.03 pounds (16.48 ounces)

US Version: 9 15/16 x 10 x 4/16 inches weight .68 pounds (10.88 ounces)

The UK printing is slightly smaller but is thicker and weighs more (a whopping 1.5 times the weight of the US printing) which equates into a much heavier weight of paper used for the book.

2. Cover: The UK version has a thicker cover. It has a matte black background with the tiger in a glossy print that really stands out. The words are slightly different on the front and the back wording is quite different. The orange tone for the wording is a deeper and richer color than that on the US printing. The US cover is thinner and is a semi-gloss. The orange used on the words is more of a fluorescent color. I’ve included a picture which shows the UK version on the left and the US on the right.

3. Paper Quality: Here is a huge difference. The UK version has a nice heavyweight paper that doesn’t crease easily and which does not show through the printing from the back of the page. The US version creases easily just from trying to turn the page and you can see the reverse print through on the page.

4. Binding: The UK version is sewn rather than glued. It is sewn in every few pages so you can remove that group with a few snips of thread. The US version is an odd hybrid. It is sewn in with multiple threads but the threads go through the entire book and are spaced very close together. Cutting these could be a chore. The US version is also glued together. There are a number of pages where the glue extends onto the page and you lose parts of the design whether you remove the pages or not.

5. Print Quality: The designs are printed on both sides of the page and most spread across two pages. The designs merge into the binding and in some cases, with both printings, the two sides are slightly offset. I found that this occurred more in the US version and that the offset portion was more pronounced. Additionally, there is a weird area of white between the two-page spreads on the US version. It appears that they didn’t print the entire image and just stopped at a certain point before the binding, i.e., you will never get to color the whole image because it was not included plus you get the weird dead white space in the middle of your book. I’ve included pictures which show the the problems with the US version – dead white area in the middle at the binding, some where you can see that the pages are glued together and you lose some of the image and finally, some where the images where offset to the right. In these pictures, the UK version is at the top of the photo and the US version is at the bottom.

The UK version has a crisper look to the printing. That may be a better quality ink or just what happens with a better quality paper. I’ve included a picture of the title page with the UK version on the left and the US version on the right. Obviously, the US version chose to use a lighter ink for the title but there is a difference in the rest of the print ink, too.

Also, while the US book is bigger, many of the images have portions of the sides and top and bottom missing. It appears that they enlarged the images. In some cases, they offset the images, too. There is a picture of a whale where the image has been shifted to the right, leaving dead space in the left side of the two pages and losing elements from the right side. Odd, to say the least.

6. Coloring Medium:

I will list the coloring medium I tested below. I am now testing a much larger group of pens/pencils than I did in my previous review.

All alcohol-based markers bled through the pages of both books immediately and to the same degree. The only water-based marker that did not bleed through was my TomBow with the brush end. If I used the marker end, it bled through, too. The US version showed more ink leakage than did the UK but they both did show some.

My gel pens with the larger points showed a shadow through on the US version when I used bright or dark colors. This did not happen with the UK version. None of the smaller point gel pens showed through on either version (Uni-ball Signo my new favorite for detail work.) The gel pens did require a little more drying time on the UK version this is something I have seen with better quality paper. As the ink is not seeping into the paper, it sits on top and has to dry for a minute or two longer.

There was a distinct difference in how coloring pencils worked with these books. The UK version took the soft core colors beautifully and the hard core pencils did not made indents that could be seen from the back of the page. The US version did okay with the soft core (but not as creamy or as good coverage.) The hard core pencils left distinct indents on the back of the page.

These are the coloring medium that I use for testing. If there is something else you feel I should be testing, please let me know and I will see if I can add it to my growing pile:

Markers: 1) alcohol-based Copic Sketch, Prismacolor double ended markers (brush and fine point), Sharpies (fine and ultra-fine) and 2) water-based Tombows dual end markers (brush and fine point), Stabilo 88, Staedler triplus fineliners, and Pentel markers

Gel Pens: Sakura, Fiskars, Uni-ball Signo 0.38/0.28 and Tekwriter

Coloring Pencils: Prismacolor Premier Soft Core, Derwent Colorsoft, Prismacolor Verithins, and Faber-Castel Polychromos