70 visually interesting designs printed on both sides of page in small format

Optical Illusions: 70 designs to help you de-stress (Coloring for Mindfulness)

By: Hamlyn

Rating: 4 of 5

This is a book of optical illusion designs. The pages are printed in gray rather than black as most coloring books. While I like the concept and the designs are quite different, I think that the light gray makes it difficult to color. If it had been printed in black, I could use light or dark colors without any problems. With the lighter tone, my bright colors overwhelm the page.

The format of this is smaller than most coloring books at approximately 8 x 8 inches. The binding is a type of rubbery glue that is located at the top of the book. It makes getting to all sides of the design much easier and now that I have experienced it, I wish more coloring books had top binding (as do many art books). My only concern is that if I remove a page, it may break the binding at that point and take more than the one page off. The back of the book is a heavy cardboard that keeps the book stable, especially if you are working in-hand instead of on a hard surface.

The designs are printed on both sides of the page which is a big disappointment for me because, although the paper weight is good, all of my gel pens and markers bleed through. If I want to color each design in the book, I would have to use my colored pencils. If I really wanted to use markers or pens, I would have to sacrifice the back side picture and remove the picture from the book or put a waste page below my work area to keep other pages from being ruined.

The designs are interesting but I wish the publisher had re-thought both the gray printing and printing on both sides of the page.

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