Fantomorphia: An Extreme Coloring and Search Challenge
By: Kerby Rosanes
Rating: 3.5 of 5
I am a big fan of Kerby Rosanes. I’ve enjoyed his coloring book artwork ever since I first found it the 2013 book, “Doodle Invasion”. I was looking forward to “Fantomorphia” which I pre-ordered without looking at the book information on the product page. Had I done so, I would have seen this book contained half the number of pages his prior books in this line contained.
What I could not have foreseen was that he would also put the designs on one side of the page where previous books were printed on both sides of the page. That also reduces the number of designs by half. When you do the complete math, you are getting one quarter the number of design pages in this book at approximately the same price.
One might ask, “Where is the rest of the book?” Well, I think I have found it. It is in a second book being released later this year, “Geomorphia” (here is the link on Amazon: link.
So, if you are still interested in his work at effectively four times the price, go for it. I am torn about it but I know that, in the end, I will be buying the next book because I love the work. I’ve also found that by pre-ordering, I generally am paying much less and still have the option, before publishing date, to cancel my order.
The thing is, if Mr. Rosanes had started out with books of 20 to 25 pages, we would have all accepted it and been happy with the value. The problem is in perception. Since we have received four times as much before, that is what we now expect. I went through this same issue with the hardbound versions of coloring books by Pomegranate (notably the Intricate Ink series.) I’ve come to accept that new books will have 25 designs instead of 50.
While I was grousing about the skimpy size of the book, my husband took one look and immediately ordered a copy for himself. He’s thrilled with the one-sided prints. I’ve also found one sided prints for some of Mr. Rosanes earlier books and will be posting those in the future.
Back to this book. The artwork is beautiful, as I have come to expect. Some of the designs seem less complete than others but only because I am used to seeing the complete image on a two=sided print. There is a mix of various fantasy images with his signature doodle creatures and/or other repetitive imagery with the elements of the design.
There is an image of wolf that is shown in full on across the front and back page of the book but, unfortunately, we were only given the front half as a design in the book. The publisher should never have shown us the rest of the design because, frankly, I feel a bit cheated on this one.
The designs are highly detailed with intricate, small and somewhat difficult areas to color. Perhaps even smaller than previous books as the designs have been sized to fit on one page.
Speaking of one page – that part of the book I really love. I’ve been buying two copies of each previous book so I could use markers on the designs. They did a nice job of sizing the images go very close to the binding but do not merge into it. By breaking the spine slightly, I was able to get into the inside edge of the design fairly easily.
The paper in this book is different from the others. It is still what I call heavy weight but seems a little smoother. It is still slightly rough and has enough tooth for blending easily.
So, I give the book a five star rating for design but a two star rating for how the book was published and how few designs were included. Averaged, that is 3.5 but if I had to round in this case, I would round down to a 3.
This is what I found in this coloring book:
19 Fantasy designs included in the book plus title and presentation page artwork
The designs are printed on one side of the page
Paper is heavy weight, white, slightly rough and non-perforated
Glue Binding
The designs do not merge into the binding
Alcohol-based markers bleed through the page
Water-based markers gel pens and India ink pens do not bleed through.
Coloring pencils work well with the paper. I am able to get good pigment (color) lay down, layer the same color and multiple colors and to blend very easily using a pencil style blender. Both oil and wax-based pencils have similar results. Hard pencils do not dent through the page.
I suggest using a blotter page under your working page. I like card stock as it keeps ink from seeping through and damaging the pages below.
Here are some sample photos from the book: