Review Title: 45 line drawing designs based on famous Japanese Woodblock prints – printed one side of page

Japanese Woodblocks (Art Colouring Book): Make Your Own Art Masterpiece

By: artist David Jones and selected by Daisy Seal

Rating: 5 of 5

This is one of the latest releases in this series by David Jones and Daisy Seal. I’ve found the books in th series to be hit or miss and, for me, this one is a hit. I am inclined to like Japanese art because of I have grown up with it and enjoyed it my whole life. However, I would be the first to be critical of something that wasn’t quite right.

This book does not contain any of the issues that I have had with some of the other books in this series. The designs are good line drawing representations of famous Japanese woodblock prints.

The designs are detailed and some contain intricate and small areas to color. Quite a bit of each design is open and flowing and gives the colorist a lot of room for interpretation.

There are designs of women and designs of men as well. There are landscapes and seascapes and animals (especially fish), too. It is a nice all around book printed on quality paper. I’ll enjoy coloring in this book for years into the future.

There are 45 line drawing designs to color. The designs were chosen by Daisy Seal and were illustrated by David Jones. The name of the original woodblock print is on the page facing the drawing and includes, where possible: the name of the artist and when the artist was born and passed away and the general time in which the artwork was created. There is a thumbnail of a small portion of the design with some color showing.

The inside flaps at the front and back of the book have black and white line drawings which can be colored as well. The cover is quite smooth but will accept various forms of color medium.

This is what I found in this coloring book

45 Designs based on famous Japanese Woodblock prints.

Designs are printed on one side of the page

Paper is light ivory, heavy weight, slightly rough and is perforated.

Sewn Binding. You can remove pages at the perforations if you wish but it will separate the designs from the describing thumbnails.

Book fairly easy to lay flat in the open position.

The designs do not merge into the binding area. The designs have framing lines at their outer edges so you don’t have to color up to and over the edges.

Alcohol based markers bleed through this paper.

India ink pens can leave slight shadows of color on the back of the page.

Water based markers and gel pens do not bleed through the paper.

Coloring pencils worked well. Both oil and wax based pencils worked well for providing good pigment. Though the paper is only slightly rough, I was able to layer the same color for deeper tones, layer multiple colors and to blend easily using a pencil style blending stick.

If you use a medium that bleeds through the paper, I suggest using a blotter page under your working page. I use card stock but heavy weight paper works well, too. This will keep ink from seeping through and marring the pages below.

Below are some design samples of illustrations in the coloring book: