Creative Haven Steampunk Devices Coloring Book (Creative Haven Coloring Books)

The media could not be loaded. I own a couple of steampunk style coloring books and those books focus on the fashions and on people rather than on machines and methods of transportation. I was pleased to find this older Creative Haven book which is more about the devices.The coloring book, by Jeremy Elder, has a much more masculine feel to it. There are bold lines and scenarios that are more Jules Verne than the more romantic and stylized designs in my other books. The people in this book have more of a cartoon look and feel than anything true to life. The fun part of coloring in this book is in making the robots come to life or playing with shading color to bring attention to a newly imagined type of machinery or transportation.For my first two projects, I had fun using a variety of colored pencils. For the boat, I used Prismacolor Premier Soft core pencils and for the robot, I used Marco Raffine's 72 color pencils.This is what I found in coloring and testing my mediums in this book:31 Steampunk style designs with focus on machines and transportationPrinted on one side of white pagePaper is white, slightly rough, and is perforatedGlue BoundDesigns stop before the perforation. Most, but not all, designs have either a framing line around the outer edge or finished elements.Alcohol and water based markers leak through this paper. The alcohol markers bleed through immediately while the water-based markers leave heavy spots of color depending on how much I have to use to fill in the spot properly.Gel pens and India ink pens leave shadows of color on the back of the pageColoring pencils work well with this standard Creative Haven paper. Both wax and oil-based soft pencils lay down good color. My preference is several coats of light finish to get the pigment I prefer. I was able to blend and layer well with this paper as well. Hard lead pencils may leave dents on the back of the page.I use a blotter page under my working page or I remove each page at the perforation before coloring to prevent damage from seeping ink or marring dents.

This is my fourth Steampunk coloring book; my second one by Jeremy Elder. I would have to say that this one I like the least. While his Steampunk Animals coloring book had the drawback of being a double-sided pages. The designs themselves were *clean*I was surprised and disappointed to find that there was 2 main drawbacks to this book which canceled out the plus of being a single sided book.Cons1 ~In every one of these pictures the background is filled with dark black horizontal lines. To me this makes the designers look too crowded. Rather than * cleanly defined* background.As a colorist with eye issues from Multiple Sclerosis; black and white lines spaced this way often appears to wave or jump up and down. If you have Nystagmus this probably won't turn out to be your most relaxing experience. 2 ~The subjects didn't remind me too much as Steampunk designs. Looking at the bizarre mix of pictures throughout the book, I kept thinking of David Lynch 's Eraserhead. Some consider the movie a cult classic. I wasn't among them.These 31 pages don't relate well to one another In comparison to the other 3 books I have enjoyed. 2 were done by author Marty Noble. Of the 31 designs there are 11 that I'm unable to figure out what they are.Overall opinion : This book just wasn't for me. While I didn't like it and believe that this isn't the best example Jeremy Elder's talent as an artist. As far as coloring books go. Creative Haven paper quality is very good. For those who like to use metallic gel pens and fine line metallic. Often used in steampunk art. Based on my experience however, I couldn't recommend this book to others.

The images are somewhat similar. Each has a border & it takes up the majority of the page. However, the borders are nicely differentiated &, for the most part, have a similar theme to the image they surround.Two things that I absolutely adore about this book (considering the disappointment I had w/a few of the other books I purchased at the same time as this one): The paper is a decent, thick quality, & the pages have widely spaced perforations to make it super easy to remove them prior to coloring.The images are printed on one side of the page & the reverse is blank. I'm about to start coloring my first page from this book.

I've been spending considerable time in bed following surgery and this book is the answer to ennui. Television can only be diverting to a point and I'm not a game player so my computer is of little use. But this book just fills the time I want it to fill. Unlike a novel, you can close it and not wonder what will happen next? It's a challenge to your own (long forgotten) artistic ability and, given the somewhat wacky nature of the things to be coloured in, no real talent is needed. Nothing is "wrong", this isn't the Mona Lisa in Paint By Numbers rather this is Rube Goldberg in two dimensions. My one expense involved with this was the purchase of a set of watercolour pens which I would suggest and I've reviewed elsewhere. Even if you aren't in bed, slip it into the Wall Street Journal and you can seem to be doodling on the market, making projections and evaluations whilst you're really only amusing yourself.

I bought this book for my 21year old grandson to colour during lockdown. He was extremely pleased with it, both for the picture content and the quality of the paper on which they were printed. No two designs were the same and were also single -sided, always a plus in a colouring book.

Bit disappointed with some of the drawings, but my expectations were probably too high anyway. Besides being a colouring book I wanted some ideas for making odd creations, gleaning ideas from the book.....not as good as imagined for that purpose. Nevertheless the illustrations are well done and should be of interest to a wide range of individuals.

Bitvtoo gard for my mother in law thought it woukd be good for her didnt show images like others

Great quality book. Single sided illustrations, so great for marker pens.

Nice xmas present