Fantastic Collections: A Coloring Book of Amazing Things Real and Imagined (Fantastic Cities)

Great fun book of images but do wish publishers would stop making the books so damned BIG !!!!

Fantastic colouring book, highly recommended

Fantastic Collections by Steve McDonald is larger than most colouring books on the market at 30cm x 30cm. It has a matt card cover illustrated on the front with a collection of lanterns, and a mandala type image of sweet jars on the back. On opening the book there is the title page with the printing details on the back then the rest are all colouring pages which makes a nice change from all the 'therapy' books that tell you page after page of the benefits of colouring only they just feel like a waste of colourable paper and are there simply to pad out the book. There's none of that here.It is both glue and sewn bound, although there are no two-page spreads where colouring into the gutter may be a problem. The paper is bright white and thick. This will take water-based markers and fineliners as well as pencils. It would also be a great book to use paints in, just go easy on the water. The line work is crisp black lines and ranges from heavy to fine which I think work well with this particular book. This isn't one for subtle shading and gentle colours. Bold is best here.This is definitely a book to create art with as opposed to "just colouring in." Some of the subject matters are strange choices; fancy colouring a page of chainsaws or cleaning products? Not subjects you usually see in colouring books. It is an unusual book and some of the illustrations may not appeal as much as others. You could just colour them in realistically but I think where this book will excel is in breaking down the images into shapes and just going wild with colour and having a lot of fun doing it, but that is just my opinion of how I see this book, you may see it simply as a book of objects to colour and be happy colouring it that way.There are illustrations of various collections of objects; there are Russian dolls,dinosaurs, Seashells, padlocks, camping equipment, sunglasses, tools, frames, guitars, cassette tapes, butterflies, robots and buttons to name some. There are also some mandala type images created from the objects such as sweet jars, cameras, clocks and other items.This is a book that has grown on me. When I first received it I thought " I don't want to colour fishing flies and ray guns", but the more I've looked at it the more I can see possibilities different than other colouring books. I might even use my acrylic paints in this book and even though the pages are double-sided and not meant to be taken out of the book I can see myself doing some interesting things and framing these as pieces of art.I was kindly sent a copy from the publisher. All opinions and comments are my own.

Steve McDonald has produced two other colouring books on Structures and Cities which I have and love. This is totally different and would suit any person who loved colouring. The book is as it says Collections. The front cover picture is in the book along with full pages of: perfume bottles, hot air balloons, fish, kitchen items, tools etc etc. This book also offers intricate mandelas of the some of the pictures which are amazing. Another masterpiece that will give me hours of colouring fun. It has intricate and 'bigger' colouring images to offer which I find useful as I do not always want to colour harder pieces. Large size book, fab paper that does not show through felts, fineliners etc but cannot handle markers. HIGHLY RECOMMEND and well done Steve...again!!!!