Colouring books are books with black and white drawings that you can colour yourself. They’re often aimed at children to help them colour inside the lines and to give them something to do. I used a lot of them growing up so I have a lot of memories drawing in these. Colouring books use digital art to create the design now, however, if you’re making your own you could also just use a black pen. They were first created in 1880 and were used with watercolours and paints instead of crayons and coloured pencils since the crayons we use today didn’t exist back then. Colouring books are also used for art therapy, with Phycologist Carl Gustav Jung being the first professional to use colouring books to help with relaxation and to show self-expression.
Looking through many popular colouring books, some of the things that are often included are:
- Flowers and leaves
- A cute animal
- Patterns
- Lines
- Various textures
I also noticed that the drawings changed depending on the target audience. If the book was aimed at children, the drawings were less realistic and less complicated, whereas the colouring books targeted towards an older audience have more detailed drawings with less space in the drawing. They also surprisingly had fewer patterns which I did not expect. I want to experiment with the idea of creating a design like a colouring book, so I might make my own digitally and print it off. I’ll make multiple designs and ask people who match the target audience for the design which they prefer. I also think my design will be inspired by Heywood, an artist I researched earlier in the project since his work reminded me of colouring books, which is why I had the idea to create a design inspired by colouring books.