Hey guys! I'm Trina and today I want to do
a different kind of review. I want to talk
about adult coloring books. I don't know,
I just want to talk about coloring. Coloring is fun.
The one that I have specifically is
the Secret Garden by Johanna Basford. She
has another one that's out called The Enchanted
Forest, which is also very very popular. And
she's got a new one coming out in October
called Lost Ocean. Adult coloring books are
very very trendy right now so there are several
different ones out there, not just the Johanna
Basford books, but this is the one I have.
When I picked this one out I had trouble knowing
which art medium I wanted to use on it. Did
I want to use colored pencils? Gel pens? Markers?
So that is specifically what I will talking
about in this review today. It's probably
more a review of the paper quality and what
you can use in these coloring books. Obviously,
I can only speak about this coloring book
that I have but I would think it is safe to
assume that because the Enchanted Forest and
the Lost Ocean are also by the same artist
and same company putting them out that the
paper quality would probably be the same.
So you can probably assume that what I'm saying
is good for all of Johanna Basford's coloring
books. Basically, the reason I'm doing this
review is because it took me a long time to
pick out which coloring book I wanted. I would
really just suggest going on Amazon, searching
for adult coloring books, and just doing the
preview images. You can also look in the customer
reviews -a lot of times reviews do include
images of their finished product too - and
just look at the art styles and see if it's
a style that you like. I would highly recommend
the Johanna Basford adult coloring books because
one thing that's really cool about them is
it's not just coloring, there are actually
a lot of pages that ask you to finish the
image or fill in your own details. These are
actually front and back printed, so you get
double the amount of images. Another cool
thing about this is that you can remove the
cover and the inside of the cover can be colored,
and then you can color the actual binding
of the book. So I felt like the Johanna Basford
books were a better investment because I was
getting basically double the images, but I
was worried about bleed through. Since they
are printed front and back, was I going to
be able to use markers or were they going
to bleed through? I have used all 3 of these
different mediums in my coloring book : colored
pencils, gel pens, and markers. I'll start
with the markers first since I was just talking
about bleed through. You can actually read
a lot of customer reviews for any of the adult
coloring books that mention what those different
customers are using in their coloring books
and how they perform. So I kept seeing the
name Staedtler as a brand of markers that
don't bleed through and I picked up a 20 pack.
I got mine at Staples, you can also find them
on Amazon, and I've seen some Staedtlet products
at Target so you can check there. Specifically
I went with the fibre tip markers because
they not only have the very small tip, but
they have a broader edge that you can color
larger spaces with. I'll give you a close
up of what the tip of these markers look like.
Another option you can get with Staedtler
markers are the fine tipped, but I didn't
want those because I didn't want to be dealing
with large spaces and coloring it in with
this teeny tiny little point. So, these work
good for the fine details and the larger spaces.
And I've had absolutely NO problems with bleed
through whatsoever. I have colored 1 page
with the markers so far and I will show you
the back of that page too to prove that there
was no bleed through for me. The paper is
pretty thick so I think that it would probably
take most markers alright, but not like a
Sharpie. So I would definitely suggest the
Staedtler brand if you don't know which markers
to pick up. So like I said, a lot of customer
reviews of these coloring books will mention
what they used and I saw so many people mentioning
gel pens so I picked up a pack of Fiskars
gel pens. I got a 48 color pack and they have
like, neons, pastels, metallics, glitter.
They can really get in there for the fine
details and have a lot of great colors. The
true downside of the gel pens is that it just
takes a while for them to dry. As you go all
over the page you might smear it before they
have had a chance to dry. But if you can deal
with the drying time, or if you can rotate
the page so that you're not smudging it with
the side of your hand, or if you can just
go left to right or right to left then I don't
think you'll have that much problem with it.
I've used gel pens more than any other of
these mediums in my coloring book so far.
I'll show you some close ups of these images
too. The end result really is great with the
gel pens - I really like how bold the colors
are and the different textures you can get
because of the glitter or the metallic or
the neon. And lastly, probably the most commonly
used coloring method is just colored pencils.
I have a mixture of Crayola, Prismacolor,
and Faber-Castell brand colored pencils. I
would just say to start out with a basic pack
of Crayolas. They are very affordable. You
can get like 48 colors and then once you start
actually coloring with them and noticing which
colors you wish you had, then you can go to
like a craft store - Hobby Lobby and Michael's
I know sell individual colors of Prismacolor
and Faber-Castell. They will cost you about
$2 per pencil, which is a little bit steep,
but it's a good way to start out with a basic
set of Crayolas and then supplement as you
come across colors that you wish you had.
Prismacolors and Faber-Castells do go on a
lot more smoothly and they blend a lot easier,
but to be honest, Crayolas work really well
on the paper in this Johanna Basford coloring
book because the paper is very smooth so it
lets them blend out really easily. So really,
any of these options are going to work just
fine in these coloring books. So, that was
my really unusual review of a coloring book.
I hope that maybe this had helped you and
answered some questions that you might have
had because I had those same questions. Thank
you so much for watching and I will see you
in the comments. Byeeee!
[Outro Music]
