I Have VERY Strong Opinions About Coloring Books Now

When I received a Twitter message from “Weird Al” Yankovic a little over a decade asking me to work with him on a coffee table book about his extraordinary life and career I had never owned a coffee table book. 

Why would I? Coffee table books are for squares and old people and I am a hip, irreverent kid in my mid-forties. So I once again found myself in the curious, curiously satisfying process of learning how to do something by doing it. 

I learned how to write a coffee table book by writing a coffee table book. On a similar note, when I decided to turn Felipe Sobreiro’s amazing artwork for The Weird Accordion to Al and The Weird A-Coloring to Al into a coloring book I’d never bought a coloring book for myself.

So I  figured out how to do a coloring book by doing a coloring book. I’m still not sure I did it correctly. Coloring books generally don’t have settings or plots or extensive captions and prompts on every page and The Weird A-Coloring to Al has all of those things. 

It was a process of trial and error, seeing what works and what doesn’t. 

So even though I am a relative neophyte in the exciting, high-stakes, take-no-prisoners world of coloring books I have already developed some strong feelings about the medium. 

Before I created The Weird A-Coloring to Al (with a slight assist from Felipe, in the sense that he did all of the important work) I didn’t think too much about how books should be colored. 

Now, however, I have thought, if anything, way too much about the subject. 

I have opinions. STRONG opinions. 

For example I have come to the conclusion that you absolutely should not use markers in a coloring book. The ink bleeds through the image you’re coloring in and ruins the images behind it. 

In the coloring book I foolishly refer to markers as acceptable coloring instruments. I’M WRONG! VERY, VERY WRONG! 

DON’T USE MARKERS on The Weird A-Coloring to Al unless you want to commit a terrible injustice against Felipe’s brilliant work. Crayons are more acceptable in the sense that they will not bleed through the page and ruin artwork unnecessarily but there’s something a little artless and clumsy about crayons as a tool. 

That is why you should use colored pencils and only colored pencils on a book like The Weird A-Coloring to Al. They’re perfect for a medium like coloring books. 

Let’s just say that there is a reason that crayons are used by children and colored pencils are used by artists. That’s also why I include a free pack of colored pencils whenever you buy three copies of The Weird A-Coloring to Al. 

It’s because I want you to use colored pencils, and only colored pencils, when coloring The Weird A-Coloring to Al. 

Oh sure, you can use crayons if you’d like, or even markers, if so inclined but I will be judging you silently and harshly. I personally use colored pencils when coloring and as the self-appointed “Coloring Book King” I know a thing or two about coloring books, a medium where I am both a neophyte and a master. 

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