A few days ago, I got a message from a lady in New Zealand who had found my line drawing version of Eostre, Saxon goddess of the dawn, and downloaded it to colour. My first reaction was consternation, that people should be using my images without permission (or payment), but then I thought, “Hey, it’s the internet — if it’s out there, people are going to download it. And she did write me a nice note to tell me!” So the more i thought about it, the more I thought that it was pretty cool that one of my drawings was being enjoyed (and coloured) on the other side of the world! I do sell them as prints (but only face to face), and tell people they can colour it or appreciate it as is, so why not? All you far-away folks are never going to see me at a show to get one in person, so through the miracle of the internet, you can colour my drawings if I post them!
So here’s the deal — Every Thursday, for as long as they hold out, I’m going to post one of a series of drawings I did specifically to colour. They are Celtic-insprired designs, and I’ve been told by friends who have coloured them that they are very meditative to colour. The originals are not large; they take about half an 8 1/2 x 11 inch sheet of paper (standard size here in North America), so it’s probably best not to try to print them too large or they’ll pixilate (that’s a fancy word for when the pixies have been at something!). All I ask is that you don’t change anything, leave my signature in place, and don’t use them for commercial purposes (that includes using them for your business logo, or selling copies). If you want to do something more for me, you could make me happy by liking my Facebook page, or following me on Twitter or Tumblr (There is a lot of sharing of this blog there, but I post other stuff too)!
I suggest printing them on white card stock (you can even make your own notecards!) and using coloured pencils, markers, or watercolour. This first one will be a test — if anyone does colour this, please leave me some feedback in the comments below as to how the download and printing process went — I’m hoping that they are high enough resolution to make a satisfying colouring experience. If not, I may find another way to post them.
Celtic Cats Colouring Card number 1 — have fun,, and let me know how it turns out!
If you do colour it, and want to show it off, please post it on your own blog with a link back here so more people can find it, and then put a comment below with a link to your blog so I (and others that don’t yet follow you) can see what you did with it! Enjoy!
Karen Gillmore Art 
Actually that might be a great way to practise my watercolours or inktense without the pressure of also having to draw something pretty first!
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Good idea! I haven’t tried watercolour pencils myself on these yet — I’ll be printing out one for my own test, and then I could try my own inktense pencils on it. Let me know if you do it!
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well, I just learned that my printer doesn’t take watercolour paper…
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Oops… I haven’t tried mine with that, though it takes ordinary card stock fine. What weight did you try?
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I only had 300g – found a manual online, it only accepts 200 g tops.
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What a good idea — I hadn’t thought of finding an online manual (my printer is pretty old but reliable). I hope you got it unjammed.
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I was also testing some brochure paper for another purpose and your image printed just lovely on that.
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Good to know that — thanks!
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This is a great picture. Wish I had the time to color it, but I did download it to go back and enjoy looking at later. If I did color it, it would probably be digitally. And I shared it on Facebook. Also followed you on Tumblr and Twitter.
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Wonderful! Thanks, Charlotte! Now I’ll really have to work on the separate content for those! Digital colouring is something I hadn’t thought of — these would make great practice pieces for my own learning.
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They look like they would lend themselves to digital coloring very well, plus since they are already in file form, it would be simple to pull them into the graphics program to play with them . . . experiment and change until you got exactly what you wanted and then print it out. I really love Celtic patterns and have done a few Celtic themed jewelry designs. These Celtic cats are wonderful!
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Thanks! Ooh, Celtic jewelry! I’ve often thought these would be neat translated into needlepoint. My mentor pointed out today that I should have translated this to greyscale before posting — doh! This is what having a cold does to my brain! Anyway, I’m going to try to replace this image with a better one by tomorrow, and remember to do the rest of them that way too!
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Grayscale would be cool, too, but I think for the purpose of digitally coloring them, probably the line drawings are better, depending on what kind of digital coloring you plan. I was mostly thinking of just coloring with plain color and/or gradients to make it look something like stained glass. Later I could come back and play with shading and such, assuming I ever had the time.
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By greyscale I meant not-RGB — there is some residual colour to the white from the paper tone itself.
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AH! I was asleep when I read that! I should have known that’s what you meant. Tee-hee.
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I am awestruck that you can read in your sleep!
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I’ve just downloaded the file to my computer and I play with the idea of digitally colouring it…
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Great! Let me know how it goes. As I mentioned in response to Chalaedra above, I should have converted it to greyscale first and cleaned up the whites and blacks. I’ll be putting up a new version today.
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