There are lots of different ways to create the coloring pages for in My Coloring Book, whether you want to draw from scratch or convert an exisitng image.

It's not hard to do, but if you prefer we also have a growing selection of premade coloring pages.  Check out the coloring page image library.

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Every coloring page MUST BE A PURE BLACK AND WHITE GIF.

I.e. Every single pixel may only be BLACK (rgb: 000000) or WHITE (rgb: FFFFFF) - NO shades of gray, NO off-white - and definitely NO colors!

If you try to use an image that is not, you will get STRANGE SIDE EFFECTS when you go to color in.

My Coloring Book Editor (Windows)

To make life easier we've created a special FREE tool to help you out.  My Coloring Book Editor is a basic editor for Windows, that simplifies creating coloring pages.

It's certainly not a high-end graphics program, but it makes sure that you end up with a black-and-white GIF, has a nice import feature, and some basic tools for pixel-level editing.  It also provides a simple test mode to help make sure your picture can be easily colored in.

For a free download, and more information, check the My Coloring Book Editor page.

Other Editors

For those who don't have a Windows machine, or if you just don't want to use MCBEdit, you can still achieve good results with other editors.  The most important thing is that the resulting GIF has ONLY black pixels and white pixels.  No COLOR, No SHADES OF GRAY.  No ANTI-ALIASING.

Follow the instructions for your favorite graphics editor...

• Using Photoshop to create coloring pages.
• Using GIMP2 to create coloring pages.
• Using Windows Paint to create coloring pages.

Tips

• Draw your Pictures with My Coloring Book in mind.
• Don't create pictures that have a lot of small details that will need to be colored.
• If you have embedded the coloring book on your page in a 400x300 frame, then the best results will be by having a picture approximately twice this size and then using the scale-to-fit feature (in the configuration).
• Coloring is based in contiguous areas (a white area completely bounded by black).  So it's worth putting some thought into how it will work when you go to paint it.
• Make sure that each area is fully enclosed, and that there aren't too many really small white areas.
• Try to avoid having items in the foreground that cut across the items behind.  This can result in objects being difficult to color.
• Avoid grids etc.  You may want your picture to include a wire mesh fence, a fishing net, or tennis racket, but unless you fake it a bit, you will end up with a lot of little diamond shapes to color in.  Similarly items like power-lines can unnecessarily break up a picture.  One way around this is to create a small gap one pixel wide to allow the paint to flow through.

Tutorials

For a more step-by-step guide, check out the Importing a picture for My Coloring Book tutorial.

Advanced Topic: Overlays

Overlays can be used to add a variety of effects and graphics to an ordinary coloring page.  See the Overlays article for details.