Kids love coloring books, whether they are just for fun or as a learning tool. Here are some tips for putting together your own coloring book.

Decide on a Theme

For instance, if you are a teacher you may want to create a coloring book that relates to what you are covering in class (National Parks, the First Thanksgiving, etc.). Same goes if you are just creating a gift for a child, though in that case, it might be fun to create a coloring book that is based on people and places that he or she is familiar with, a recent outing, or whatever the child happens to be fascinated with at the time (sports, cowboys, dogs, etc).

If you are a company that is looking to create a great marketing tool, or just something to keep the kids happily busy while you do business with the parents, a fun little coloring book that is somehow related to your industry may be just the thing. This would be a great idea for, say, an auto dealership, among other businesses.

Create The Pages

There are a few different ways to go about this. If you are artistically inclined, you can draw the pages yourself by hand, or on the computer using some drawing software. If you don't have these sorts of talents yourself, you can enlist the help of a professional graphic artist. Some photo editing software programs such as Photoshop allow you to alter photos in such a way that they resemble black and white line drawings, and you may be able to use these, at least as a starting off point.

The images you use should be compelling and complex enough to be fun to color, but not so dense that you can't easily tell what a given object is. Remember the age of your audience when you are putting this together. You can make it both fun and challenging with a little bit of effort.

Create (or get your artist to create) a nice looking, color title and cover that conveys the theme of your coloring book.

Organize it.

Decide how you want to organize the pages of your book within your theme (chronologically, etc.) and place them within your document-creation software. From here, you will want to make PDF pages of your coloring book making sure that the fonts are embedded. If you are using MS Word, or Acrobat Professional, you can use the PDF creation application within those programs. If not, there are a few free PDF-creation programs available online.

Bind it.

There are a few options to consider here when it comes to binding style, but some of the most logical would be plastic comb binding, spiral coil binding, or thermal (hardcover) binding. Take a look around online or head down to your local printer to see what binding style works best for you. If you are going to be creating a fair number of coloring books, now or in the future, you may want to look into owning your own binding machine. They are less expensive than you might think, and most are rather easy to use as well.