printable paint by number, made by a person
your dog. the wedding. the house you grew up in. one photo becomes a numbered kit you can actually finish, and every color in it is matched to the markers and pencils already in your cup.
two ways to paint it
the same picture, the same numbers, whichever you already own.
a printable PDF. eighteen outlines to choose from, a swatch card matched to ohuhu, copic, prismacolor and polychromos, and a page per color. one way to use the outlines: print the faintest, and nothing shows in your finished piece.
see the printable kitsa layered kit for procreate, and it works the same in fresco, clip studio and krita. color drop through the numbers, then switch both the numbers and the outlines off. what is left is a painting.
see the iPad kitsready tonight
each one is a deliberately different night in. the counts are real, taken out of the kit files, not estimated.
six slices of kiwi caught mid-air on a hot yellow background, with three blueberries falling past them.
citrus cut in half and laid out from above: oranges, pink grapefruit, lemons and limes on a clean white table.
a painterly wash of sunset color: gold and butter yellow burning through coral and hot pink into deep violet. no subject, no edges, just color doing what it wants.
two grapefruit cocktails in hard summer sunlight, with rosemary sprigs, orange slices and a scatter of baby's breath.
your photo
built for the person who loves the coloring and hates the getting started: the tracing, the drawing, the color choices and the marker matching are already done. send one photo and it comes back as a numbered kit you can actually finish. I look at it first and tell you honestly whether it will paint well, and swap it for free if it will not.
the part nothing else does
a free tracer hands you a hex code and wishes you luck. every kit here matches every swatch to its closest color in four popular brands, markers and pencils both, on a card printed at true 1-inch squares so you can swatch your own markers right beside it. the guesswork is done before you uncap anything.
320 alcohol markers
357 alcohol markers
150 colored pencils
120 colored pencils
what that looks like in practice
the dog at the top of this site was colored entirely in ohuhu markers first, one flat color at a time. the last hour was prismacolor pencils on top: the little hairs on his face, the grass, the texture in the hydrangeas.
two different sets, one card, and every color matched. that is the whole point: you are not guessing which marker is closest while the ink is still wet, and you can finish in pencil over marker without the two sets arguing.
this reference is built from nine independent hand-swatched sources across the four sets, swatched on more than one paper, never off a maker's chart. where nothing comes close, the card says so. where nothing comes close, the card says no close marker match instead of pointing you at something wrong.
the honest comparison
they are real and some of them are decent. this is what you get for paying instead.
| what you get | a hello paint kit | a free generator |
|---|---|---|
| outlines to print | eighteen: four darknesses, plain or numbered, with or without the color bar | one |
| a page per color | yes, plus a build-up page showing the picture as it grows | no |
| matched to real markers and pencils | ohuhu, copic, prismacolor and polychromos, by code and by name | a hex code, if that |
| piece count before you buy | yes, and the count of pieces smaller than a size-0 brush tip | no |
| a person looks at your photo | yes, and says so if it will not paint well. free photo swaps | no |
real reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars 5.0 across 7 reviews on etsy, every word theirs.
It has been so fun making this!!
Awesome product. Easy to print and use. Customer service is stellar!
Amazing customer service, she does great work. Quick to download and start working on.
start to finish
no drawing needed, ever. if you can match a number to a number, you can paint this.
it uploads right in the etsy order box, which also asks who is coloring, what you color with, and how long you want to color. I can size the job to fit, or leave it to me.
that it will survive being cut into flat colors. free photo swaps if it will not, and I will tell you why.
a watermarked preview, usually the same evening. one round of changes is free.
within 1 to 2 days of ordering, total, the proof included. five PDFs, or a zip if you are painting on an iPad.
print it at home or at any print shop, or open it on your tablet. no drawing needed, ever.
the tracing and the numbering are computer-assisted, by a program I wrote and keep fixing. then I check and finish every kit by hand. it is not a stock file and it is not a machine left alone with your photo.
premade kits download the moment you buy. custom kits land in your inbox within 1 to 2 days of ordering, total, proof included.
your idea, everyone's kit
a pumpkin patch. a lighthouse in fog. a bowl of ramen. if you want to paint it, someone else does too. tell me and it might turn up in the shop.
no surprises
no, and that is on purpose. everything is digital: printable PDFs for paper, or a zip of layered files for procreate. nothing ships, nothing gets lost in the post, and you can print your outline again if you ruin one.
because a free generator hands you one machine trace and wishes you luck. a kit here is eighteen outlines at four darknesses, a page per color, the piece count and the small-piece warning in writing before you pay, and a swatch card that names the closest ohuhu, copic, prismacolor and polychromos for every color in the kit. and a person looks at your photo first and tells you if it will not paint well.
alcohol markers, colored pencils, acrylics or watercolor all work. the kits are built around ohuhu and copic markers and prismacolor and polychromos pencils, and every color carries its exact hex and RGB, so anything else in your cup still works.
on paper, no: one way is to color on the faintest plain outline and keep the numbered one beside you as your map. on an iPad, no: the numbers are on their own layer and so are the outlines, and both switch off at the end.
no. no drawing needed, ever. if you can match a number to a number, you can paint this. nobody is grading this.