paint by numbers
- noun
:
pintar por números
- Paint by numbers.
That's all sort of nonsense picture, you know, sort of fill in the the dots or, or paint by numbers.
- That's all sort of nonsense picture, you know, sort of fill in the the dots or, or paint by numbers.
Examples
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The children spent the afternoon happily working on their paint by numbers kits, creating colorful landscapes.
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The newest form of mass-distributed art: Paint by numbers.
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It's not a formula, it's not paint by numbers, but it at least is a way to say, here's how I'm going to start my work today.
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It's paint-by-numbers.
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She enjoyed her paint by numbers project, carefully matching each color to the numbered sections.
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As a beginner, he found it relaxing to follow the paint by numbers instructions while creating his first artwork.
How Guided
Surface Forms
Morphology
The noun phrase is directly compositional: 'paint' (to apply colour) together with the pattern 'by numbers' signals doing the painting using numbered areas as a guiding method. This follows normal English composition and is cross‑linguistically transparent, so a B1 learner who knows the constituents would readily infer the literal meaning (though there is a secondary figurative use meaning 'formulaic' or 'unimaginative').
Etymology
Paint by numbers comes from art kits that show a picture divided into numbered areas; you paint each area with the color for its number. Because the kit makes the picture by following a fixed, 'predictable' plan, people now call anything made in a simple, 'step-by-step' way paint by numbers.