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"How to Draw" Books
Are you feeling lost in the jungle of books for
artists (manga style artists in particular)? I am. It is very hard to
decide in advance what books are useful - especially when you're ordering
them online.
This is why I decided to write reviews of the books
I own. Hopefully you can get a bit of guidance to see what books to buy and
what books to avoid.
On this page I will not restrict myself to reviewing
manga-specific books. I will also present books that are oriented towards
western style comics and fine art.
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| "How to Draw Manga", by Katy
Coope.
When I picked this book up, I was immediately horrified
with the amateurish artwork. It is very basic, and appears to be targeted
towards children. As a "manga drawing book" for kids, it may actually be
really good. Other artists, who are trying to nail the "manga style", need
not bother.
The book is mainly focusing on the drawing of characters. It also gives you
a general overview of what equipment you'll need to start drawing, which
I found very informative and good. It doesn't contain much text, and it doesn't
dwell on any subject for more than a couple of pages. In return, it covers
all stages for drawing a complete picture.
The art follows the stereotypic western image of
manga art to a T, with an over-emphasis on pointy chins, spiky hairdos, and
enormous eyes. It is no surprise that the author is not Japanese, and it
is painfully obvious that she hasn't mastered even the basics of drawing
yet. Her art makes a sloppy impression, and she has big problems with proportions
in particular.
Despite these glaring shortcomings, I must
say I do like some of the author's more elaborate character designs. She
has a knack for making her characters feel "cozy", so I think that she has
potential. I feel awful for bashing her art like this, but this is a book
review, and I would've expected a LOT more of a commersially released product.
I kind of start to wonder how old the author is/was, and if she got properly
paid by the publisher.
This book will only teach you how to draw stereotypic
looking manga characters (poorly), in a "paint by the numbers" sort of fashion.
I would only recommend this book to people who want to start drawing manga-esque
characters right away. If you just want to get your little nieces into
drawing, it probably serves a purpose. |
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Rating:
Title:
"How to Draw
Manga"
Author:
Katy
Coope
Publisher:
D&S Books
Limited
Year:
2002
ISBN:
-
Note:
Swedish version
reviewed.
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| "Anime & Game Characters
Vol. 2 - Expressing Emotions", by Tadashi Ozawa.
This book is for semi-advanced artists who have
the anatomy bit down already. The purpose of the book is to demonstrate the
expressing emotions - in various styles of manga, and with various types
of characters. It goes through facial expressions, body language and scene
arrangement. It has a wealth of information in it - and it actually feels
a little overwhelming at first. Every page is virtually littered with advice,
tips, hints, etc (I haven't even read them all yet) - and you even get a
bit of philosophy in the foreword. =)
I have mainly used this book for reference and
inspiration, and I think it is very useful that way. I'm frequently picking
it from the bookshelf to browse it through and check for details. It also
proved very useful during a couple of months when I spent time on improving
expressions and dynamic poses. It has this nice little expression chart in
the beginning that I replicated using my own characters, and that turned
out to be a very good exercise.
This is a good book, but I'm not sure how it compares
to other titles with similar subjects. I would recommend it to anyone who
has a general interest in widening their style, their character designs and/or
their array of expressions. The art style is on the generic side (looking
a bit boring), but it is high quality and the expressions and poses are easy
to adapt for your own characters. Apart from the art style, the characters
are detailed down to their very personalities, and you get a very distinct
feel for each of them. |
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"How to Draw Manga Vol. 4 -
Dressing Your Characters in Casual Wear",
by "The Society for the Study of Manga Techniques".
This book is meant to be used as a guide when learning
how to draw clothing. It's also good to use as a reference book when you
don't have any suitable photos around. The core material consists of three
long sections with poses. These were drawn very realistically from a posing
model and clearly demonstrate how wrinkles and folds occur in casual clothing.
The pose sections are mixed with short info sections that give you some theory
and facts in-between. These are very informative, and the art in them has
a more characteristic "teen manga" style.
Like the title implies, this book only deals with
casual clothing. It starts off with underwear, and goes on to show jeans
+ t-shirt, sweatshirt + skirt, and finally jacket + jeans. I personally think
it wouldn't have hurt them to include some formal wear in it as well, in
particular suits and dresses. I think it would also have been good if they
had made the pose sections with more clothing variations. Perhaps their model
was expensive? There's one thing with it that I found rather funny: Although
they have skirts in there, they actually do _not_ have a pose section with
the "iconic" mini-skirt that is so common in manga. However they did put
in 22 pages of just bras and panties! Highly amusing. ^____^
In summary; The book does have a few shortcomings.
I would have liked to see more variation, along with some more theory. The
big emphasis on female underwear in the beginning comes off as quite odd
with our western culture references. Nevertheless, this book is a useful
reference source and it is definitely worth the cash if you have the discipline
to actually sit down and practice off of it.
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Rating:
Title:
"How to Draw Manga Vol.
4 - Dressing Your Characters in Casual Wear".
Author:
"The Society for the Study
of Manga Techniques".
Publisher:
Japan Publications Trading
Co. Ltd.
Year:
2001
ISBN:
- |
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| "How to Draw Manga Vol. 6 -
Martial Arts & Combat Sports", by Hikaru Hayashi.
This "How to draw" book impressed me more than
any other I've seen so far. The artwork in it is very good and it has oodles
of very useful information in regards to drawing fights. I haven't had time
to really "dig into it" yet - I'll have to take the week off one of these
days and do just that. =P
The book is divided into five chapters; Judo, Karate,
Kendo, Boxing, and Street Battles. Each of these types of fighting get a
thorough examination and typical poses are presented. This is mixed in with
plenty of clothing examples, theory, and advice for accomplishing dramatic
effects.
The art is the best I've seen in any of the "how
to draw" books that passed through my hands. In many of these books the art
is generic and/or rushed looking, but here it is excellent! Stylistically,
it's on the realistic side (in the vein of manga titles for adults), and
very detailed. You get a lot of examples of how clothing will wrinkle and
fold in typical battle poses. By the way - the book cover is not at all
representative of what's inside, as you're not going to find any big-eyed,
big-boobed fantasy girls in this title! You will not find any exotic clothing
in there either - it's just martial arts uniforms and "casual"
clothing.
I personally found the "Street Battle" section
the most interesting and useful. The other sections look like they cater
more to people who want to draw sports stories (?). In any case, here's a
good opportunity to practice and get inspiration for dynamic poses. If you
want to get into a more realistic manga style of drawing, you can pick up
plenty of ideas from this book. If you're interested in martial arts on top
of that, the book also makes an interesting read. For me personally it was
definitely worth the money. |
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| "Dynamic Figure Drawing", by
Burne Hogarth.
This is one of the books that have become a household
name among drawing artists - and as such, it was a must-have purchase for
me. Burne Hogarth (1911-1996) is mostly known for his breakthrough as the
ace cartoonist of Tarzan - but is also reknowned among drawing artists
as a master of human anatomy, dramatic poses and
foreshortening.
As its title implies, the book deals with human
anatomy, figure drawing in dynamic poses, and how to instill action into
static drawings. Hogarth's figure drawing is elaborate and beautiful, with
perfect proportions, and it feels like heresy to find faults in it. However,
I can't help but feel that the style feels awfully dated, and that the poses
are remarkably...well...lifeless for being dynamic poses. To me they
look like statues, frozen in various poses (which was also something that
annoyed me with a lot of western comics, including Tarzan).
What's worse - the book is a sleeping pill. The
illustrations are all great, and I'm sure I have a lot to learn from it -
but the text just bores me to tears, and I have yet to finish reading even
a quarter of it. I do not doubt the skill and the wisdom of the late Mr.
Hogarth at all, but I just can't bring myself to get through this. I feel
sorry for the students that had to have this as course
litterature.
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