5 comments about Cartoon Animation (The Collector's Series).

1. I am taking Web design and Animation. My professor suggested that i review this book. She is right the animation is wonderful and i would recommend it to anyone that is inspired by animation and perhaps want to make it a career.



2. This book is a must for all would be animators. I have dabbled with cartoons for years but this book helped me bring them to life, I used the walk sequences as templates and dressed them with my own characters, thus enabling me to focus on the character and not worry about the position of the legs.
   There is plenty of help and advice on character building, movement, mouth shaping for speech, hands, expressions, I could go on but I won't.
   If there is nothing in this book to help you.........then you should be working for DISNEY.



3. hmm i think its the best book for learning to draw and animate cartoon characters
   , complete with guided and many2 example and illustration.



4. It was like reading a comic book, only I was learning a lot reading this one. An artist cant help but appreciate the art work by Mr Blair present in the book. I went through the alligator and hippo sequences like a million times. Masterpieces !
   Just by examining the brush strokes and stuff you get to know so much, the discussions on character building etc are a bonus. I wont be able to agree with anyone saying there are hard and fast rules for character building but yes what I read in the book WORKS, like a character with no chin does look like a screwball.
   Later the discussions on sequencing became a little monotonous and its then that I realized I wasn't reading a comic book but they really were redundant at two three places. Animation techniques discussions are simply great. So are drawing and scene building ones. All in all I learnt a LOT ! Could be because I didn't know a lot but I'm really happy that I bought this book, I couldn't afford to not have this masterpiece.



5. I bought this book several years ago, around 1999, and for its price (or whatever) it's the best book an animator can begin with. Along with The Illusion of Life, it is a must have book for all animators. It taught me the differences between the "cute" types and the "screwball" types, showed how the stopwatch and metronome are used, and even a few things about clean-up. If you love cartoons, by all means GET THIS BOOK!

5 comments about Gardner's Art Through the Ages: The Western Perspective, Volume I (with ArtStudy CD-ROM 2.1, Western).

1. I am extremely disappointed in amazon and this book. You guys delivered it over a month late.I'm not paying for amazon prime so I can receive much needed books over a month late. I had to go to my College bookstore and pay $120. You wanna know the worst part? They don't accept devolutions. So I'm extremely disappointed.



2. This book is very informative and it tries to explain so that there is not much confusion after looking it over.



3. Loved this book for my Art class. I didn't think I would like the class, fell in love with art, and even kept the book afterwards instead of selling it.



4. I would recommend this to anyone who wants to better themselves in the region of art history knowledge and the ability to evaluate art's content as well. It was well worth buying and compliments any classes orientated towards the subject...maybe would even overshadow the required text.



5. I purchased this book for my Art History class. Very interesting pictures along with non-boring texts. I really like the accompanied CD as it has all pictures from this text as well as other version of Gardner's art history books. Pictures are crystal clear. Although I finished that class long ago in 2002 and sold the book for school's book store with attractive price, I still have a copy of that CD and often reviewed whenever I saw some interesting stories of art history (such as female goddess from Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code). All pictures are under flash cards section. Besides a good text book, it should be kept as a reference.

5 comments about Sargent Portrait Drawings: 42 Works by John Singer Sargent (Dover Art Library).

1. A good book full of great drawings by one of the best artist I have ever studied. The price is right and you should not waist one more minute before you order it.
   I always like to see how the great artist draw, since drawing is the back bone to good painting in my mind.
   I really get a kick out of artist who say they can't draw and can only paint, sure.. Thats like saying you never learned to walk and that you can only run.
   Sargent used to say you should draw every day and I think he was right.



2. The book is great. The ones who sent it didn't package it well. It is a paperback book and it came all bent up.



3. A remarkable bargain and a must for anyone interested in John Singer Sargent or his work. An 8 by 11 inch, less than 50 page paperback. Published by Dover. B&W reproductions of 42 portrait sketches by Sargent. Mostly done in charcoal. Two long pages of lucid and informed, really excellent text by Trevor Fairbrother, author of books devoted to Sargent and several articles as well. The reproductions are competent, but, as always, can be nothing like the originals, one of which I've many times had the privilege of admiring in person. Although here again, any one familiar with works on paper has seen how even the interposition of the protective glass, sadly, visibly degrades the viewing.
   
   The 42 sketches span a remarkable, interesting and even entertaining range. Arranged in almost chronological order, they stem from early in his career, but not his childhood, to near the end of his productive life, when he had almost entirely quit portraiture. Fairbrother skillfully has chosen an eclectic lot of Sargent subjects, well illustrating yet another facet of Sargent's personality. Although said shy unto retiring, Sargent must have liked people, at least the varied types of people. He certainly depicted all kinds. Here from a boy little more than an infant to the elderly and "important". The serious and the frivolous. Talented, self-made artists and performers to the witless-looking heirs and dismal aristocrats.
   
   The book's incredible spectrum of people / types and Sargent's genius at capturing both their surface and their interior, can form the center of quite a game easily played today via the Internet. For example, the portrait of a friend of Sargent's, one Earnest Thesiger. From this sketch one infers quite a character, seeming a person perhaps of manic ebullience. The very amusing facts in his bio on the web's Wikipedia rather bears this out. One learns further that Thesiger was the nephew of General Frederic Augustus Thesiger, 2nd Baron Chelmsford, famously incompetent in needlessly losing his entire army in a massacre by the Zulus. (One can imagine a portrait of a dim and blimpy character here. Thankfully, nowadays the British select more professionals for their general officers.) Sargent's jolly Earnest Thesiger further was cousin to the famous Wifred Thesiger, author of the autobiography, "The Last Nomad". Wifred Thesiger was a war hero, diplomat, author, explorer and skilled photographer. Among his other accomplishments, the autobiography describes Wilfred's tireless toiling in the Sharm el Shatt (where the south of Iraq borders the south of Iran) to bring modern male circumcision to the primitive marsh Arabs. (A people so independent in their watery wilderness that the late Saddam Hussein ordered the draining of their protective confusion of still waters and bogs.) Well, odd as it might seem, Wilfred's medical procedures were clearly an improvement over the native's, I imagine especially over a ceremony for teenagers involving a low-banked fire built in a shallow sand pit. But, I digress.
   
   However, that is the point, digressing from Sargent's wonderful portraits. What do they tell us; how can we follow up on our impressions? I'm returning to Fairbrother's book to select another sketch subject to mine for edification. I'm confident because Sargent has been described as having a large circle of interesting and talented friends. Except for those portraits of blimps.
   
   Again, an excellent book at a very reasonable price.



4. Nice series of books, these Old Master Portrait Drawings from Dover Art Library. Good material if you want to study portrait drawing. Good reproductions of the drawings. No text, only a short introduction from the publisher and titles with the drawings. The drawings say it all.



5. As a student of Life Drawing and Portraiture (Carolyn's by Design) going back to her art, I had to have more of Sargent. I had just read the book, "Strapless" about the nortorious Madame X who was captured over and over again in Sargent's renderings. This compilation of renderings displays how attuned Sargent is with his representations of the personalities, how good his eye is at capturing the likeness.....how easily he appears to use minimal usage of his medium to obtain maximum expression in his subject.....This small Dover Art Library reference to Sargent gives you the medium and size as well as the name of the subject and the Intro gives you a great synopsis on Sargent's bio.....For any serious student of Sargent....you will refer back to this over and over again for technical knowledge as well as the inspirational beauty obtained from his work...I love him! Formerly millersequine....sign me Carolyn's by Design and "Enjoy"!!!

5 comments about Dynamic Anatomy: Revised and Expanded Edition.

1. As an aspiring illustrator/artist/graphic designer/film maker/whatever I felt I had a grasp on drawing the human figure. I could more or less draw what I saw or if I could plan something well enough in my head I could put that to paper.
   
   However therein I came up against a limitation. I could only plan so well. My understanding of the human body - its proportions and limits of motion only reached a certain point. My figures always looked static and never seemed to leap off the page in the way that I intended.
   
   There's a multitude of conflicting information that I've read through before coming across this book - the human is six heads high, no, wait, seven, no eight and a half... if you've suffered this problem then I suggest you read this book. It gives you a base, or rather, flexible rules to work from. Reading it you feel the only step beyond it would be actually going to study life drawing at University.
   
   I strongly recommend this book for anyone who wants to add a sense of 'life' to their figure drawings, be they cartoonish or realistic styles. Especially if you've suffered the 'conflicting advice problem' as I have. It also aids in being able to invent dynamic figures rather than just understanding what you're seeing.



2. the book met all my expectations regarding its detail and content.
   the pictures show the human body in all its musculature glory.
   some of the bigtures are repeated throughtout when describing the human form and that was rather disappointing but overall the deatil and particular style of anatomy drawing is dynamic as the title suggests. buy this and a standard science text book and you will have enough source material to work from



3. Definetely a must have. Wonderfful drawings, perfectly explained. You will learn anatomy in the most romantic way you can imagine. I love it!



4. The book is absolutely excellent for anyone that is trying to learn artistic anatomy. It is precisely oriented to the artist's needs and it doesn't go around talking about medically or biological explanations.
   I took a point out because I'm not so sure this new edition has really improved the quality. It has a couple of long initial chapters talking about the history of human anatomy in art and a disclamer about the modern arts. But I don't see this comments add as much value as the space it consumes.
   Also, the yellow figures are not as clear to see as the old black and white figures the old edition had.
   Anyway, I think is a really good book and I absolutelly recommend it.



5. This is a fascinating approach to anatomy, utilizing over-emphasized musculature to better illustrate the human form. Anyone considering purchasing this book must possess the understanding that these are exaggerated proportions not demonstrative of a realistic human form. But they are not designed to be. They convey the inter-relationships between masses that would normally be only subtly perceived. I did not require the art history lesson in the beginning, but perhaps that may appeal to some customers who would like to see the artistic past that helped inevitably shape artists like Hogarth. Overall, this is a good work that acheives its purpose.

1 comments about 1,000 Restaurant Bar and Cafe Graphics: From Signage to Logos and Everything in Between.

1. This 1000 series is wonderful and this is an excellent example. It really stands out in the sea of graphic design annuals that are poorly designed and are questionably juries.

1 comments about Art Forms From The Ocean: The Radiolarian Atlas Of 1862.

1. Radiolarians are a total blank to the majority of people, yet these remarkable builders of glass houses (microscopic to be sure) abound in the world's oceans. Ernst Haeckel, the Nineteenth Century German biologist and supporter of Darwin, wrote the most comprehensive monograph on the group in his Radiolarian Atlas of 1862, which is still in use today. The illustrations have never been surpassed and so it is certainly a boon for microscopists that the plates have now been republished in all their glory as "Art Forms from the Ocean: The Radiolarian Atlas of 1862". In many ways I wish that the text would have included descriptions of the radiolarians illustrated and their distributions, but that probably would have been of little interest to the general public. Instead there is a discussion of Haeckel's life and work, especially of his involvement with radiolarians and other microscopic marine life.
   
   Still, for the price this is a real bargain, and I thus recommend this book just for the plates to any amateur or professional biologist who is interested in the micro planktonic organisms of the ocean.

5 comments about Picture This: How Pictures Work.

1. I can't say I'm overly well versed in composition, namely because most books on the subject are so dense. But in Picture This, the author has found easily understandable way to show the basic fundamentals of art.
   
   Rather than teach composition with diagrams drawn over old master paintings like some books, Molly Bang uses simple bits of paper to demonstrate how shape, color and placement can affect the mood of a picture. And once you understand these principles, it's easy to see how they can be applied to more complex artwork.
   
   Bang's pace is very deliberate. Every change to her construction paper compositions is well documented and explained. It's that simplicity and directness that allow her to communicate such a large amount of knowledge in only 96 pages.
   
   And don't let the short page count and the fact that this book is recommended for grade schoolers fool you. This is a book every artist should have her shelf.



2. This book is amazing...the illustrations are simple, clear and compelling and the narrative approach to understanding the art elements and principles makes this rather dry topic into a fascinating tale. I have purchased several copies of this book for friends and plan to use it in my middle school art classroom.



3. Don't be misled by the simple pictures and storybook style into thinking this a just a book for children. I have given this book to several adult friends, including some who are professional artists. We all learned something from Molly Bang's clear and compelling explanations of the principles of visual composition.



4. I love this book and using it for teaching basic design ideas...a fellow teacher uses it in Psychology! The simple story of Little Red Riding Hood serves as the basis for discussion how line, color, shape, etc. work in art. Such a great idea...wish there were others of this type. I will be using it to teach the elements of art in Art History this fall.



5. Using the story of Little Red Riding Hood this book is focusing on the basic principles of composing images.

   Reduced to the maximum and using simple colors and arrangements of basic elements like circles or triangles, the drawings as well as the short, precise text within this book are pointing out, how simple and complex arrangements within pictures work, transfer obvious (and hidden) messages, how philosophy and psychology witin pictures works. Therefor its a book telling the story why pictures may lie, may influence, may manipulate an observer even though obviously just showing "reality".

   Whether you are taking photographs, drawing or designing - this book is a absolute must! A photo/image tells more than thousand words - here you will find the answer how and why. Great to read and watch, easy and fast to understand - even though dealing with a most complex matter.

   Finally a personal statement and hint for an esthetes: if you like to possess a book with an outer shape and appearance that promises, what the contents keeps, than you have to buy the nice hard cover version instead of the cheaper soft cover version - it will pay off for sure.

3 comments about The Ultimate Book of Optical Illusions.

1. Gave as a gift. The person enjoyed the book as it helped him pass time when he was ill. Some of the illusions were better than others, but if you like this kind of thing then this should be ok.



2. Some are a little obvious, and some I don't get at all. But mostly it's a pretty cool book to leaf through!



3. I cannot tell you how pleased I am with this book. I had been loooking for a "science-y" type book to donate to my son's kindergarten class - something to get kids excited about science other than dinosaurs. Well, my son got so excited when he started "getting" the illusions that I literally thought he was going to have a potty accident. He wanted to look at page after page - some of the illusions he got right away and others he didn't really see, but he was not deterred. In fact, the whole family - both parents and 2 kids, looked at the book enthusiastically for much of the night. There are hundreds of excellent photos with nice simple captions. The book is very entertaining and offers a broad array of types of optical illusions. The book does not describe how or why these illusions work, so if you are looking for that, you'll need to look elsewhere. But for a great collection of optical illusions - suitable for your coffee table or your children's classroom, you will not be disappointed. I am going to look at Seckel's other books to buy another!

1 comments about The Language of Art: Reggio-Inspired Studio Practices in Early Childhood Settings.

1. This book is an exceptional resource for those just beginning to offer a creative art program in their school, or for those experienced in offering creative arts who want some new insights to add to their program! This book is NOT a guide to arts and crafts, it is far more than that. It truly draws on the philosophies of Reggio Emilia and the concept of using creative art as a form of self expression, but these concepts are presented in such a way that even an educator with no prior knowledge of Reggio Emilia could implement the program successfully. It includes descriptions of various art activities (including watercolors, tempera paint, clay, and more), materials lists, and instructions for clean up, but even more valuable to me were the guides to conversing with children as they worked in an engaging, but non-directive manner. A must-have book for anyone interested in offering children creative art opportunities!

1 comments about Art History, Volume 2 (3rd Edition).

1. I had to order this text book since the university did not have enough on campus. I got a better deal and actually received the book in only a couple of days. Couldn't have worked out better.
   Thanks.