2 comments about Interpreting Engineering Drawings.

1. After I purchased this book, I realized that the book looked very much like a sub-set of the 1200 page Engineering Drawing and Design by David Madsen published by Delmar.
   
   This is a very good text/reference book that is written very well for anyone who is looking to learn and to create engineering drawings. The book is very user friendly, with numerous illustrations and white area. The book covers the in-depth ASME drawing standards. If you are looking for a great book that covers both drawing and design, purchase the Engineering Drawing and Design book. It is more expense, but you get 500 pages of additional design information.



2. This is an in depth tutorial and reference book, masterfully written and made accessible for whoever is looking for the serious knowledge, the part dealing with geometric tolerances is particularly impressive, the author did his best to nail down this elusive and often skipped subject. I am recommending this book to my students

2 comments about Shoes and Slippers: From Snowshill, One of the World's Leading Collections of Costume and Accessories of the 18th and 19th Centuries.

1. Buy this. Gorgeous pictures, charming and scholarly text, what more can a designer, clothes lover, or dress historian ask from any book? The introduction of these pretty jewel-like volumes on Shoes and Hats provide pleasure and inspiration for designers and fashion fanciers. And the detailed inset photographs on construction makes "Shoes & Slippers", and its sister volume "Hats and Bonnets" obligatory reading for costume makers. Who knew that the Snowshill Collection held this treasure trove of costume? Hat's off to Althea Mackenzie for her terrific work on these fresh additions to the costume and fashion bookshelf.



2. Beautiful photos of a wonderful collection of 18th & 19th century footwear. A terrific reference for anyone interested in either century.

5 comments about A Charlie Brown Christmas: The Making of a Tradition.

1. A Charlie Brown Christmas: The Making of a Tradition is a treasure for those -- like me -- who love this Christmas classic. It is a great "behind the scenes look" that includes photos of the cast of characters whose voices are so familiar. Give it as a gift to the "Peanuts Fan" in your life.
   Philip D. Halfacre
   Author, Genuine Friendship



2. While we've been treated to many Charles Schulz documentaries and remembrances over the years, "A Charlie Brown Christmas: The Making of a Tradition" is the first book to focus on the first Peanuts' television special. The book includes in-depth interviews with producer Lee Mendelson, animator Bill Melendez, and Vince Guaraldi's children. This book is the ultimate backstage pass to the recording studio, with interviews with the original child actors who voiced the characters and sang on Guaraldi's "Christmas Time is Here." As a bonus treat, the script and original animation art round out the book.



3. I loved this book! It has material for every fan of the famous TV special, "A Charlie Brown Christmas". I may not be musical, but if you are, this book includes the music. I am fond of the discussions of the people involved in creating the production of the TV show and the script. I will be using the script in my classroom for Reader's Theatre. The book has a lot of material that has meaning for me personally. I was young when this special was shown on television and it was always one of my favorites. The book was not a disappointment to read and own. I am very glad I bought it.



4. "Charlie Brown Christmas" is the crown jewel of Christmas specials. Heavy on holiday introspection, but with the dry wit and humor you'd come to expect from Charles Schulz's creations.
   
   "A Charlie Brown Christmas: The Making of a Tradition" just expands that experience, by outlining how the famed special came to be -- the music, the animation, the voice acting, even the advertisement to get people to watch it. It's a charming, nostalgic little book, and a good accompaniment.
   
   "A Charlie Brown Christmas" was spun up quickly, when Coca Cola wanted a Christmas special in less than a week -- and Charles Schulz's lovable loser Charlie Brown seemed to be the ticket. But the special was made very differently from other cartoons -- 2-D animation, no laugh track, uncutesy kids, and (horrors!) a jazz soundtrack. It was doomed to fail, they said.
   
   Well, instead it became a booming hit, and has been running every December ever since. Lee Mendelson and Bill Melendez reminisce in here about the much-loved Charles Schulz, and about Vince Guaraldi, who made the distinctive piano soundtrack, and why it's so beloved -- it dares to approach holiday ennui and commercialization, then dashes it away with Linus' description of Christmas' meaning.
   
   As for the "making of" portion, there are storyboards, musical scores, test photos, clips of television reviews, and rare photos like Melendez and Schulz doing the football gag. Finally, there is the entire script of the special, framed by colourful stills from the cartoon.
   
   You couldn't wring this much information from most half-hour animated specials, no matter how much fun they were. But it's a bit different with "Charlie Brown Christmas." It was so completely unusual -- and has proved to be so timeless -- that a book on the making of it, and its effect, seems completely right.
   
   It's a very conversational, reminiscent book. It feels like sitting in a room with Melendez and Mendelson, listening to them reminisce about "Sparky." And we also get input from other people involved in the project, such as Christopher Shea (Linus), who talks about his famous "Second Chapter of Luke" speech, as well as odd bits of trivia (the little girl playing Sally had to be fed her lines).
   
   The Christmas special is more than able to stand on its own, but "Charlie Brown Christmas: The Making of a Tradition" is a wonderful accompaniment. Full of interesting tidbits and history.



5. This is the ultimate companion to the tv show. The art work is from the original show and the dialogue is a great bonus! The book is also packed with great trivia and information about the decisions "behind stage" that led to the creation of the ultimate Christmas Special.

2 comments about Redoute Flowers and Fruits CD-ROM and Book (Dover Full-Color Electronic Design).

1. This is a great resource. I'm a graphic designer and have been looking for full color illustrations of flowers and fruit like this for a while. Lots of online stock photo/illustration sites sell similar artwork for anywhere from $75-250 each. Here you get a large variety for under $20.



2. This is an excellent printing of just what I needed. I use these images for decoupage and they are great!

3 comments about The Web Collection: Flash MX 2004, Dreamweaver MX 2004, Fireworks MX 2004, Design Professional (Macromedia Flash Mx 2004, Dreamweaver Mx 2004, and Fireworks Mx 2004).

1. This book attempts to cover topics in Flash, Dreamweaver, and Fireworks all in one book, with huge screenshots taking up every page. As a result, you barely scratch the surface of these complex programs. I am a beginner myself, and already there are things I want to learn that I can't find in this book. Its clearly written for slow college students, and while I'm a college student myself I find this book to be too slow and elementary. I covered almost the whole flash section in about two days. If you are completely new to working with images, video timelines, and web publishing, this book would probably be fine, in fact, perfect for you, as it pays close attention to the beginner's details. However, I've worked with Adobe Photoshop and have done some web publishing before, so the step by step instructions are rather intuitive. Also the examples used throughout the book are incredibly unprofessional and unrealistic for practical use, so you feel like you're learning to draw stick figures and make goofy personal web pages when you're trying to learn to make something professional and marketable.
   
   If you aren't particularly serious about learning these programs and just want to play around with them, and if you don't have any, meaning zero, experience with photo applications and web publishing, buy this book. (You can buy mine if you want. Send me a message.) Otherwise, you'll get through it in about a week and find yourself wondering, now what am I supposed to do with this thing?



2. This book was our text in a Dreamweaver and Fireworks class I took. It offers a good introduction with hands-on experience. You can download files from the internet to do the exercises. The directions are quite clear and easy to follow. I found the dimensions a bit annoying - too wide to set by the computer on a small desk, but the content served it's purpose. Nice layouts too. Lots of eye candy!



3. Great book for bigginers, takes you to the next level you'll be using Macromedia Suite in no time! did me a lot of good...

3 comments about The Universal Penman (Picture Archives).

1. This book is a reprint of cooperplate writing from XVIII century.
   If you like calligraphy you will enjoy it!



2. This book is amazing! I bought it for a school project my daughter was working on in school about Colonial America, to show the kind of book people used to write from back then. It is beautiful and the calligraphy is amazing. As a historical item it is definitely worth buying, however, if you are wanting to LEARN how to do it, there are other books that are better. Mastering Copperplate Calligraphy, a Step-by-Step Manual is one good choice.



3. The "Universal Penman" is an excellent example of 18th century engravings. The engravings are amazing. The talent of the artists inspires both the beginning and advanced student of penmanship.

5 comments about Jeans: A Cultural History of an American Icon.

1. I was torn between a 4 and a 5 rating. What is good is great, but I think a few things should have been added.
   
   I'd give it a couple of stars just for the loving detail of having printed it blue on white. It is a very interesting history. It is all the more informative because Sullivan gives alternate versions of various stories, instead of simply selecting the one he prefers. In addition, he mentions that he is slightly skeptical of some "official stories" without actually calling the source a liar. He has obviously spoken with or researched a large number of people involved in the industry. There is a lot of detail about various companies, although Levis gets the most space (as is appropriate.) Sullivan begins with forerunners of jeans, different fabrics, and traces the shift in usage from working people, to youthful rebellion to deisgner jeans.
   
   There is one thing missing in this history, in my opinion, and I admit that this is a self-serving pet peeve. Having been born in 1953, I am tired of having the baby boomers all characterized the the oldest members of the set. The Baby Boom lasted until 1968 - some of the youngest "boomers" are the children of the oldest. I can just imagine what people younger than myself think. By the late 1960s and early 1970s, when I was wearing jeans, the sense of rebellion had pretty much died out. Oh, the rebellious still wore jeans, wearing jeans wasn't necessarily a sign of being rebellious. I'm sure there are exceptions, but the adults of most of my peers accepted jeans as the costume of the young without much protest, even though most of them didn't wear jeans. That battle was fought and won by the slightly older. The issue was less blue jeans per se than the issue of formality in dress. We couldn't wear jeans to high school, but women also couldn't wear any type of pants, including a split skirt or culottes. I don't think that jeans were quite the sex symbols that they became with designer jeans. They were rather androgynous and partly symbolic of sexual equality. Some people wore them as an alternative to gendered clothing. If you're not sure what that meant, try reading Susan Brownmiller's Feminity. I'm not saying that wearers necessarily succeeded in avoiding cultural norms of looking sexy, just that it was sometimes their intent.
   
   My other problems are with some of the details. Sullivan doesn't clearly define a lot of terms. While I appreciate his explanation of denim/jean/dungaree and how they came to be confused, a little more detail would have been nice. When Sullivan says that denim differed from jean in being a tougher twill, does he mean that denim was a twill and jean was not, or does he mean that both were twills but denim was tougher. I think he should have defined more of his fashion terms: there weren't so many that it would have been burdensome. I imagine that a lot of people think that "calico" applies only to fabrics with small figured prints, in which case the description of "dungaree" must have been a surprise. And what is a a "broken twill" or the various leg styles? One, which was called a something like a "Dickie-leg" (its not in the index), is completely unfamiliar to me.
   
   Another odd thing about jeans, which I don't think Sullivan touched on, is that they are a "neutral" color. People will wear blue jeans with colors that they wouldn't combine with a pair of slacks that were the same color.
   
   The index is good, but as illustrated above, could have been a bit more detailed.
   
   A few complaints, but overall a very good read and a useful book on popular culture.



2. Being a 3rd generation garmento, I found this book very interesting. Denim has gone from being a blue-collar item
   to having full-fledged fashion status and dominating the contemporary market. Sullivan's book chronicles this transition
   in a smooth, intelligible way. This book explores American culture as much as it does denim.
   
   And to the person who contested the Brigham Young quote, your comment was not exactly a "review",
   which is what this section is designed for. Furthermore, I would be interested to know your basis in challenging
   this quote as you offered no source for your statement.



3. James Sullivan covers the history of jeans from the creation of denim to the Levi's I'm wearing today. The book is well researched; full of great information and things I never knew about the jeans industry. It brought clarity to much of what went on in the late 70's and early 80's when designer jeans came about. A fun look at America's cultural history. Really a great read.



4. Regardless of what denomination Brigham Young was when he did or didn't call jeans 'fornication pants', jeans ARE sexy and--as everyone knows--sex sells. Sullivan does a great job of tracing the arc of this most iconic piece of American clothing from simple work gear to high fashion (and big business) must-have. A stylish and functional bit of Americana, much like jeans themselves; I love the blue type and design. My only complaint is that "Jeans" doesn't come with a soundtrack, but then again I guess we each have our own.



5. Brigham Young wasn't a Mormon until April 14th, 1832. In 1830, he was a Methodist.
   
   So, it should read, "Brigham Young, Methodist Preacher, called them fornication pants."
   
   But, he never said it as a Methodist either.

1 comments about Exploring Visual Design: The Elements and Principles.

1. Joseph A. Gatto has published one of the most comprehensive tomes on modern visual art and the utility of the space around us, the products we use, and indeed, man's design of his environment and the world. Fascinating theories, a good read, for beginner and pro alike.

No comments about Picasso Line Drawings and Prints (Dover Art Library).

2 comments about Florid Victorian Ornament (Dover Pictorial Archives).

1. These motifs are very detailed and perfect what I use them for. This book offers 700 motifs, and while I appreciate the number, some of them are really small.
   
   Overall I like this book and am glad I chose it.



2. This is a good recopilation of designs that include the florist, cubist and intricate crest designs of victorian period. They have no information of who drew them or where they came from but the quality of the drawings is superb maybe even too elaborate for some people.
   
   It's a very complete book that features scrolls, frames, illustrations and simple decorations, most may not be suitable for stencils because of their exagerated amount of details, details are the thing of this book, though there are still enough designs to be made stencils.
   
   Overall this is a good purchase for the amount of designs in relation to the price.