5 comments about The Art of Looking Sideways.

1. The product was shipped the next day and got to me quickly. The book is awesome and was in perfect condition when I got it. Thanks!



2. the book is big, heavy and has a confusing layout(page numbers refer to spreads, not individual pages) Some pages are printed with black type on darkblue or gray making them almost unreadable (including the index which also has numbers smaller than most eye charts.) There is no index and little way to get back to something you found before without post-its. Yet for all its drawbacks, it's a fascinating compendium of design ideas - ideas in general. Great price for this much imagery. And if one has even a bit of leisure to peruse books for what just might pop out, this would be a good one to have.



3. This book is a tour de force of creativity and it is suitable for everyone, not just graphic designers. Each page is so thick and rich that you shouldn't browse through it. I highly recommend you limit yourself to 1 page a day so you can absorb and digest what it contains. It is a stunning whack of creativity that you need to take slowly. Over time this book will help you to see and to think in different ways and with significantly more "creativity".
   
   If you consider yourself to be a creative person you absolutely, positively, have to get this book. It will change you.



4. All the scraps of thoughts, quotes, illustrations, art, and scientific insights all blend into a very nice amalgam of a book. I didn't read it from cover to cover, but rather opened up somewhere random and read different pieces. The randomness of all the inspirational thoughts allows for this type of reading - I think it actually makes the book even better. It almost works as the mind itself: getting bits and pieces of information to juggle with really gets your creative juices flowing.
   A must have, and must-random-read, for everyone in the creative industries and arts sector. Not sure about what other people should do with it.



5. The only book that I have ever bought that compares to the is Gary Larson's The Complete Far Side.
   
   They both have pride of place beside the toilet. Visitors can pick this book up, open it anywhere and be enlightened, amused or amazed.

5 comments about Creating Characters with Personality: For Film, TV, Animation, Video Games, and Graphic Novels.

1. As an aspiring cartoonist with my own cast of characters on my Captain Cockle website I found this book an excellent and yet simple guide to creating characters that leap out of the page. The inclusion of guest cartoonists, many of them very famous in their own fields, is a great idea and adds depth to the book. If you have a limited budget and are confused by the huge variety of "how to" books on cartooning, I would strongly recommend this one as an essential starting point.



2. I am a student studying animation, and I purchased this book for my character design class. I really love this book, it is quite usefull, and my two roommates reference it as well! One is an illustrator, and one is a video game designer. Useful to anyone and everyone...



3. This a great book for the beginning character artist. I often have a hard time drawing cartoon characters but this book always helps me out. Covers everything from personality to color, from exaggerated to semi-realistic. Highly recommend!



4. Nice book , a lot of ideas , examples. Very good choice for beginners. My students loved it.



5. This is a great book to take your drawings to the next step. I've been frustrated that my characters lacked that certain special 'something' to make them pop from regular ol' dry drawings to likable, engaging characters. This book illustrates simple examples of a line here, a curve there, to push it up a notch. I really enjoyed the suggestions, and this book has been very helpful. myspace/kris10cartoons

5 comments about Graffiti World: Street Art from Five Continents.

1. I bought this for my 14 year old daughter and would recommend this for any urban artist. It captures so many excellent murals and other types of graffiti from around the world. Just when you think you've found your favorite artist, you turn the page to find another. Regardless of how you feel about scripture on walls, trains and buses, the art and freedom that exudes from each picture is awesome and beyond the descriptive word. They just are!



2. The book is rad, there is better street art out there than what is in thisb book but it was still worth the purchase. It was delivered in a heshen bag with a ripped cover.



3. I bought this book for my boyfriend (who loves graffiti art) for Christmas and he loved it! :)



4. Escribo estas líneas como un amante del graffiti y de la cultura urbana en general. Como tal debo decir que soy muy exigente cuando veo libros o revistas sobre este tipo de arte, habiendo ya comprado varias ediciones y libros que se venden aquí en Amazon así como en diversas librerias como en España y Chile. Sin embargo, ninguno se compara a este en lo que se refiere a la calidad de las imagenes y la selección de las obras (porque vaya que son reales obras de arte!!). Este libro aborda no distintos aspectos del greffiti, pues hace una breve introducción en la cual describe la historia de este arte desde la época antigua, hasta la historio del mismo en nuestros días. Luego de pasar por más de 350 páginas de gloriosos diseños, el libro termina dando una breve síntesis de los datos de información de los diston "crews" o grupos, un glosario, bibliografía de respaldo y hasta una lista de páginas web y revistas de referencia.
   
   En lo respecta a la vedette del libro, esto es, las imágenes, estas son simplemente espectaculares!! En efecto, en este libro se han registrado las más impactantes y representativas imagenes de las pincipales capitales mundiales del graffiti. Así tenemos en un solo libro una selección de algunos de los mejores graffitis de Chile, Brasil, Nueva York, Los Angeles, Italia, Francia, Alemania, Japón, entre otros. Si bien es cierto por la fecha de edición del mismo (2004) no han recogido más obras representativas de ciudades latinoamericanas (como la barca del Rio Mapocho en Chile, graffitis de Rio o Sau Paulo, o el reciente boom artístico registrado en Lima-Perú, el cual ha sido objeto de reportajes en noticieros) este no deja de ser un importante registro pictórico de lo que representa tanto artística como culturalmente el mundo del graffiti.



5. This book was better than described. I will purchase from this seller in the future. It was a present for my boyfriend who hasnt been able to put it down since Christmas. He keeps commenting on how expensive it must have been. I would never tell him it wasn't... Thank you so much.

5 comments about Meggs' History of Graphic Design.

1. This is an excellent textbook and well worth the price. It's more like a history of art and culture.



2. I purchased this book for my Graphic Design history class. The book is well written and it is very informative.



3. i bought this product as new. i could tell the book had not been or had hardly been opened b/c of the sound it makes when you open a new book. the pages are clean and crisp. it was only the book jacket that protects the hard cover that had a few marks on it, but overall i'm very happy with it. =)



4. After using all the editions, the latest isn't up to the late Phil Meggs' standards. In its attempt to
   be concise and concept oriented, it omits much cultural and marginal information that was
   interesting and flavorful. This edition is not as delicious as the others. I'm thinking of switching
   textbooks for my students.



5. This book provides an excellent resource on the graphic design industry with in-depth information on typography and how different art movements affected graphic design. It is well written and has great pictures with detailed descriptions. I recommend it for every graphic designer's personal library.

4 comments about Modern Mark Making: From Classical Calligraphy to Hip Hand-Lettering.

1. What a magnificent book! It isn't often I get lost in a book. Call it an occupational hazard, but when you handle hundreds of books a month, you have a tendency to become immune/jaded/whatever, but this book is so rich in color and content and visual stimulation, I actually put it down so I could digest the yumminess taken in thus far, picking it up later to continue. The overload was fabulous, but it overheated my brain, and the poor thing needed time to cool while the images swirled about before I began reading again. I still have not absorbed it all (dare I hope that will happen?) as I see it as a delightful meal or vacation to be savored for as long as possible. It is also a book I will return to again and again and again. It is like sitting in Lisa's classroom or having a conversation with her. Absolutely delightful and totally stimulating! It gives one wings, just as she hoped!



2. Calligraphers buy lots of books. Most of us own a copy of Johnston's Writing and Illuminating and Lettering. We look wistfully in our bank accounts and decide we can't really justify the facsimile edition of the St. John's Bible, a unique calligraphic wonder of our time. I have over two shelves just with calligraphy books. Some of them are straightforward how-to manuals (a boon for people who live far away from good personal instruction); others are more exemplars.
   
   Then along comes Mark Making... It has been years since I've been so bowled over by this kind of audacity. Placing graffiti artists somehow on a par with medieval scribes, and exhorting us all to bust out and have more fun (check out the section on fabric!), without ever bypassing the need to get a firm foundation, Engelbrecht gives us the new "must-have" for our shelves. It's a bit like Danny Gregory's Creative License for calligraphers. Bravo to Lisa Engelbrecht, and thanks for the permission. I might just go and roll up my sleeves...



3. If you have EVER had the pleasure of seeing Lisa's work in person or taken a workshop from this MEGA TALENTED artist you would not walk BUT RUN to purchase this book. Her vision is always fresh and her style is timeless!



4. This is a fresh voice in Calligraphy books, noting what works for todays scribe and showing pictures of tools and suggestions for writing mediums. Loved the examples and I think that teens thru adults will gather inspiration from all the fantastic ideas for taking that next step away from the old letterforms!

5 comments about Logo Design Workbook: A Hands-On Guide to Creating Logos.

1. A great and interesting book to read if you want to design logo's (or just your own, like I did).
   
   The layout is great and makes you enthousiastic to start designing.
   
   The reason that it is not five stars is that I missed some great examples (could be that I've different reference materials because I live in Europe).
   
   Though it was an inspiring and usefull book; I'd buy it again.



2. I don't know why the author decieves us wih the word "Workbook." It should be called "about the design of famous logos"
   
   The first 51 pages (of 230) are great. I like the colorful charts and stuff about logo design in the first 51 pages.
   
   The rest is interesting to look at and read, but not what I need and not essential (230 pages long). I am still looking for a book about the logo design PROCESS. It is well designed and has some really great stuff, but still not everything I needed.
   
   ANY AUTHORS OUT THERE? WRITE IT! I need a book which uses about 5 individual designers, their clients, and quotes from both about the process. I want pencil-sketchy looking beginnings. I want stuff about failures as well as successes. I want nitty gritty detail. If you can even include pictures of the designers and clients working together, photos of designers holding up logo proposals in front of a client, that would be great. I know what logos look like. I see them all the time. I do not want to see another book like this that just shows me a bunch of logos!



3. Another great book from AdamsMorioka. Graphic design geniuses. :) This book is superb-- it tells you what concerns need to be addressed before the design process begins, which was the most helpful part of the book. But the eye candy-- the logos-- were the most fun. I went through it all in a day, but can't wait to study it more intently. This will be a great reference and inspiration to me in my work.



4. Subtitled "A hands-on guide to creating logos," the book Logo Design Workbook is a must on the studio library shelf of any designer interested in the creation of logos. Now in paperback, this Rockport Publishers offering covers all aspects of identity design clearly and specifically. From "The Ten Rules" to "Implementing Logos," the authors provide a visual smorgasbord of case studies and examples from firms such as Landor Associates, Morla Design, Pentagram, and over 45 other studios of all sizes, in explaining the basics and the idiosynchrocies of the logo design process. This book should be required reading for the students of any educational institution as they begin to study the creation of identities. - Jeff Fisher, Logo Notions/CreativeLatitude and bLog-oMotives



5. A great introduction to logo design process. The first part of the book is about the process and the second part is a catalog of case studies.
   
   This book will not teach you how to draw your logo in your favorite vector-based drawing program, but gives you a bird's eye view on process and it does it great: it is easy to understand and covers important topics as asking the right questions to make your logo successful. Because it talks about the process more, it does not go into details with e.g. typeface and color selection (there are books which cover those topics), but you can see how the complete identity was designed e.g. for Metropolitan Market. Recently I had to work with external graphics professionals to re-design the graphical identity of one of our products and this book's focus on the process has helped me a lot to understand and to set up project requirements.
   
   I recommend this book to anyone who works with designers or interested in logo design.

5 comments about Fashion Artist (Fashion Design Series).

1. I wore holes in piles of paper trying to work up to the basic points so magnificently outlined in this book! It's like having an art teacher with you (without the snide remarks) to bring your abilities to the top.
   
   If you are planning on studying fashion, or just doing it for fun, you need this book.
   
   Highly recommended!



2. This book is a great start for beginners who want to work in the fashion industry or for those who consider fashion designing a hobby and want to improve on their illustration skills, like myself. Burke starts with the basics, like learning how to draw the female figure in different poses and drawing some examples of clothes, but she also touches upon fabric rendering and ideas on how to make a presentation. There's even a section on designing for men, childeren, and costumes. Overall a very informative, clear and consise book to get started and to encourage and inspire amateurs to want to learn more.



3. I haven't really had a chance to play a lot with this book since I got it a month ago, but so far, I like it. There are very colorful designs, croquis', and many illustrations. It seems like it gives a lot of information in a short amount of time.



4. I'm wanting to become a fashion designer and i bought this book and i was amazed. it really teaches you how to draw fashion models (and people in general) in all different poses. it shows you so many different poses both with an actual person modeling the pose and then a block figure showing you how to draw it. after the structure is learned, it teaches you in a really easy way how to flesh it out, and then how to draw the clothes and how the clothes are supposed to look at folds and creases. if you like this book, i recommend Draw Fashion Models! by Lee Hammond, a great book that goes in depth into more poses and how you should draw the clothes and how they look when the arms are raised, when you're leaning on one hip, etc.
   
   i really recommend buying this amazing book, it's straightforward and very helpful!



5. I bought this book for my 16 yr old daughter who is an aspiring fashion designer. To get into design school & possibly qualify for a scholarship, she must prepare a portfolio. She expressed concern that her sketching skills would look amateurish so she asked for a book to help her.
   
   This book shows in picture and text detail the supplies needed to do a project & an easy format to follow. She loved it and was so excited to have a guide to help her. This book not only helps in this regard, but has several sections that gives pointers on design elements and much more pertinent information.
   
   If you or someone you know is an aspiring fashion designer, do not hesitate to get this book. It will be a valuable tool that will be put t good use.

No comments about The World's Coolest Hotel Rooms (The Cool Hunter).

5 comments about Artist Trading Card Workshop: Create, Collect, Swap.

1. This was my first ATC book and gives good ideas, guidelines, techniques. Kind of neat- a teacher from my old highschool was featured in here. I DO like how several different styles were highlighted in the book.



2. Terrific book with a lot of fresh ideas. Some items are harder to find, but reasonable subsitutes can often be found...for instance Orange Goo Gone can be used in place of Gamsol in some instances. You can find a number of groups working on the challenges together and sharing their progress with this book and that's an extraordinary situation, IMO. I love it!



3. This is one of the best "how to" craft books I have ever read. I've just gotten interested in ATCs and the instructions on different methods and history of this artform are excellent. I highly recommend this book for beginners!



4. This book contains everything you need to know to create ATC's. It explains everything from the origins of this fascinating art form to examples and instructions. It provides inspiration as well. Great book!



5. I have only had this book in my possession for about a week and I have already made a trip to the craft store to get a few new supplies and was up until all hours of the night the last few days trying the new techniques! I have been an avid scrapbooker and paper crafter for years, but this book showed me things I have never thought of or tried before and it opened a whole new world of possibilities and inspiration for me. Not only does the author present some great techniques, but she includes gorgeous color photos and easy to follow instructions. Any paper crafter can use the ideas in this guide and make them their own!

5 comments about The Ultimate Guide to Video Game Writing and Design.

1. Though I've been mostly interested in writing for animation and comics, while playing video games I questioned who came up with it's stories. Many games have little to no stories and focus mostly on mindless entertainment...which isn't always a bad thing. But some video game stories really touch the viewer (Half Life 2, Final Fantasy, Bioshock, etc. come to mind.)
   
   On a whim I bought this book and have enjoyed it immensely. Both the authors provided much more than I was hoping for. Both are seasoned game writers/designers who have worked on many games you know, and are still working on games. Stuff like UNCHARTED - DRAKE'S FORTUNE, CRIMSON SKIES, PROJECT ORIGIN, and FRANK MILLER'S SIN CITY - THE GAME. These guys know what they are doing.
   
   The book breaks down not only how to write for games, but what that entails, hardships you will find along the way (both with writing and people), they provide sheets you can fill out to create your own game bible to pitch. And as an added bonus they occasionally have writing exercises to help you hone your craft or understnad a point better.
   
   Leave no stone unturned and that's what these two have done. It has my highest regards! Buy it and truly educate yourself.



2. As a member of the student team who needed to produce video game in rather short amount of time, I have found this book extremely helpful. I did like one-sheet summary that allowed us to summarize everything. The content was very helpful. Thank you.



3. I am a Multimedia student in Community College.
   
   This book has given me a ton of good ideas on how to create a top-notch game!
   
   I reccomend it to anybody (Like Me.) who wants to design a hit videogame!



4. this book is chock-full of incredibly useful information about writing and game design. many of the classic traps in this area of game development can be avoided by following flint and john's advice here. everything is outlined in a very clean and (not surprisingly) fun and witty read.
   
   as a game developer for 10 years now, i found information in this book that i'll be using in the future and i can't recommend this book enough. these guys get it, and so should you.



5. When I read The Ultimate Guide to Videogame Writing and Design I was expecting quite a lot from a title like that. As a well read veteran game designer with over 34 million units sold to date, as well as game design professor at USC, I thought I had seen every element and angle in game development. Not only that, at USC we have developed a pretty robust curriculum on how to build great narrative into a solid game. To my amazement, my high expectations were not only met, but exceeded by a wide margin with this book! Ultimate Guide is extremely well thought out and presented in a no nonsense manner, with many excellent examples, points, and tips on not only writing, but also how to survive and prosper in the game industry. I guess it comes as no surprise since this book is practically a FedEx straight from the front lines, as these authors are still writing top games, and have written a number of "Story of the Year" games over the last five years. These guys have written for both film and interactive, and they know how to bring solid storytelling craft into the game space. I recommend this book to all my students as well as colleagues as a must read. You will not find a more straight forward and to the point book packed with real world examples anywhere. This is more than a "how to" book, but also a "how come" as it focuses down precisely on the challenges and pitfalls of game design and writing today from a variety of angles. I guarantee it will provide insights and value to both new and veteran game writers, as well as designers who are looking to bridge the gap between solid storytelling and great gameplay. I wish I'd had this book when I was starting out! But I'm sure glad I have it now!