He then demonstrates, step by step, how to draw each facial feature, develop visual awareness, and render the head in color with soft pastels.

    It is an inexhaustible mine of anecdotes, quotations, images, curious facts and useless information, oddities, serious science, jokes and memories, all concerned with the interplay between the verbal and the visual, and the limitless resources of the human mind. Loosely arranged in 72 chapters, all this material is presented in a wonderfully inventive series of pages that are themselves masterly demonstrations of the expressive use of type, space, color and imagery.This book does not set out to teach lessons, but it is full of wisdom and insight collected from all over the world. Describing himself as a visual jackdaw, master designer Alan Fletcher has distilled a lifetime of experience and reflection into a brilliantly witty and inimitable exploration of such subjects as perception, color, pattern, proportion, paradox, illusion, language, alphabets, words, letters, ideas, creativity, culture, style, aesthetics and value.The Art of Looking Sideways is the ultimate guide to visual awareness, a magical compilation that will entertain and inspire all those who enjoy the interplay between word and image, and who relish the odd and the unexpected.

    Sachiko Umoto’s engaging, relaxing techniques include a primer on drawing basics, plus detailed steps for creating animals from start to finish, including deer, sheep, horses, giraffes, dolphins, and more. Learn about essential materials, then discover the best methods for starting and adding onto a drawing, and incorporating shading and color. Sachiko’s instructions are so easy to follow, you’ll be creating a whole menagerie in your sketchbook in no time. Create a marching dog, a sleepy bear, and a bouncy bunny. Trace or copy the designs, then enhance them with unique doodles and details to make them your own. Add color for even more punch. Sachiko’s illustrations will inspire you to incorporate drawings into art journal pages, book art, planners, scrapbooks, and cards. Connect with the world and share your creations with friends and family. Using these techniques, you’ll discover how to:Draw cute character faces that come aliveEasily incorporate details such as fur, patterns, wings, and hornsGet ideas for taking your illustrations further with cute poses and facial expressionsBe inspired by ideas for drawing animals in their surroundingsAdd fun scene-setting extras, such as footprints, food, plants, and moreTake this book with you wherever you, and have fun practicing drawing the cutest animals around. Grab a pencil and get started! Discover how the Illustration School series of books makes drawing enjoyable and stress-free. Using Sachiko Umoto’s fun, easy techniques for sketching quirky animals, plants, landscapes, and people in the Japanese character style, you’ll fill pages with charming illustrations that are uniquely you.

    In more than 1000 illustrations, the human body is shown from a new perspective—from bone structure to musculature, from anatomical detail to the body in motion. Morpho is a rich, fascinating, and helpful book that can go with you everywhere on your sketching journey.

    Among graphic artists and commercial designers, Mucha is praised for the innovative style books that pioneered the use of Art Nouveau in commercial packaging, design, and ornament.The most important of these style books was Documents Décoratifs, published in 1901 at the height of Mucha's fame as the high priest of the Art Nouveau movement. While the artist's fame rests largely on his posters, it is in the smaller works of the style books, or design portfolios, that the refinement of his technique can best be appreciated. The present volume, carefully reproduced from an extremely rare and valuable set of originals, contains all 72 plates of the Documents Décoratifs portfolio. Included are designs for jewelry, wallpaper, stained glass, furniture, and tableware; figure and botanical studies; and a selection of Mucha's famous panneaux décoratifs. Eighteen of the plates are in full color, while the remaining 54 are reproduced in two or more color tones.In addition to numerous innovative designs for practical and decorative objects, the elegant draftsmanship and meticulous execution that characterized all of Mucha's work is evident in studies of langorous nudes, portrait sketches, delicately rendered plant and animal motifs, exquisite modeling of drapery and cloth, and the flowing, fantastic forms created as experiments in pure design. In the Foreword by Gabriel Mourey, specially translated for this edition, Mucha's own philosophy of art, and the relation of the Documents to the rest of his work, receive an appreciative and informative discussion.Hitherto available only in scattered sources, or in the libraries of wealthy collectors, the complete Documents Décoratifs is now available in this inexpensive one-volume edition. Lovers of Mucha's work, admirers of Art Nouveau, and the application of that style to the decorative arts, will want to own this fine royalty-free collection by one of the greatest masters of the technique."[Documents Décoratifs is] . . . an encyclopedic source for Mucha's style in every branch of decorative and applied art and one of the few books on design where even individual plates are sought after by collectors." — Marina Henderson, The Graphic Style of Alphonse Mucha

    Extracted from an Afghan mine, the blue “ultramarine” paint used by Michelangelo was so expensive he couldn’t afford to buy it himself. Since ancient times, carmine red—still found in lipsticks and Cherry Coke today—has come from the blood of insects.

    “It will...meet a deeply felt need to draw the human figure from a vantage point of understanding and visual acuity.”—Arts & Activities.

    In Encaustic Workshop, it becomes much more: a dynamic medium where anything goes and the possibilities are endless.Packed with step-by-step techniques, helpful tips and diverse examples of completed works, Encaustic Workshop brings all the accessibility and excitement of a mixed-media workshop to your own workspace. If you're a beginner, you'll find everything you need to know to get started. If you're a more advanced crafter or fine artist, you'll discover things you never knew you could do with encaustic.Instructions and photos will guide you as you learn to:Apply, layer, color and carve wax to create artwork rich with texture and depth.Create collages that combine encaustic with papers, fabric, found objects, image transfers and more.Experiment with charcoal, inks, watercolors, pastels and other mediums to create unexpected effects in the wax.Then, complete step-by-step projects and an extensive inspirational gallery will show you how you can combine the techniques you've learned to create more complex works.Sign your creativity up for this Encaustic Workshop--then just melt, paint and play!

    Both practicing and beginning artists will learn to develop drawing skills, overcome creative blocks, and enter the meditative state in order to find creative connections and confidence. Featuring full-color examples from professional artists, three different drawing methods, and exercises tested and developed in the author's own drawing class, this is an invaluable tool for artists, writers, musicians, and all who wish to access their creative strengths and live inspired, authentic lives.

    Giger (1940—2014) reigned as one of the leading exponents of fantastic art. After he studied interior and industrial design for eight years at the School of Commercial Art in Zurich, Switzerland, from 1962 till 1970, he was soon gaining attention as an independent artist, with endeavors ranging from surrealistic dream landscapes created with a spray gun and stencils, to album cover designs for famous pop stars, and sculptures. In addition, Giger’s multi-faceted career includes designing two bars, located in Tokyo and Chur, as well as work on various film projects—his creation of the set design and title figure for Ridley Scott’s filmAlien won him not only international fame but also an Academy Award for Best Achievement for Visual Effects (1980).About the series:Each book in TASCHEN’s Basic Art series features:●a detailed chronological summary of the life and oeuvre of the artist, covering his or her cultural and historical importance●a concise biography●approximately 100 illustrations with explanatory captions

    It gives detailed explanations of game art techniques and their importance, while also highlighting their dependence on artistic aspects of game design and programming.” — John Romero, co-founder of id Software and CEO of Loot Drop, Inc."Solarski’s methodology here is to show us the artistic techniques that every artist should know, and then he transposes them to the realm of video games to show how they should be used to create a far more artful gaming experience ... if I were an artist planning to do video game work, I’d have a copy of this on my shelf."— Marc Mason, Comics Waiting RoomVideo games are not a revolution in art history, but an evolution. Whether the medium is paper or canvas—or a computer screen—the artist’s challenge is to make something without depth seem like a window into a living, breathing world. Video game art is no different.  Drawing Basics and Video Game Art is first to examine the connections between classical art and video games, enabling developers to create more expressive and varied emotional experiences in games. Artist game designer Chris Solarski gives readers a comprehensive introduction to basic and advanced drawing and design skills—light, value, color, anatomy, concept development—as well as detailed instruction for using these methods to design complex characters, worlds, and gameplay experiences. Artwork by the likes of Michelangelo, Titian, and Rubens are studied alongside AAA games like BioShock, Journey, the Mario series, and Portal 2, to demonstrate perpetual theories of depth, composition, movement, artistic anatomy, and expression. Although Drawing Basics and Video Game Art is primarily a practical reference for artists and designers working in the video games industry, it’s equally accessible for those interested to learn about gaming’s future, and potential as an artistic medium.Also available as an eBook

    They will learn classic visual storytelling techniques such as conveying meaning with images and directing the viewer's eye. Glebas also teaches how to spot potential problems before they cost time and money, and he offers creative solutions on how to solve them.

    A new generation of artists--as well as some who never abandoned figurative painting in the first place--is relishing the solitary, slow, subtle set of processes involved in not just painting, but painting people. They are choosing paint's unique ability to distill a lifetime of events rather than photography's glimpse of a frozen moment. Painting People, edited by the prominent London art historian and critic Charlotte Mullins, unites and contrasts the work of a key group of artists from around the world, and investigates their richly varied accomplishments in lucid text with detailed commentaries, accompanied by more than 150 reproductions. The list of contributing artists is stellar, ranging from photo-based painters like Luc Tuymans, Peter Doig and Marlene Dumas to Pop artists like Sigmar Polke and Alex Katz, photorealists like Chuck Close and Gerhard Richter, Neoexpressionists like Cecily Brown, and comics-inspired painters like Yoshitomo Nara, Inka Essenhigh and Takashi Murakami. There are erotic grotesques from John Currin and Lisa Yuskavage, meditations on the muse by Elizabeth Peyton and Lucian Freud, "Repro-realistic" work from Neo Rauch and of course self-portraits by Philip Akkerman and Marcel Dzama, among others.

    Designing Characters with Personality shows artists how to create a distinctive character, then place that character in context within a script, establish hierarchy, and maximize the impact of pose and expression. Practical exercises help readers put everything together to make their new characters sparkle. Lessons from the author, who designed the dragon Mushu (voiced by Eddie Murphy) in Disney's Mulan—plus big-name experts in film, TV, video games, and graphic novels—make a complex subject accessible to every artist.

    Stan Lee, the Mighty Man from Marvel, and John Buscema, active and adventuresome artist behind the Silver Surfer, Conan the Barbarian, the Mighty Thor and Spider-Man, have collaborated on this comics compendium: an encyclopedia of information for creating your own superhero comic strips. Using artwork from Marvel comics as primary examples, Buscema graphically illustrates the hitherto mysterious methods of comic art. Stan Lee’s pithy prose gives able assistance and advice to the apprentice artist. Bursting with Buscema’s magnificent illustrations and Lee’s laudable word-magic, How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way belongs in the library of everyone who has ever wanted to illustrate his or her own comic strip.