The Animator's Survival Kit


Richard Williams - 2001
    During his more than forty years in the business, Williams has been one of the true innovators, winning three Academy Awards and serving as the link between Disney's golden age of animation by hand and the new computer animation exemplified by Toy Story. Perhaps even more important, though, has been his dedication in passing along his knowledge to a new generation of animators so that they in turn could push the medium in new directions. In this book, based on his sold-out master classes in the United States and across Europe, Williams provides the underlying principles of animation that every animator--from beginner to expert, classic animator to computer animation whiz --needs. Urging his readers to "invent but be believable," he illustrates his points with hundreds of drawings, distilling the secrets of the masters into a working system in order to create a book that will become the standard work on all forms of animation for professionals, students, and fans.

A Smile in the Mind: Witty Thinking in Graphic Design: Revised and Updated Edition


Beryl McAlhone - 1996
    Packed with illustrations showcasing the use of wit by today’s practitioners alongside classic examples, A Smile in the Mind brings together the best projects from around the world and across the decades. The different routes designers can take are examined and illustrated with inspirational examples, exploring wit by technique (such as ambiguity, substitution and double takes), application (including posters, packaging and data visualization) and business area, spanning digital, retail, arts and culture, politics and even matters of life and death.The book also features interviews with legendary designers past and present, answering the biggest question of all: how did they get the idea? Designers offer a glimpse into their private working methods and thought processes, and reveal the inspiration behind classic pieces of work.Showcasing forty years of witty thinking and including over 1,000 projects and 500 designers and creative thinkers, A Smile in the Mind is an essential compendium of contemporary designs and a celebration of classic pieces, resulting in the definitive guide to wit in graphic design. Written with humour and insight, it offers designers a friendly read, a helpful sourcebook and a trigger for ideas.

The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity


Julia Cameron - 1992
    An international bestseller, millions of readers have found it to be an invaluable guide to living the artist’s life. Still as vital today—or perhaps even more so—than it was when it was first published one decade ago, it is a powerfully provocative and inspiring work. In a new introduction to the book, Julia Cameron reflects upon the impact of The Artist’s Way and describes the work she has done during the last decade and the new insights into the creative process that she has gained. Updated and expanded, this anniversary edition reframes The Artist’s Way for a new century.

Creative Lettering and Beyond: Inspiring tips, techniques, and ideas for hand lettering your way to beautiful works of art


Gabri Joy Kirkendall - 2014
    After a brief introduction to the various tools and materials, artists and lettering enthusiasts will learn how to master the art of hand lettering and typography through easy-to-follow step-by-step projects, prompts, and exercises. From the basic shape and form of letters to cursive script, spacing, and alignment, artists will discover how to transform simple words, phrases, and quotes into beautiful works of hand-lettered art. The interactive format and step-by-step process offers inspirational instruction for a wide variety of fun projects and gift ideas, including hand-rendered phrases on paper and digitally enhanced note cards. Artists will also discover how to apply lettering to linen, coffee mugs, calendars, and more. Numerous practice pages and interactive prompts throughout the book invite readers to put their newfound lettering skills to use, as well as work out their artistic ideas. Covering a variety of styles and types of lettered art, including calligraphy, illustration, chalk lettering, and more, artists will find a plethora of exercises and tips to help them develop their own unique lettering style.

Graphic Design Solutions


Robin Landa - 1996
    Graphic Design Solutions continues to provide a clear and comprehensive introduction to graphic design and advertising design, with step-by-step visual solutions that readers can apply with confidence to their own design and advertising projects. A highly illustrative, straightforward assessment of developing winning graphic design solutions for a variety of media-including print, Web, television, and unconventional formats-helps designers think critically and creatively about their work while understanding the demands of the graphic design profession in today's world.

Editing by Design: For Designers, Art Directors, and Editors--the Classic Guide to Winning Readers


Jan V. White - 1974
    Brimming with hundreds of illustrations, Editing by Design presents proven solutions to such design issues as columns and grids, margins, spacing, captions, covers and color, type, page symmetry, and much more. A must-have resource for designers, writers, and art directors looking to give their work visual flair and a competitive edge!• Explains sophisticated concepts insimple words and pictures • A perfect desk reference for every kind of publishing medium • Vast audience, with equal appeal to designers, writers, publishers, teachers, and students

MTIV Process, Inspiration and Practice for the New Media Designer


Hillman Curtis - 2002
    Divided into three parts, this book offers a methodology for artistic and professional work and also offers technical advice for translating this to the web.

Designa: Technical Secrets of the Traditional Visual Arts


John Martineau - 2013
    Following the success of Quadrivium and Sciencia, a compendium of six titles on art and design in the acclaimed Wooden Books series appears here in one volume.Book 1: Celtic Pattern by Adam TetlowBook 2: Islamic Design by Daud SuttonBook 3: Curves by Lisa DelongBook 4: Perspective by Phoebe McNaughtonBook 5: Symmetry by David WadeBook 6: The Golden Section by Scott Olsen

The Wayfinding Handbook: Information Design for Public Places


David Gibson - 2009
    Whether we find ourselves in a museum, hospital, airport, mall, or street in an unfamiliar city, we depend on systems of visual, audible, and tactile cues not only to lead the way, but also to keep us safe. They are the fundamental questions of wayfindinga process that encompasses both the experience of choosing a path within a built environment and the set of design elements that aid in such a decision. A decade ago, the professional practice of wayfinding design simply involved devising sign systems. Today, the field is much broader and continues to expand to address technological developmentskinetic media, GPS systems, web connectivity, smart materialsas well as cultural changes in areas such as branding and environmental awareness. Similarly, a cross-disciplinary familiarity with graphic, architectural, landscape, interior, industrial, and information design has become an essential requirement of twenty-first-century wayfinding design.The Wayfinding Handbook is an exciting new volume in our acclaimed Design Briefs series. Professional wayfinding designer David Gibson draws on more than thirty years of experience collaborating with architects, planners, developers, managers, and civic leaders to offer an insider's view of this rapidly evolving discipline. Using real-life examples, Gibson illustrates the way type, color, mapmaking, dimensional forms, material selection, and new media are used to create effective wayfinding systems.The Wayfinding Handbook is a complete guide to the discipline, from planning and design to practical considerations, such as setting up teams and managing projects. "Other Voices" sidebars, presentedthroughout the book, reveal the opinions of experts who plan, manage, and shape wayfinding projects. A comprehensive bibliography and gallery of resources round out what is likely to become the go-to resource for students, professionals, or anyone charged with designing people-friendly, universally accessible environments.

The Acrylic Artist's Bible


Marylin Scott - 2005
    The stylish design of this book, along with the interior photographs, illustrations and diagrams, make the learning process simple and fun for beginners, and provides useful tips for more advanced readers.With its great flexibility, acrylic paint can mimic the appearance of oils, tempera, and watercolors in unique ways, each method pictured in a separate step-by-step demonstration. The author also examines the use of acrylics with airbrush, sculptural, and printing techniques-even three-dimensional relief painting and collagraphy printing methods are included-and how several of these different creative processes can be integrated successfully in one composition with ink, pencil, charcoal, and pastel. Inspiring examples of representational and abstract subjects are depicted throughout, and a complete survey of all the latest acrylic materials covers the best paint brands, painting mediums, supports, varnishes, brushes, knives, and palettes.This book contains instructions on painting many different subjects, like landscapes, trees, mountains, buildings, still lifes, and portraits. It makes an ideal gift for someone practiced in the arts of acrylic painting, and newcomers to the art form.

Skin: The Complete Guide to Digitally Lighting, Photographing, and Retouching Faces and Bodies


Lee Varis - 2006
    Master this challenge with professional photographer Lee Varis as he covers a range of skin: women and men, young and old, various tones, in-studio and outdoors, tattoos, and more. His step-by-step tutorials and before-and-after illustrations demonstrate various techniques for topics such as digital-specific lighting challenges and what can and cannot be done in post-process. A free CD-ROM accompanies the book and contains sample image files to use while following the tutorials, plus equipment recommendations and technical reference materials that enhance and reinforce the instruction. Order your copy of this practical guide today and get a complete start-to-finish approach to integrating everything from posing models to shooting and retouching candid scenes.

The Art of Urban Sketching: Drawing On Location Around The World


Gabriel Campanario - 2012
    The Art of Urban Sketching is both a comprehensive guide and a showcase of location drawings by artists around the world who draw the cities where they live and travel.

The Shape of Design


Frank Chimero - 2012
    My name's Frank Chimero. I've spent the better part of the last two years writing and speaking on design and thinking about the topics that orbit the practice: storytelling, concept, craft, and improvisation. I want to take all of the ideas I've had and connected these past few months and capture them in a book format.I've been teaching for the past 5 years, and I've always been a bit frustrated that there isn't a nice, concise book that overviews the mental state of a successful designer while they go through their creative process. For instance, many say that graphic design is visual communication. A cornerstone of communication is storytelling, and yet you'd be hard-pressed to find any discussion of how to tell stories with design in any design book. This should be remedied.There are new challenges in the world that need to be discussed, and I think design is a prime lens to consider these topics. As our world moves faster and as things become less stable, it becomes more important for individuals to embrace ambiguity, understand paradox, and realize that two things can conflict and still somehow both be true. We must realize that logic doesn't always work, and that sometimes nonsense is the best answer. These are the topics I intend to address in the book.The Shape of Design isn't going to be a text book. The project will be focused on Why instead of How. We have enough How; it's time for a thoughtful analysis of our practice and its characteristics so we can better practice our craft. After reading the book, I want you to look at what you do in a whole new light. Design is more than working for clients.But really, this book aims to look at the mindset and worldview that designing develops in order to answer one big, important question: How can we make things that help all of us live better?"

The Handmade Marketplace: How to Sell Your Crafts Locally, Globally, and On-Line


Kari Chapin - 2010
    Learn to determine your cost of goods, set prices, identify the competition, and understand the ins and outs of wholesale and retail sales. Explore the various sales venues available, including independent craft fairs, Web sites such as Etsy, and traditional stores, and learn to maximize your visibility and sales in each one. Want to start your own website? Chapin shows you how to style and prop your crafts for photography and explains how the most popular Web marketplaces operate. You’ll find everything you need to turn your talent into profits.

Mythology: The DC Comics Art of Alex Ross


Alex Ross - 2003
    His heroes–both super and mortal–have weight; they exist in space, and that space is affected by them in ways never before seen on the page.” And so here they are, the incomparable cast of the DC Comics universe: Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, the Flash, Aquaman, the Green Lantern, and the rest of the Justice League as you’ve never seen them before. Mythology brings together the best loved comic characters in the world, brought to life by Alex Ross, one of the most astonishing young artists working in the medium today. The award-winning designer/writer Chip Kidd and photographer Geoff Spear have teamed up to create a book like no other, with an introduction by M. Night Shyamalan, the acclaimed director of The Village and The Sixth Sense. Ross has often been called the Norman Rockwell of comics, and this book reveals not only his lifelong love of these classic superheroes but also his vision: Mythology takes you into the studio for a behind-the-scenes look at his fascinating creative process. The combination of Ross’s dynamic art and Kidd’s kinetic design makes images from his most memorable stories–including Kingdom Come, Superman: Peace on Earth, Batman: War on Crime, and Uncle Sam–soar off the more than 300 pages. The new material centers on Ross’s startling new comic book series, Justice, including sketches, preliminary art, prototype figures, and more. Mythology is a book in which every page explodes with the power of the icons it celebrates.