Customer Reviews

Apes and Babes: The Art Of Frank Cho Book 1

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Length:: 0:20 Mins

Apes and Babes should be the first art book of Frank Cho feature more of his action and superhero comic art. It's a 144-page hardcover with a dust jacket.

The book features comic covers he has drawn for Marvel, Jungle Girl, Liberty Meadows and Mars. I'm not sure what Mars is but it's something like Conan, Xena, Frank Frazetta kind of art. For many of the illustrations, he has included the pencil line art version so you can see the before and after. Even though the subject is similar, the feel of the art is very different when colours are added on.

The most impressive part about is art book is probably his knowledge of anatomy. Even though the characters might still be a bit stylised, the anatomy adds a more realistic dimensionality to the character designs. I like the way he uses extremely thin lines to portray muscle contours. The colouring -- in this case probably called lighting -- is fantastic.

This book is recommended to superhero art collectors and Frank Cho fans.

(More pictures are available on my blog. Just visit my Amazon profile for the link.)

Overall this is a nice book. If you can't afford or find, the Mars Maidens, Jungle Queens, or the Sketches and Scribbles books, this has a nice sampling of the works from those. The book is from Image, and like the Liberty Meadows books, it's a nice quality hard cover with bright pages. And it's also the same size as previous LM books. Under the dust jacket, the book itself is dark green with a shiny silver skull surrounded by the name of book in the same color. Don't stare too long kids.

I like the way on most of the work, you get a comp sketch, with loose or tight pencils, that precedes the finished work. And the piece will encompass the full page on the left, then the full page on the right. So that you can compare and see what compositional changes were made before going to print. On some pages, there are the finished inks preceding the final.

For about the first half of the book, it's mostly marvel stuff he has done recently. Then the jungle section is basically that, apes and babes, with a few of his older pieces you can see in the Sketches and Scribbles books. Followed by some Brandy and friends. And then ends with the Mars section. Some Conan, Red Sonja, Dejah Thoris, and 4 armed apes. It's a nice selection of images, new and from books mentioned previously.

If you're new to Cho, or have been following his work, it's worth saving your lunch money for. I don't think you'll be disappointed. With a strong foundation in anatomy, and super clean inks, he fits into that Frazetta, Suydam genre.

The selection of art is pretty extensive for a book of this type. Almost half of it hasn't seen the inside of any of his previous art books. Unfortunately most it is familiar because it's cover art that helped to make him famous in the world of American comic books. There are some reproductions of his paintings that have lost their intensity, they're a little washed out looking.
Besides these problems this is a nice book. The people who have been buying up his many books will be happy to see the work that hasn't been in previous books. For those holding out, this is as good as they're likely to get.
This is 144 pages of fun. It's that simple. Frank Cho is a surprising talent in today's American comic book market. This book illustrates why knowing anatomy and not relying on distinctive but over-stylized, gimmick laden art is not old fashioned. Frank knows his stuff.

This book is mainly a collection of comic book covers done by Frank Cho throughout most of his career. It starts off with Marvel covers that feature a lot of his work with Captain Marvel(Carol Danvers), but has a little bit of everything from the Avengers and other titles. The later art is mostly from his work on She-Ra and some Liberty Meadows, though not as much as you might think, given his long career with that series. Throughout the book he supplements it with some sketches, released or unreleased.

The art is amazing, but the meat of it is it's mostly eye candy for fans of Cho's work. If you're not a fan, most of this book will probably go unappreciated and you might be better off buying individual comics with his work instead. And as good as this book is, it's probably more satisfying to visit a comic convention and get some sketches and other items from Frank personally, as it is from any artist you like.

Frank Cho, to put it simply, is probably among the top five comic book illustrators working today, and his latest volume of art, "Apes and Babes: The Art of Frank Cho Book 1" shows this. Cho is not only a superb penciller, but as an inking draftsman, he can achieve amazing subtlety with pen and brush.

In this book you will find a selection of Cho's cover work, mostly (largely Marvel and work for independents), covering superheroes, jungle scenes, fantasy, science-fantasy, and other genres. Much of the book is composed of "before-and-after" pictures - on one page we see the preliminary sketch, on the other we see the finished inked/colored product. This is one reason that I only gave this book four stars - it would have been nice to fit some more variety into this book in that regard. Additionally included are some of Cho's own efforts in painting, which are quite good.

Overall this book is recommended for those with a serious interest in comic book art, or the work of Cho specifically.

If you like Frank Cho's art. This would be a great sketch book to add.

This is one of the great Artbooks I've bought this year. Buy it here not at a "book store" for the full price....i wish I did. A perfect find for comic book art fanatics. Buy it buy it buy it this is a super collection to view again and again.

I love this book. I want to get some more by Frank Cho. Just wish there was a lil' bit more apes and babes. No just kidding. It really is a nice book. Also, the fact that it is hardcover makes it extra nice.

Frank Cho appears to me to have a sketchbook scam going on; he publishes sketch book after sketchbook that all have seem to have the same (or variations of the sme) drawings in them; it is like he made 100 sketches and then said "okay, publish them in different books over and over while i sit on the beach and count the suckers who buy my pathetic frazetta rip-offs." This book stinks : all the art appears to have been in his earlier books and the reproductions are horrible, washined out colors. Don't be a fool and buy this book. Boycott Cho.