Customer Reviews

Cartooning for the Beginner (Christopher Hart Titles)

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I bought this book last year, and it's really one of the great ones. However, I don't think it's appropriate for someone who's looking for a "how to draw" book. If you are a beginner, I'd reccomend a good artist's atlas or an art class...
Mr. Hart is not trying to teach you how to draw his characters, but how to perfect your own. I think most of the beginning is just filler; It's weak on form and the instructions are a little confusing. HOWEVER, it's chock full'o goodness in the form of tiny details that a beginner might be unfamiliar with; The fact that a woman's high heeled shoe sticks out at the heel, How the tilt of a nose can change personality, etc.
I have yet to see a better chapter on perspective. Although he does have the obligatory "This a box, these are the box's disapearing lines, etc", he goes much farther, showing how to place a character in relation to the horizon without having to use three rulers and a protractor. Very concise and easy to understand. If you're past stick figures but not quite happy with what you produce, this may be the book for you.
It should be called "Cartooning for the Intermediate" :)

I found this to be an excellent learning tool and reference for cartooning / animation. He clearly states step by step with many examples, and almost all the art in the book has the rough "circle" sketch going to the full cartoon final (in color). The color illustrations are excellent, the perspective and clothing tutorials are well-done and easy to understand.

A reviewer below stated that he didn't even specify how to erase the guide lines, and was confused and didn't think that this book was for a beginner. I highly disagree. Page 10 "Creating a face from a basic head shape" specifically states at the bottom to erase your guide lines at the end. If you can follow instructions, you can learn from this book.

I use this book to supplement the Flash cartoons I've been working on, and in fact, instead of taking pencil to paper, I have followed all his guidelines drawn directly into Macromedia Flash (with a Wacom Intuos2 graphics tablet). When it says to "stretch" a ball shape, no problem, all done digitally, all quite simple. Even someone who can't draw a straight line can benefit from this book if they use it in conjunction with Macromedia Flash to learn to create cartoons.

Excellent reference and learning tool, I'm going to the store today to purchase three more of his "how-to" books.

Although this book was somewhat helpful, it seemed to be a mere summary of knowledge, and not exactly in the proper order; if you were to follow this book from front to back, you would get lost pretty quick. Hart doesn't go into detail, nor does he explain anything. He just assumes you "get it," so if you truely are a beginner, this book won't help you much as far as drawing cartoon characters.

There are lot's of great tips as mentioned by other reviewers, but "Beginner" in the title definitely refers to experienced artists who want to learn about cartoons. Like most of Hart's books, each page is taken up almost entirely by large drawings with very little explanation. This may seem to make sense considering the subject matter, but the degree to which it is done is excessive and is actually just a way to blow up a booklet into a book. If several books from Hart's series were combined into one, it might approach the value of other non-cartoon drawing books I've been using that are just as insightful and provide much more information.

I am an aspiring comic artists. First, a word of note to beginners in cartooning or art -- drawing is HARD. Not everybody have the gift or the vision to make professional style art. If you are a beginner, I highly advise you to take a drawing course in a local college. The face-to-face interaction and feedback is invaluable. You *can* learn to draw from reading a book, but not at a very fast pace.

I picked up this book because I was really bored and wanted to learn something new. I mainly draw in the Marc Silvestri and Top Cow studio style. This is a good book that starts you off with the basics, using simple geometrical shapes and then altering the shapes. Then it slowly adds the details. This is as SIMPLE as it can get! If you cannot even get a good feel from the get-go of reading the first couple of pages, you will have a hard time finishing this book or moving on into other drawing style.

Mastery of this book can give you a good boost in moving on to other drawing fields such as anime, comics, and realism. If you have a fairly good grasp of art, this book is not necessary, unless you want to try dabbing in cartoons. The basics are pretty much there if you want to draw your own comic strips. The rest is just practice.

I have this book and many others of Christopher Hart, i really like this 1 as i am a begginer and find that working thru this book and others is very helpful, Hart's style is second to none i always look for books on cartooning and have stopped buying others and only collect his. Others i like are, Drawing the funny side of the brain, Everything you wanted to know about cartooning, How to draw cartoons for comic strips, how to draw cartoon animals, these are all great. Keep em coming Hart.....Thanks

"Cartooning For The Beginner", is a great resource for beginners like me (no art or drawing experience at all). It would have received a 5 star if I had not purchased the "Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Cartooning" book as well.

The instruction is good, the tips are relevent, but in comparison to E.Y.E.W.T.K.A.C.B.W.A.T.D it doesn't have the same "Snap" to it. I recommend getting both books but if you have to choose get the Best Seller.

I have to say I will purchase more of this author's books. Thanks

I've found this book to be great. I have most of Mr. Harts books and found This to one to be one of his best. Everything from character design to animation tips are here. Everyone from the everday cartoon fan to the seasoned professional will get something out of this book.

I purchased this book for my fourteen year old granddaughter(8th grade)for Christmas. She spends a great deal of her spare time doodling, drawing faces, etc., so I wanted her to have some good drawing books to model from. She absolutely loves this book! She and I both think it's for more advanced students though. It has both realistic and cartoonish renderings to improve drawing skills. Oh, and I also think it's a keeper!

This is a really good book. This was the first book on cartooning I ever got... I am pretty much a beginner to drawing, not counting stick figure doodles that I used to do when I was in grade school. I'm now a 19 year old with renewed interest in cartooning and I decided to dig up this old gem and start practicing.

My first thoughts on looking through this book again were that I wished it had more details and explanations. Most of the pages just have pictures on them with very little explanation and I don't feel that the parts on head/body construction were detailed enough.

HOWEVER... after about a week of just practicing what the book taught and copying the figures in the book (which are beautifully drawn - Chris Hart is an extremely talented artist) I realized that maybe what a beginner needs is less explanation and more practice. After a week I tried designing some of my own toons and, just because of what I learned from the lessons in the book/copying stuff about proportions and how to make the different body parts look good and how to make expressions and all that, I was able to make some pretty cool looking original toons.

This book is a great introduction to cartooning, though I wish it had a little more emphasis on the basics (how to construct characters from shapes, etc). It is great for the beginner who wants to get his feet wet in this amazing art, but the book alone won't be enough to get to a really impressive level. I recommend this book to be bought along with a more detailed one that fills in the holes in this great book.