Customer Reviews

Complete Idiot's Guide to Drawing

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

 

 

I bought /The Complete Idiot's Guide to Drawing/ on a whim, because it had lots of illustrations and a wide variety of topics contained within. I'm not at all disappointed with the book, but I feel I should warn potential buyers that this is not necessarily the best book to start with.

The authors start out with basic drawing theory, left brain vs. right brain, etc. and a few exercises to help you understand how best to approach drawing in general. They move on to talk about different types of paper, pencils, the picture plane, viewfinder, and other tools for drawing - very useful and well thought out information. Then the book jumps into various ideas for what to draw, what perspectives to try, etc.

If you're thinking it sounds like something has been left out, you're right. While /Idiot's Guide to Drawing/ covers a lot of tools and drawing ideas, it doesn't offer much in the way of exercises or practical advice for actually _drawing_. So while you may be inspired by, say, the section on still life drawings, you will find very little in the way to help you practice.

So what it comes down to is this: if you've dabbled a bit in drawing and aren't afraid of experimentation, this is an excellent book. Lots of good stuff in here, and great ideas for where you might want to point your creativity. But as I said, there aren't very many guided exercises in the book to help you explore the concepts you see and get any decent amount of feedback. Some would argue that lots of little exercises are silly or pointless, but I think they can be great confidence builders for those of us who tend to be overly critical of our own artwork... Or those of us who expect far too much from ourselves early on.

I highly recommend this book - but with a strong suggestion that you start with one or two more basic drawing books (like /Drawing for Dummies/), unless you want to do a great deal of experimentation on your own.

Most drawing books either get too advanced early or are written for young kids. This one contains useful exercises in every chapter at a pace that isn't boring but can be followed. This is the fourth drawing book I've started and the only one I've stuck with. By chapter 8 (or 12 at the latest) your drawings will no longer belong on the refrigerator door. Good luck to all the other adult beginners out there!!

Well...stick people with depth! But seriously, I always though I had a drawing impairment gene but even after spending a few minutes with this book and the excellent ideas and advice on how to "see" objects I could actually sit down and do a drawing of my hand that looked dimensional. I am really amazed by the results so far and can certainly recommend it to those who want to have some fun and try a little drawing beyond stick people.

What a great book! Thoroughly addresses every aspect of drawing for the complete beginner with plenty of room to grow for all levels. It is excellent in the way it addresses the issue of training oneself to see skillfully in order to draw skillfully. In the absence of that information most "complete idiot's" won't even begin, but once convinced most have the confidence to try...with exciting results. This book presents a very convincing case. The book addresses almost every imaginable area of interest to an aspiring artist. Great for classroom teachers, homeschoolers and others who would like to pass on their love of drawing in an organized fashion. Top notch!

At best, this is an oversimplified rehash of Betty Edwards', "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain." As a much better alternative to both of these books, look into Brenda Hoddinott's, "Drawing for Dummies." Brenda's method is very methodical and step-by-step, not to mention fun and a little silly,(just like Brenda!) whereas this particular book calls for a "If you only look at what your drawing, it will be easy!" attitude. Nothing truly worth doing is easy. Check out Ms. Hoddinott's Drawspace.com website as well. You won't be sorry you did.

This book is bargain-priced, but there are better "how to's" out there for beginners. It is a good reference book for the money, and full of useful general information. As an additional resource for your study, it has something to offer; but it's more of an "extra".

This is a very good book, You can learn how to draw fast. The author is very good, has a good sense of humor. It feels like the author is actually talking to you and holding your hand through this somewhat-scary journey of you learning how to draw!

This book covers:

Shading

Perspective

The Basic Shapes in 2D and 3D

Proportion

Hands

Face/Head

Body

Clothing/Drapery

Nature

Contour Lines

Mild Anatomy

and more!

Very good book.

This is book is much better than "Drawing for Dummies"

There is also the "Complete Idiots Guide to Drawing People"

This book described products that I was unaware of (the pencil extender and eraser guide). I found these and other tips very helpful.

I had the chance to use a copy of this book, so I sat down at the dinner table and read the chapter on landscape drawing at my leisure. It was useless. It amounts to an inventory of elements in landscapes, with a random assortment of completely uninspired drawings for each one, coupled with the sagacious observation that this element (be it skies or trees or whatever) presents different aspects and opportunities for you as you draw it. There are checklists of purportedly practical tips, but they could have been brainstormed by any hack writer over a cup of coffee & are not really demonstrated or explored.

So, if you have to buy a guide to drawing for the idiot/dummy, I feel pretty certain saying you're better off with the competing title Drawing for Dummies. I haven't used this book, but the author Brenda Hoddinott's online drawspace-dot-com instructional materials show her far superior ability to help you think about drawing.

If I may descend to the merely snarky (since the illiteracy and historical disorientation of artists is nothing new), I was pretty dismayed by the advice, "Don't draw a head of broccoli like painters used to before en plein air painting became popular..." Ummm, Leonardo and Dürer's botanical studies are a bit truer to nature than anything in this book! The author of this book declared previously at one point (mistakenly), "En plein air is a French term meaning 'full of fresh air.'" My verdict on her book: Full of hot air.