How to Draw Anime & Game Characters, Vol. 1: Basics for Beginners and Beyond (Paperback)

by Tadashi Ozawa (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
This exciting new series which may be used in conjunction with How To Draw Manga is a dream-come-true for all aspiring "Anime = Japanese Animation" artists, "Video Game" designers, as well as fans. Volume one introduces the step-by-steps involved in drawing various types of male and female characters, young and old, in the unique "Anime" style whose popularity seems to be growing by the day. Moreover, it provides detailed explanations how to bring out certain personality traits through facial features, anatomy, wardrobe as well as accessories. This will be one "Hot" book for all "Anime" fans.

Product Details

• Paperback: 152 pages
• Publisher: Graphic-Sha; illustrated edition edition (September 5, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 4766111206
• ISBN-13: 978-4766111200
• Product Dimensions: 10 x 7.1 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (54 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #27,538 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

  Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

  #7 in	Books > Arts & Photography > Drawing > Specific Objects
  #28 in	Books > Arts & Photography > Design & Decorative Arts > Graphic Design > Commercial > Illustration
  #72 in	Books > Comics & Graphic Novels > Cartooning

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

160 of 161 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent illustration instruction, October 13, 2000

By	Erik K (Austin, TX United States) - See all my reviews

Far and away the best of the English "How to Draw Manga" books. The art style is clean and the layout is well-done, with no issues of whether you should be reading left-to-right or right-to-left (a definite problem in some Japanese conversions).

Best of all, Ozawa starts from the very basics, and urges you to do the exercises from the beginning. Sure, drawing cubes isn't exciting, but even for a non-beginners, it's a useful warm-up that improves technique. With the reassuring statement "if you can hold a pencil and draw straight lines, you can draw, " he skillfully leads the reader to develop or improve drawing skills.

He also includes something I've never seen in a comics manual before: Drawings from different ability levels. He shows stuff by absolute beginers, intermediate, advanced and professional and critiques the problems and positives. Personally, I found this extremely helpful and reassuring. He also marks the time it took to create some of the professional drawings: Again, very reassuring that these things took time and weren't dashed off in minutes.

Finally, Ozawa covers a broad range of character styles, from generally realistic to the SD (simple deformed) type. For each, he includes plenty of detail on what makes such characters work and why.

These books can be hard to find, so if you're interested in this subject, don't wait. Get your copy now.

42 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Ahhhh this book rocks!!, January 3, 2003

By	Kaya (Rio Piedras, PR) - See all my reviews

I... Well actually my dad bought this book for me (I bought volume 3), and trust me this book is worth every single penny! It talks about the basics like the face, body, poses, and more! The main reason I bought this book was to learn how to improve my anime eyes; and let me tell you, being the amateur I am, they've improved ALOT! I would show a scan of one of my practice sheets, but it's not allowed, oh well! XD

I made a drawing of a kitty girl with the instructions the book gives you...*can't imagine all the critiques she would get from the author* But anyway, the book tells you to compare your drawings with other drawings, and it takes you think: "Man, I used to draw like THAT?" At least that's how I did...lol

One of the things I loved about this book was that the author shows us these drawings made from 100% Amateurs, Intermediate *sp* and Advanced artists, plus proffessional versions of the drawings. It tells you WHAT'S wrong with the drawings, the errors etc. And that helps ALOT because these drawings have very common errors.

May I add that the mascots are, hmm how do I put this...KAWAII?! (japanese for cute...heh) The author uses these adorable mascots that briefly explain you things like "We must learn the basics!"; that adds humor to the book, and that alone made me more confident of myself, and killed the thought of "Oh it'll probably be too hard for me". But let me tell you, if you put your heart and time to it, and practice with this book, you'll be a kick-arse anime artist in no time! And remember, if your first straight line comes out horrible, don't worry, by time you'll get it right, because practice makes perfect =3 If you plan on becoming an anime artist or illustrator or whatever, thi book MUST be on your bookshelf, you won't regret it. ^_^

53 of 57 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A vey nice book, October 16, 2000

By	Gwen Kramer "gwenhwyvar" (Tehachapi, CA United States) - See all my reviews

I hesitated to buy this book at first because I was worried that it was one of those cheap, 12 page, how to draw book meant for 2nd graders. This book is not! It is pretty thick for a drawing book. I really liked the exercise suggestions, they helped a lot with my drawing.

One quibble and that is not enough to bring down my rating, some of the translation is obscure (fringe for bangs, etc.) but you can usually figure out what was meant.

This book is well worth it if you enjoy anime.