Drawing Cutting Edge Fusion: American Comics with a Manga Influence [Paperback]

Christopher Hart (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2005

American comics once dominated the world. Now the balance of power is changing, as anime (Japanese animation) and manga (Japanese comics) have exploded into the mainstream of American culture. Drawing Cutting Edge Fusion is the first-ever tutorial that shows how to draw American-style comics with a manga influence. With this book, artists learn to assimilate Japanese aesthetics into new-look comics: how to turn supermuscular bodies leaner and more athletic; how to make facial features more angular and elegant; how to draw hair in up-to-the-minute spiked or long styles. This dynamic fusion of cultures brings together exciting storytelling and sophisticated design. Now artists can capture the best of East and West with Drawing Cutting Edge Fusion.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Christopher Hart is the world’s
best-selling author of drawing and
cartooning books. His titles have sold more than two million copies worldwide and have been translated into
seventeen languages.

Product Details

• Paperback: 144 pages
• Publisher: Watson-Guptill (October 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0823001601
• ISBN-13: 978-0823001606
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 0.4 x 11 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #793,799 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Thanks for taking a look at my books, and this "Author Bio." I'm a competent tennis player, who also enjoys playing computer chess while I'm watching TV at night (Hey, it prevents me from channel-surfing). I'm keenly interested in M-theory, although i have become skeptical of it of late, despite Brian's Green's full-body gushing... I love being with my family, and even my extremely evil dog, a Welsh Springer Spaniel named "Rusty." Oh, yes, he truly is that evil.

As for my work, I'm the author of many How-To-Draw books, published by Watson-Guptill,the art imprint of Random House. Thanks to a lot of the wonderful readers (and you know who you are!), I have sold over 3 million copies domestically, which have been translated into 20 languages worldwide.

I'm fortunate to also have had 26 of the Best-Selling art books in the country, according to Bookscan.(Bookscan is the publishing industry's rating system for books, which is owned by same company that does the Neislen TV ratings.)

I also have my own drawing show on the Comcast Network, called, "How To Draw Action Heroes With Chris Hart." It's on Comcast's "Activity TV." I hope you like my books, and find them a valuable adjunct to your own imagination.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good Art Book, Few Caveats, March 4, 2006

By 

Serene (Marina, CA, United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Drawing Cutting Edge Fusion: American Comics with a Manga Influence (Paperback)

Chris Hart's books are hit or miss, but this is one of his better ones. If you're interested in drawing "Fusion Style" comics, a style pioneered by Rob Liefeld than this book is for you. Like most Hart books, this book is filled by illustrations from various artists with Hart providing an occasional illustration. While I like his books, I find Hart's style is poor. Thankfully, illustrations drawn by the author are kept to a minimum.

The Good: Some good fusion style faces. From all angles this time. Thanks! More turnarounds including 'generic ones.' Excellent

The bad: Why oh why did hart have to draw the muscle charts? This illustration is very poor, and one of the worst in the book. Also, whoever drew the female figure on page 29, did not draw it in fusion style. Pages 22-33 were really bad, and just did not do the book justice. Since these were key proportion illos I was disappointed.

Overall, if drawing "Fusion" is your bag, you can't go wrong with adding this to your collection.

25 of 34 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Check It Out Before Buying..., October 23, 2005

By 

James P. Williams Jr. (Romeoville, IL) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Drawing Cutting Edge Fusion: American Comics with a Manga Influence (Paperback)

Given the nature of things online and how easy it is to misrepresent something as being *THE GREATEST EVER*, I am usually skeptical when any book has glowing reviews and it's only been out less than a month. I hate to burst the shiny bubble that the other two reviewers have given but Christopher Hart's books are not worth the time or the money for the serious would-be comic book artist or established artist looking to improve.

Don't just take my word for it though go to your local library or bookstore and have a look at Hart's books yourself. In all of his books on superhero drawing and manga style drawing, you will find no more than 25 pages of artwork done by Hart. This book I believe only has 16 - 18 pages of art attributed to him out of 144 pages.

So exactly who fills out the rest of Hart's books? A number of other artists who draw considerably better superheroes and villains in American, Manga and Fusion style than Hart can. It's a shame those artists don't have their names listed on the book covers. To even put Hart's name on the cover as though he'd done all the work (or even most of it) is very misleading. Again, don't just take my word for it, visit your library or bookstore and look for the contributing artists listed in the first few pages of the book. You will quickly find that Hart is good at drawing very basic and general characters but not the type of superheroes that populate comic books.

Now you might think well if the other artists are pretty good isn't the book still worth it? No and the reason I say this is because I've seen them and most every one is light on technique and instruction. How light? Try a page or two at best on topics like facial expressions, poses, clothing etc. There are better books out there which are more in depth and devoted to one or two topics rather than skimming over many as Hart's books do.

I can only guess that the popularity of comic books, comic books turned movies and videogames based on comics has served to fuel the book buying of how-to drawing books that have made Hart a best-seller. It's also served to prompt many others to toss crappy how-to draw books out there as well. Sadly, there's at least three worthless drawing books for every solid book on comic book/superhero drawing. With the string of Hart books coming out seemingly one after another, that ratio of bad over good will only continue to grow.

I just hope that more people discover the truth about books like this one and not buy them sight unseen based on the sales rank or number of glowing reviews. Hopefully the result will be fewer sales and ultimately fewer useless books clogging up the market.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good book, October 26, 2006

By 

Dietrich Adonis "Artist/Illustrator/Muralist/... (U S Virgin Islands & Tampa, Florida) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Drawing Cutting Edge Fusion: American Comics with a Manga Influence (Paperback)

This is the better of the Hart books: good solid information into a genre of comics/animation full of mis-conceptions.

I personally think Fusion style marries the best of these two styles. Anyone wanted to create a comic would be wise to adopt THIS style and make it your own.

As with most of the Chris Hart books the sections on who how construct panels and tell stories w/ pictures is EXTREME helpful.