Customer Reviews

Drawing Cutting Edge Fusion: American Comics with a Manga Influence

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

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.

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.

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.

Christopher Hart has written another classic instructional Cutting Edge guide. The drawings are excellent and the text is very informative as well as entertaining. In typical Hart fashion he covers his topics from the general, giving context to his subject, to the specific, clearly showing how an artist achieves his or her goals. No other book in this genre focuses on the details that separate the good artist from the great ones. His focus on angles and comparison to Standard and Fusion techniques are classic. I loved his chapter on fight scenes as well. Highly recommended.

I own quite a few of Christopher Hart's drawing books and this is the one I have been hoping he would produce. If you have ever wanted to draw like Joe (Mad) Madureira of Battle Chasers fame, the man who is the original fusion genius, this is the book that will provide the instruction necessary to fuse the incredible art of Japanese Manga with the dynamic Marvel look of in your face action in the same way Joe did when he created the dark and sexy Monika.
Drawing the art work in comic books takes a special talent since a person must know what people look like, and then take that picture and distort it till it jumps off the page and into the readers imagination; an excellent example of this is Khary Randolph's "WOW!" on page 84. If you haven't purchased a Christopher Hart book, then you may not be aware that he includes the work of quite a few artists in his pages thereby exposing us to different styles and the methods of respective artists who might draw in a way that appeals to quite a number of learning styles. In addition to Christopher Hart's work in this book you will learn from incredible artists such as: Roger Cruz (superhero perfection); Diogo Saito (leaning toward the Manga); Steven Segovia (this guy is amazing, he is the embodiment of fusion); and several more. In addition Christopher Hart has had Steven Segovia break down the drawing process into several steps: starting with the mannequin stick form in front, ¾, side, and rear view, Steve progresses to fleshing out the anatomy. Then adds the clothes and features. This is done with two very different males and one Monika style female. Throughout the process Steve explains why he is drawing certain lines and how they help in keeping the artwork true to the character that is being created.
If you have visited digitalwebbing.com the hub for people working in the comic book industry, the one thing you may have noticed is that there are an incredible number of people who have ideas and stories, all they need is an artist. The story is everything and yet without someone who can draw like Roger Cruz... I am hoping that in studying and learning from Christopher Hart's books my drawings both in speed and quality will improve to the point that I am proud of the pages I create; I am getting there... And then I am going to [...] to get my work published.

Book is very helpful in learning how to blend styles. Though for someone just beginning who does not know the two basic styles already I would suggest another book. Though if you already know American Comic styles and Manga this book is awesome.

I used to own this book when I lived in Connecticut and every time I drew, I would go back to it for reference. It would go through the differences between manga, fusion, and american style comic art. Unfortunately, I lost it during a move, but I would definately buy it again. Great drawing reference for both beginning and intermediate artists!

In my opinion, any instructional book should show you how to complete a process from steps 1, 2, 3, 4, and then 5 (depending on how long the process is, of course). However, this book (like most of the Hart books I own) teaches, or rather shows, steps 1, 3, and then 5 with little explination in between. Most "lessons" follow this simple process: A very bare beginning, a nearly complete picture with little explination as to why things were added or changed, and finally a completed masterpiece.

The book's strong point(s) would have to be the fact that when structured lessons aren't being taught, the completed pictures work very well for points of reference. Everything from casual clothes to futuristic armor is shown, and can be built upon to create other designs. The book also covers points concerning comic page layouts and panels. These too are surprisingly well done; teaching character focus and different panel designs.

There are other area's covered, but I won't give away the entire thing here. It's probably better if you have a base for drawing, and not try to learn by starting with this book. On the other hand, if you're looking to expand on what you already know, or are looking for a reference book, this one may be worth a look.

For starters, this is written by Christopher Hart, so it's probably one of your best options if you are interested in the subject of the book...

This book is great for fans of both manga and graphic novels; it goes into how the two genres differ (fusion vs graphic novel) and also the different styles in the fusion style (cartoon vs comic). Also gives huge amounts of character concepts and ideas; a fantastic buy for those who like both styles (not recommended for those who are fans of one and hate the other)

Like all of Christopher Hart's "cutting edge" comic and other cartooning instruction books, "Cutting Edge Fusion" is clear, concise, informative, and just plain enjoyable..i personally own several of his books, and every one of them has helped me fine-tune my artistic abilities and keep up with the changing styles of modern cartoons and comic styles...this book, like all his others, are well worth every penny!