Drawing Shortcuts: Developing Quick Drawing Skills Using Today's Technology [Hardcover]

Jim Leggitt (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0470435488 | ISBN-13: 978-0470435489 | Publication Date: December 30, 2009 | Edition: 2

The updated edition of a contemporary approach to merging traditional hand drawing methods with 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional digital visualization tools.

Jim Leggitt?s Drawing Shortcuts shows how communicating with hand drawings combined with digital technology can be ingeniously simple, and this new edition makes an already popular technique even better. Completely expanded with new chapters and a wealth of supporting images, this Second Edition presents practical techniques for improving drawing efficiency and effectiveness by combining traditional hand drawing methods with the latest digital technology, including 3-D modeling with SketchUp. This book?s step-by-step approach will sharpen and streamline your techniques whether you draw for pleasure, school or your design profession.

• Easy-to-follow instructions cover every aspect from the basics of drawing?such as composition, color, shading, hatching, and perspective?up to the most current technologies
• Incorporates Google SketchUp, Google Earth, computer generated renderings, digital scanners and printers
• Features new visuals from accomplished drawing experts
• Special new ?Gallery? section highlights the creative process with step-by-step examples of drawings
• Complete coverage of the ?Overlay and Trace Method,? ?Simple Composite Method,? ?Advanced Composite Method,? and ?Digital Hybrid Drawings?
• New matrices show alternative drawing techniques for specific visual effects such as Linework and Shading, Selecting the Right Views, Perspectives and Paraline Drawings, Drawing Detail, Camera Lenses, and Drawing Tools

Generously enriched with detailed process drawings, examples, and more than 500 full-color images, Drawing Shortcuts, Second Edition will have you creating top-quality drawings faster and more effectively.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Given the impact that technology has had to face with design, the second edition of this fascinating book focuses on the implementation of the illustrations of the urban landscape all the while blending the traditional hand drawing with the more contemporary digital techniques." (Tango Reporter, August 2010)

"Architect, Urban Planner, and professional illustrator Jim Leggitt brings the information he teaches in his drawing workshops to the pages of this colorful text. A second edition of a 2002 book, this version has been revised to integrate "today's technology," specifically in the form of Google Sketchup, presenting a drawing approach that merges hand-drawing techniques with digital technology." (Landscape Architecture, July 2010)

"Drawing Shortcuts, Second Edition, is a timely reference tool at a time when technology - for all its advantages – has contributed to an increased atrophy of freehand drawing skills among design students and professionals." (ChicagoArchitectureToday.com, June 2010)

"Written for students and professionals in the building and landscaping arts, Drawing Shortcuts has numerous tips that will help today's busy professional speed up the drawing process without sacrificing creativity. Author Jim Leggit's processes combine computer technology with the more emotion-based, traditional, hand techniques to produce work worthy for presentations. Rather than take years to learn the shortcuts, this book allows readers to quickly stimulate spaces that tell a story." (San Francisco Book Review, March 28, 2010)

From the Back Cover

Create top-quality drawings faster and more effectively

This book is about putting your design ideas on paper for others to enjoy. Recent developments in computer rendering technology have put amazing new tools in the hands of designers. But for communicating emotion and character, there is simply no replacement for good old-fashioned hand drawing. Jim Leggitt's Drawing Shortcuts gives you an ingeniously simple drawing approach that joins traditional hand-drawing techniques with the latest 2-D and 3-D digital technology.

In this new edition of his popular book, architect and teacher Jim Leggitt, FAIA, introduces you to the fundamentals of drawing—such as drawing types, media options, composition, color, shading, hatching, and perspective—and then explains how to incorporate the most current digital technologies into your work.

The book's step-by-step approach helps you:

• Sharpen and streamline your visualization technique using the "overlay and trace," "simple and advanced composition," and "digital hybrid drawings" methods

• Absorb the lessons through detailed process drawings, carefully chosen examples, and more than 500 full-color images

• Create amazing images combining your own hand drawings with 3-D computer views made with Google® SketchUp, Google® Earth, and other powerful programs

• Master "Tradigital Drawing," which merges traditional hand-drawing technique with digital imaging

Whether you draw for pleasure or professionally, let Drawing Shortcuts, Second Edition show you how to utilize technology on your own terms—and communicate your designs with a timeless magic that's all your own.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 264 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 2 edition (December 30, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0470435488
• ISBN-13: 978-0470435489
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 11 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #74,311 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #25 in Books > Computers & Technology > Graphic Design > 3D Graphics

More About the Author

Jim Leggitt, FAIA took his first drawing lesson at five years old, courtesy of TV. There were two 'how to draw' programs being broadcast in 1955. Winky Dink and You and Jon Gnagy's Learn to Draw gave Jim his first taste of a cutting-edge combination of technology and hand drawing while tracing televised drawings onto clear vinyl placed directly onto his black and white TV screen. Fifty years later, Jim is now reintroducing Jon Gnagy's passion for teaching traditional drawing techniques, but with 21st century digital technology, high-speed computers and 3D SketchUp models as tools to assist in the drawing process.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

56 of 60 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Better than chocolate!, August 27, 2002

By 

Deborah Brooks (Savannah, GA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Drawing Shortcuts: Developing Quick Drawing Skills Using Today's Technology (Hardcover)

The only way Jim Leggitt could make this book better would be to package it with a quarter pound of really good chocolates. I've chosen to overlook that omission since this book is exactly what I wanted to use in my rendering classes at the Savannah College of Art & Design. This is a twenty-first century handbook for rendering in color.

Thirty-one students (two classes) proved to me this summer that Drawing Shortcuts works for learning how to make and render drawings in color quickly, effectively and relatively economically. The final projects reflect ten weeks of increasingly stronger skills and confidence in drawing/rendering abilities. Both graduate and undergraduate students with varied levels of computer expertise found value in the Drawing Shortcuts approach of "Let Technology Do Your Dirty Work".

Bottom line: a relaxed learning atmosphere in studio, fearless renderers willing to experiment with color media and striking final projects. The studio professors are commenting on the improvement in rendered drawings in their classes, too. Leggitt's methods are weaning students from a dependence on computer-generated images. The enhanced freehand drawing skills complement the computer drawing skills. Students now have many options for graphic expression which reflect their individual needs and desires.

I teach rendering classes for interior design students in the School of Building Arts at SCAD. We'll be using this book every quarter. Thanks, Jim Leggitt. But think about the chocolates with the second edition of the book!

27 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Every Architect and Student Must Have This Book !, April 5, 2002

By 

R. E. Middlebrooks (Chesapeake, VA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Drawing Shortcuts: Developing Quick Drawing Skills Using Today's Technology (Hardcover)

This book is an instant classic, that every architect and architectural student must get. Many of us grew up using the techniques taught by Michael Doyle in his book "Color Drawing". Jim Leggitt's techniques are even more geared toward the pace of productivity we all face. Using all the advantages of current technologies, including cameras, copiers, and printers he shows you exactly how to improve or gain the skills it takes to produce fast and effective visualizations. Some of the techniques are so insightful and helpful, as to immediately payback the cost of the book. Great color photographs help guide you step by step. This book is packed full. No one interested in drawing technigues should miss this book.

31 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Book, November 24, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Drawing Shortcuts: Developing Quick Drawing Skills Using Today's Technology (Hardcover)

I am an architecture student. The content of this book isn't by any means revolutionary, but it is smart. Basically the whole argument revolves around tracing as a basis for developing drawings, a concept I kind of thought of as cheating before reading this book. That sounds simple enough, but it is worth buying the book to find out all of the interesting ways he is able to develop a traced framework - ways I would never have thought of. He could have gotten everything he wanted to get across in half the pages, but then the book wouldn't look very serious.
Buy this book: the quality of your drawings may or may not increase from reading it, but you'll be able to produce twice as many in the same time.