Forensic Art Essentials: A Manual for Law Enforcement Artists [Paperback]

Lois Gibson (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0123708982 | ISBN-13: 978-0123708984 | Publication Date: December 20, 2007 | Edition: 1

The demand for forensic art usage in investigations is rapidly expanding due to media attention. Despite this fact, to date no book thoroughly explains how to sketch a suspect's face from a witness' memory. Forensic Art Essentials teaches artists to extract information from a witness or victim about a face they have seen, and produce an image good enough to lead detectives to the criminal being described. After reading this book, anyone with adequate drawing skills will be able to learn the tools necessary to develop his or her skills as a forensic artist. Instruction focuses on an explanation of techniques for various scenarios and includes the use of case studies of special situations and how they should be handled.

Additionally, Forensic Art Essentials covers skull reconstructions of unidentified murder victims and age progressions to aid in the apprehension of known fugitives. The book also provides step-by-step illustrations of how to reconstruct a face from a skull, and offers solutions to a multitude of common problems that occur in the field. With 500 full-color illustrations, this book is an essential tool for any forensic artist.

* Provides insight as to the best way to responsibly interview and extract information from eye-witnesses and victims to develop accurate composite sketches
* 500 illustrations, many full color, show examples of various challenges in developing sketches and reconstructing from skulls
* Serves as a guide for forensic art professionals as well as a call to law enforcement agencies to expand the use of this valuable forensic tool

Product Details

• Paperback: 432 pages
• Publisher: Academic Press; 1 edition (December 20, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0123708982
• ISBN-13: 978-0123708984
• Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 7.5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #546,041 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Lois Gibson promotes other forensic artists who want to join her profession. She wrote Forensic Art Essentials to convey her techniques to practicing artists and those wishing to enter the field. Realizing there are less than 20 full-time forensic artists in the entire country, Gibson has made it her mission to advocate and develop forensic artists wherever she can. She trained and nurtured the first forensic artist in Israel, Gil Gibli. Her training has propelled the career of Florin Lazau in Romania, Filipe Franco in Portugal, and many other forensic artists world-wide.

Gibson was nearly killed in a violent criminal attack at age 21. Lois describes how she gained justice for that attack in her true-crime book, Faces of Evil (New Horizon Press, 2004). Knowing what it feels like to be a victim of crime is the impetus for her creation of the forensic art position serving the Houston Police Department and surrounding areas since 1981. Graduating with Honors from the University of Texas at Austin, she now teaches forensic art at Northwestern University Center for Public Safety in the near-Chicago suburb of Evanston Illinois. During her early 20's Lois drew approximately 3,000 fine-art portraits of tourists posing live on the River Walk in San Antonio Texas. She attended the University of Texas Health Science Center Dental School in San Antonio and completed the forensic art training at the FBI National Academy in Quantico VA.


Gibson is in the Guinness Book of Records for having the most identifications of any forensic artist in the world. Gibson created the first forensic sketch shown on America's Most Wanted and has found success through the years with drawings shown there and on other crime-fighting programs. Gibson's 2007 drawing of an unidentified murdered infant girl who washed up in a plastic box on a Galveston beach and was dubbed "Baby Grace" by locals, prompted the tiny girl's grandmother to call authorities with her identity. Even though that Grandmother was a thousand miles away in Mentor Ohio, Gibson's drawing reached out via the internet and helped authorities find the two people who thought they could murder 2-year-old Riley Sawyers and get away by hiding her identity.

Gibson has been profiled in People Magazine and Oprah's O Magazine, on the CBS Early Show, Good Morning America, Dateline NBC, Reader's Digest, Discovery Channel, ABC's 20/20, Fox News and many more. An entire RELENTLESS episode on the Oxygen Channel focused on Gibson's help solving a notorious Kansas serial-rapist case. A team of experienced writers and producers are now working on creating a television movie/series on Lois Gibson's life and work.

Lois Gibson has a son and daughter ages 27 and 24. She resides in Spring Texas and paints oil portraits of prominent Houstonians including Mayor Bob Lanier for the City of Houston Public Works Building. Her surrealistic landscape paintings are shown in prominent galleries and private collections. However, as long as she has the strength, she plans to use her talents to help law enforcement stop evil doers and support other artists to do the same.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is the best forensic art book availlable, January 23, 2009

By 

Wanda Harris "Forensic Artist" (Texas) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Forensic Art Essentials: A Manual for Law Enforcement Artists (Paperback)

This book is the very best tool a forensic artist could have. I am a forensic artist in Texas and with every page I learned something new. Lois doesn't hold back. She is willing to share her vast knowledge freely. I am so impressed with her insight into the victims fragil condition and is able to pull out the hidden memories and then do an almost photographic sketch. She bravely opened the door for all the rest of us to follow her. Any forensic artist or any portrait artist should have this book at their side at all time. It should be the required text book for all forensic art classes and all portrait art classes. I read her first book "The Faces of Evil" and I could'nt put it down from start to finish. This is the reason she is in the Guiness Book of Records for the most arrests from her sketches. Lois Gibson is probably the best Forensic Artist in the world.
WJ Harris

4 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Forensic Art Essentials, August 15, 2008

By 

L. Willingham - See all my reviews

This review is from: Forensic Art Essentials: A Manual for Law Enforcement Artists (Paperback)

This book is worth studying...not just reading. The content is invaluable for the forensic artist to examine how a composite sketch is done. The common mistakes, step by step explainations that make sense, and the examples are wonderful tools. I allowed a teenager to read one of the chapters when she was struggling with a sketch. The chapter helped her to apply the information and stop struggling. So it is a great tool for Art Teachers when they are trying to teach how to do a portrait.
I enjoyed the humor that eased the pain of some of the example stories. There's a gentle tone to the wording of truly horrifying real life stories and focus on the courage of the witnesses. I enjoyed the book beginning to end.

1 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Incredibly thorough, September 29, 2008

By 

Pamela Hammond "chipmunk" (Campbell, TX USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Forensic Art Essentials: A Manual for Law Enforcement Artists (Paperback)

I just received this book and can hardly put it down. I'm only half way through it, but I feel I've already learned a great deal. Ms. Gibson is obviously very talented in all aspects of forensic art and I can only hope to be a fraction as talented.