Customer Reviews

Quantum Dreams: The Art of Stephan Martiniere

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

 

 

Length:: 0:19 Mins

This would probably appeal more to sci-fi fans and futuristic landscape concept artists.

This book is a showcase of Stephan Martiniere's art. The quality is great and obviously he's in a class of his own.

Most of them are for book covers and some computer game concept designs. Expect planets, star trails, space cities, humans with cool uniforms, and robots. Each painting is accompanied by the artist's comments.

There are 80 pages, and at the end, I felt wanting more. However, you can see more paintings on his website.

(More pictures are available on my blog. Just visit my Amazon profile for the link.)

I am a heavy consumer of art books and I also enjoy conceptual art books. I love to look at collections by artists and for conceptual art, you have many books that are dedicated to a film such as "Star Wars" or "Batman".

And if you do enjoy those films, certain names tend to come up. One name I find is Stephan Martiniere. A Frenchman known for his work involving theme parks, animated television shows and special effects for films such as "Virus", "Red Planet", "I, Robot" and "Star Wars Episodes 2 & 3'.

His book "Quantum Dreams" is a collection of digital paintings and concept art created for book covers, computer games and personal paintings all created on Adobe Photoshop.

Each page (or to be specific every two pages) feature Martiniere's concept and what he was trying to accomplish for a given cover or artwork.

There is no explanation of how he created it but at the end of the book is a one page several paragraph segment of how he works with Adobe Photoshop, the various layers and distortions and opacity levels that he does to create his work.

The majority of the work featured are not from his films but from various book covers and his own personal work. The photos are large and you can see the detail in his paintings.

I love these type of books that have the photos very big, especially if you need a book to be used as a reference. I for one, have used it to get ideas on lighting and ideas of how he was able to work with clouds and various areas in his work.

But for those expecting "how-to's", you're not going to find much in this book.

And for those expecting a lot of reading, you get a foreword by "Myst" creator Rand Miller, a two-page introduction and a page explaining of how Martiniere does his work but the main focal point are the images and a paragraph or two on how he came up with the idea of the artwork.

There are a lot of concept art books out there, many that cover digital painting as well. But what I like about this book is that it can be found online for a great price and whether you are a fan of his art, a student who is looking for a reference or just a person who enjoys perusing concept art books, this is a fine addition to your collection.

I am passionate towards Martiniere's concept art work and very glad to see the book being printed but showcasing the covers fairly large in order for us to see the detail of his work.

All in all, a very cool book to own!

Stephan Martiniere shares some of his excellent art and a bit of his technique in this well put together collection. The book is relatively short compared to some other art books but it is priced to match. Essentially if you like the cover you can expect more of the same kind of work inside. He tends to use a combination of extreme photo manipulation and painting to achieve his look. I found the book to be a worthy addition to my collection of art books, and I would recommend it to those who are interested in digital illustration.

I would get Structura and The Skillful Huntsman and maybe some other books before this one, but it's still a good book.

The pieces reviewed below are the ones on the right hand pages. On the left hand pages there are mostly sketches, other versions, or details of the piece on the opposing page.
In spite of the splendour of some images, having 32 full page pieces on an 80 page book leaves me with mixed feelings about this one.

SPECIFICS:
Page Count: 80
Number of images (right hand pages): 35
Small images: 1
Half page images: 2
Full page images: 32
2-page spreads: 0
BW images: 0

TEXT:
1 page foreword
2 page introduction
1 page - the artist explains how he works
Comments on all the pieces on the right hand pages.

ART:
12 images: 5 stars
9 images: 4 stars
9 images: 3 stars
5 images: 2 stars
0 images: 1 star

Overall: 3,5 stars

Definitely worth the money. this book is a great inspiration for me from a great artist. Amazing prints on good quality paper. I was very impressed with this purchase.

Work is very visually arresting, but lacks the depth of some other gifted ideators. One is left to wonder how a person might actually live inside one of those scenes.