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Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics was published in 1993, just as "Comics Aren't Just for Kids Anymore!" articles were starting to appear and graphic novels were making their way into the mainstream, and it quickly gave the newly respectable medium the theoretical and practical manifesto it needed. With his clear-eyed and approachable analysis--done using the same comics tools he was describing--McCloud quickly gave "sequential art" a language to understand itself. McCloud made the simplest of drawing decisions seem deep with artistic potential.
Thirteen years later, following the Internet evangelizing of Reinventing Comics, McCloud has returned with Making Comics.
Designed as a craftsperson's overview of the drawing and storytelling decisions and possibilities available to comics artists, covering everything from facial expressions and page layout to the choice of tools and story construction, Making Comics, like its predecessors, is also an eye-opening trip behind the scenes of art-making, fascinating for anyone reading comics as well as those making them. Get a sense of the range of his lessons by clicking through to the opening pages of his book, including his (illustrated, of course) table of contents (warning: large file, recommended for high-bandwidth users):
Book Description
Scott McCloud tore down the wall between high and low culture in 1993 with Understanding Comics, a massive comic book about comics, linking the medium to such diverse fields as media theory, movie criticism, and web design. In Reinventing Comics, McCloud took this to the next level, charting twelve different revolutions in how comics are generated, read, and perceived today. Now, in Making Comics, McCloud focuses his analysis on the art form itself, exploring the creation of comics, from the broadest principles to the sharpest details (like how to accentuate a character's facial muscles in order to form the emotion of disgust rather than the emotion of surprise.) And he does all of it in his inimitable voice and through his cartoon stand–in narrator, mixing dry humor and legitimate instruction. McCloud shows his reader how to master the human condition through word and image in a brilliantly minimalistic way. Comic book devotees as well as the most uninitiated will marvel at this journey into a once–underappreciated art form.
Customer Reviews:
Fun to read and very informative.......2007-08-25
I read Understanding Comics and liked it so much I decided to check this book out as well, and found it to be even more enjoyable. McCloud's artwork is very fun and whimsical, his writing is humorous and he puts many concepts about the writing and drawing of comics in very easy-to-understand language. I never thought about making comics before, but this volume was so inspiring I'm convinced it might be fun to try!
A Great Learning Tool.......2007-08-15
If you've ever wondered about the finer points of crafting a comic this is the book for you. This is not a how to draw book and if thats what you are looking for than this isn't for you. It IS a very intelligent and thought provoking insight into the story telling aspects of the creation of comics. This is a MUST HAVE for anyone serious about comics.
Scott McCloud is the Alton Brown of Comics.......2007-08-07
Alton Brown is not a world-class chef but 'Good Eats' is indispensible educational television. It's the same thing with Scott McCloud, reviewers who say he hasn't produced anything earth shaking in the comics medium are missing the point. Making Comics is a wide-ranging, free-wheeling and passionate examination of what makes comics (and much visual art) tick, and provides a toolbox we can use to create our own stories. This is the best thing since Understanding Comics and goes more into the details of visual storytelling, the chapter on facial expressions alone is worth the price of admission. I want to send this book to Edward Tufte. Anyone interested in visual communication needs to read this book, and that goes double for aspiring comics creators.
Must-Have for Aspiring Artists.......2007-07-05
You need to own Understanding Comics to accompany this one. Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art
Making Comics is a complete book that refers to many of the topics that Understanding Comics expands upon. It is a great starting point for aspiring artists to look at approaching their own comic. McCloud explains the mutlitude of styles involved and how each of them works to engage the reader. He is truly a master of his craft.
He strips away the layers of superhero masculine fantasy to reveal comics as a storytelling vehicle. Not your typical how-to-draw book.
Review of book.......2007-05-28
Excellent book - very well presented and detailed. Well worth the price. Our kids (9 and 7) are using it to create better comics
Book Description
This set includes the book How to Draw Manga: Getting Started - with sections on Basics, Characters, Tone, Storytelling, and Backgrounds. Also in the set is 5 sheets of double sided 8 1/2 x 11 3/4 paper, black ink illustrations pen, 8" ruler, 2 pencils, eraser, and plastic curve template. The set is packaged in a hard plastic case, good for storage or travel. (****Additional Text****) A Previews Exclusive! Imported from Japan! You've read the books. You've got your ideas ready to run down your arm to the waiting paper... but how do you get started? Graphic Sha and Previews have the answer with the official How to Draw Manga "Getting Started" Illustration Kit! This indispensable kit is perfect for any budding manga-ka to launch their first project, and includes: a copy of the 128-page English-language book, How To Draw Manga: Getting Started featuring informative chapters on "the basics," Characters, Tone, Storytelling, and even backgrounds! PLUS: 10 sheets of 8 ½" x 11 ¾" (A4-size) authentic Deleter brand Manga Illustration Paper, One Deleter Black Ink Illustration Pen, One Deleter brand "Neo-Piko" Color Marker (one pen, TWO tips, thick and thin!), One Plastic Curve Template, an 8" Plastic Ruler, Two Pencils, and an Eraser... all packaged in a durable, hard plastic case, perfect for storage or travel!
Customer Reviews:
Buy if u know about drawing.......2005-10-10
I found the explinations rather vague.... the book doesn't really explain too well the form in which you have to draw, its good at teaching technique materials requires and stuff, but if you don't already know how to draw its a little hard to learn how to draw good anime from it. I didn't get much from this book... it doesn't give much explination in the actualy WAY you need to draw the head and body. And it gave absolutley no teaching on how to draw the eyes... which is an essential part of the anime style drawing, maybe its to get you to buy the other books??
Book Description
Everyone loves chibi, the newest, hottest manga style out of Asia. Chibis—characters that range from hypercute miniature people to bizarrely sexy furry characters—come in all varieties, all roles, including chibi teenagers, faeries, schoolgirls, nurses, mermaids, devils, angels, and everyone in between. Now Christopher Hart, the world's best-selling author of cartoon and drawing titles, shows readers exactly how to darw chibis, infusing them with personality and creating authentic costumes for them. Cute chibi-style monsters (small yet powerful), appealing cat-girls (humanlike, but with feline traits), superdeformed manga/chibi characters (used to make funny wisecracks)—every type of chibi character is shown here in crystal clear, step-by-step drawings. Manga Mania Chibi and Furry Characters will get every manga fan in on the chibi fun.
Customer Reviews:
Chibinate me Capin'.......2007-06-22
WARNING: This book is not for beginers. There are few step by step instructions, the rest you have to figure out on your own. (you lazy people)
For those who are not beginers, this book goes fairly deep into the world of Chibi characters. It shows basics in body structures and facial expressions.
It also touches bases on many catgirl body types.
I feel this book gives you a wide variety of ideas that you can use to create catgirls.
All and all this is one of Mr. Hart's better books. One of the facts is that he put less of his style into this book. Which causes it to become more manga, not americanized/manga that he usually draws.
Which is a good thing.
I really like the section in the back about stylized chibi's from Japan.
Manga Mania's Chibi and Furry Characters is really a must have for Manga Arists........2007-06-08
I myself personally have difficulty drawing chibi character's. This book is very thorough with the basic how to's of drawing chibis. IT even teaches you to think outside out the box when creating fantastical little monsters. I highly recommend this book.
Awesome and Helpful BOOK!!!!.......2007-03-19
OMG! This was the best how-to book i have ever READ!!!!! It is so thorough. I could draw everything, and it came out near perfection. My friends loved, I loved, and heck, my GRANDFATHER loved it! He thought it was really, really good, in terms of teaching you how to draw! I loved it, and recommend it to everyone! The book shows you step by step how to draw cat-girls (beautiful) and cute tropical girl/chibi/cat-girl and other adorable creatures. It teaches you when to use super-deformed characters, and uses cute drawings (eg, questionable little angel (my fave!) to enable you to use different, effective techniques! This is chock-full of great things!
Great for artists' of all age groups!.......2007-01-05
Chistopher Hart has truly out done himself with this book,as well as his other book fantasy worlds. In this book, Hart gives you examples of teaching you how to draw chibi characters as well as telling you what makes a chibi a chibi. A great thing about this book is that they have a large section of how to draw a variety of cat girls!!! That was my most favorite part! I really enjoyed this book alot, and as a bonus I will give you the run down of what to expect in the book....
Chibi basics
What makes a chibi a chibi?
The chibi head
Drawing the chibi head step by step
Full figures: Standard manag versus chibi
Turn any character into a chibi
Personality pointers
The chibi size size chart
Drawing the chibi face and body step by step
full body views
Chibi characters and costumes
Costumes
Mischevious chibis!
Making eye contact
Girl costumes and popular japanese roles
Stupid chibis!
Regular chibis versus super small chibis
Super small chibis
Fantasy chibis: Angels, fairies, and princesses
Chibi Expressions, emotions, and attitudes
Emotions
body language with special effects
Magical effects
Chibi cat girls and furry characters
Furry-style ears
Chibi cat-girls:full figures
Boxing cats
Chibi cat girl types
In-space adventures
Standard-size cat girls
Standard-size cat girls: the basics
Drawing the cat-girls head step by step
Drawing the cat-girl versus human head
drawing cat-girl bodies step by step
From tame to wild
Cat-girl hand and foot markings
Cat-girl prsonalities
Cat-girl poses
Cat-girl scenes
Foreshortening
A world of cat girls!
Chibi and magical creatures
Standard monsters versus chibi monsters
Creating chibi monsters from basic shapes
Creating chibi monsters from inanimate objects
Pterodactyl chibi monsters
Chibi monsters with magical powers
Magicalchibis without owners
Super stylized chibis
Little lady
Super stylized chibi boy
Super stylized chibi cat girl
Super stylized chibi rabbit girl
Chibi trouble maker
Witch in training
Little angel
Wishing on a star
Candy girl
Serious student
Chibi hero fighter
Tropical girl
The rest of the pictures are basically sample images showing you that you can use a chibi in certain scenes of regular sized characters, like when they are emabarrassed or mad. The chibi form of that person shows great expression, as well as hillarity. Plus chibis are ultra cute! This book is a perfect add on to any how to draw collection. I definitely recommend this book to any artist, whether beginner or intermediate, this book is extremely helpful. A must buy!
Great Book For Aspiring Little Artists!.......2006-08-05
The young lady I bought this book for just loves it.
Book Description
The foundation for drawing manga begins with the artist copying the works of an admired manga artist. The artist learns the traits of the characters' faces and figures while replicating the eyes, the mouth, and other features and recreating the overall images projected. The first chapter of this volume painstakingly explains the artistic development process beginning with copying professional artists' work to the point where the beginning artist is able to produce his or her own original manga. The second chapter covers the basics of a character's face and body, as well as portraying backgrounds. Chapter Three demonstrates how characters from professional manga artists' work are portrayed.
Customer Reviews:
Perfect For Begginer Manga Artist.......2007-03-07
This was my very firt book my daddy bought me and let me tell you, he made a smart decision on buying How To Draw Manga: Ultimate Manga Lessons! This book is great for the basics of Manga.
My personal favorite was the deep detail the author went into when drawing the head. I also liked how the author clearly showed the differences on age of the child, protagonist, younger adult, mother, and an elder.
I would recommend this book to all ages, only one page with minor, let me repeat, MINOR nudity. Overall, this was a pretty great book.
The Good 'n Bad.......2005-11-08
The Good:
Compared to the other How to Draw Manga series, I would say this book was a summary of every book in the series. With multiple artists and varying styles, it offers a beginning artist a definite edge and foundation for drawing manga. Not only does it show a more stylized version of manga, and also shows a more realistic version. This was one of the more useful books for head angles. The heads are a variety of , high, low, and side angles. This is very useful for a beginning artist so that their work doesn't look dull or monotonous.
The Bad:
I somewhat felt a little ripped off when I saw the price for such a small book. Also, it seems as if this book doesn't go deeply into each specific section. It's more of a 'general' help book. For instance, if you want to know more about anatomy, I recommend buying the 'Bodies and Anatomy' book in the How To Draw Manga series. This book is more of a 'overall' book.
In conclusion, I'd recommend buying this book if I was a beginner or intermediate. You can always improve as an artist. Hope you found this helpful.
it's alright.......2005-08-03
okay this is my first review ever so hang in there with me alright? Now I purchesed this book "How to Draw Manga: Ultimate Lessons vol. 1" mainly because I like the other HtDM books and I wanted to see what this had to offer me. When the book came I was expecting it to be as big as the other HtDM books. Boy was I wrong! it was as thick as the others but the hight and with were 'shorter' none the less the content of the book itself prooved to be of some help. The book itself starts off with the begining mini comic or 'manga' if you will then the table of contents, and then the actual material. The first chapter is all about the basics, starting with "practice by starting with copying" then it moves onto how to go and create your own charatures by showing you the basics of drawing (start with a rough general outline of blah blah blah then refine it and add detale blah blah blah). First they start with the head and face the move down to the torso, arms, and legs. In the book they also show examples of expressing emotions, depicting 'cool action poses', a little bit of sceanery, and how to properly hold your drawing tools. IN the book itself it says these are the goals it's trying to teach you:
1) The Basics of Faces
2) Basics of Figures
3) The ABC's of Tools ans Materials
4) Basic Background and Special Effect Techniques
and
5) Producing and Original Draft of Manga
In all it's a pretty helpful book; however it'll do you jack if you don't put it to use.. in other words keep on drawing. The book is only there to help you get ideas on how you may want it to look. It's not going to do it for you, or magically you'll be able to draw "manga" the instant after you read it.
Now I gave it 4 stars because for some reason I felt that it was lacking a little something in it.. other then that it's a great refference book for anyone, not just people who want to draw manga/anime, who wants to improve their drawing technique.
Good Book.......2005-07-15
How to draw Manga: Ultimate Manga Lessons Volume 1 is a good book to start with if you are trying to learn the art of drawing manga. This book covers almost all the basics and helped me alot. It tells you how to use different drawing materials and how to start drawing your own manga. It also showes you the differenses between male and female cheracters. Also as to be acspected in any how to draw manga book there is some mild nudity (but nothing that detailled). So alaround I think this is a very good book to start drawing manga with.-_-
Absoulutely amazing!.......2005-07-03
This is the most amazing drawing book I have ever purchased. This book is extremely helpful, especially towards the end. It shows characters in different poses to help you learn how to draw them. It does suggest in the beginning to copy some of your favorite artists' work. I copied pictures out of my manga books and then tried to do something original, and I have improved greatly! GET THIS BOOK!!
Customer Reviews:
Perfect for perfecting female characters.......2007-08-10
This is the book if your having trouble with females characters or looking to improve it some more.
All of the other people complaining about nudity should just stfu. If they're in clothing how do you get the details you really need to improve your drawings. You have to be mature enough to know that it's art, not porn. There's a difference. It's the human body for god's sake...you have one don't you? Everyone is a human so why the hell are you complaining about a human body o.O If you don't want to "perfect" your females characters look at some other crap, but if your really willing, why care about the nude females. You are here to draw and not just flip through it to get horny and jack/jill off.
Mkay...onto the book xD
What others called "sexual positions" are simply positions that you use every day. Bending over, laying on the bed, sitting down, standing, and yes, some people even crawl to reach for things under their desk. Chill out about that. This book pretty much covers everything, the face which I needed help on badly. The upper body, arms, lower body, stomach and etc. I had trouble with fingers and this somewhat even briefly covered that. This is a truly great book by an amazing author(s)
How to draw manga.......2007-05-30
The entire experience was amazing. Shipped earlier then expected, in pristine condition, no hassles no worry.
The product itself is great. The guide truly helps with the basic structure of drawing characters anatonomically correct. It's always better to learn how to draw something right first and then learn how to break the rules later.
Not to be immature, but, ew.......2007-05-27
This book does have *some* useful information, but it is mostly scantily clad or nude women in sexual positions. The only part that I found relatively interesting was the section on different clothing textures. I would *not* recommend this book to anyone that wants to learn realistic anatomy or poses.
How to draw manga or females in sexual positions?.......2007-05-13
Thinking this book would make drawing the female form easier in the manga style might not be the best motivation for buying this book. The book is almost completely based on sexual positions you may want to draw in and in my opinion isn't what drawing the female figure should be about. Buy this if your not interested in drawing anything but dirty pictures!
Excellent Book!.......2007-04-15
This book was helpful and provided in-depth info about the female form. It covers drawing ears, the hips, chest, eyes, as well as a variety of other featured acquitted with drawing girls. For those who bought this book and complained about the nudity... dont! Any true artist undserstands that the human body is just another part of their work. Ignoring the mature theme, this book was resourceful and I learned a great deal! I recommend it for beginner and intermediate artists alike.
Customer Reviews:
The Art of My Neighbor Totoro: A Film by Hayao Miyazaki.......2007-04-06
If you're a Miyazaki's freak, you will love this series of books.
Beautifully edited, hard cover, with original sketches and storyboards.
The Art of My Neighbor Totoro: A Film by Hayao Miyazaki, has the particularity to transport you to the movie in seconds and you get the same happy and heartwarming feelings with just watch their pages.
Also explains what a Totoro is and why Miyazaki wanted to do this movie. Characters development, full color illustrations. A must have if you are into animation.
Beautiful Book.......2007-02-07
If you loved the movie, you'll love this book.THe beautiful art and concepts makes you appreciate Miyazaki's work even more.
Book Description
The popularity of manga continues to row, inspiring interest in learning how to draw in this exciting style of comics. Estudio Joso creates the ultimate guide to illustration—384 pages of manga instruction. The Monster Book of Manga is divided into sections focusing on the most figures and themes—Girls, Boys, Samurais, Monsters, and more. Each illustration is broken down into six stages accompanied by step-by-step instructions, taking the artist from initial back-and-white sketches to the final color piece. They are all accompanied by practical suggestions, hints, and tips.
Customer Reviews:
excellent content for intermediate-level illustrators.......2007-09-24
I'm familiar with manga illustrations, but certainly not an expert, and this is the main reason I found "The Monster Book of Manga" very useful. It's not a how-to-draw book, but rather a draw-like-this manual, with step by step examples of how a finished piece is done. Here is, briefly, a list of what I consider to be its strong and weak points.
STRONG POINTS:
- Over fifty, very detailed, illustrations, each broken down into six stages, from sketch to full colour. It's relatively easy to see through the process if you already know the basics of drawing the human figure.
- Six major categories (girls, fantasy, monsters, science fiction, music and samurai) that will help you become familiarized with many popular types of manga characters, from school girls to androids.
- All lessons and tips aside, the artwork is gorgeous.
- Each character is drawn in a different pose, so the book also works as a pose reference manual at some point
- The costumes are drawn in detail and work as inspiration to create your own
- It's a very good practice manual and can inspire your own original characters based on the types included.
WEAK POINTS:
- Don't mistake this book for a beginner's how-to book, some of the illustrations included are quite difficult to draw, even if you're just copying them. Furthermore, I feel they should have perhaps broken down each drawing into more stages, so as to make the process easier to understand.
- Being a draw-this type of book, it tends to limit your creativity a bit.
- Some of the tips and explanations are really not necessary. What's the use of putting 'In this case, we have chosen violets and blues' next to a violet and blue dragon?
- The introduction to each character type could have been expanded a bit, perhaps with examples from actual manga series.
- The chapter on digital manga is a bit disappointing, in that it's mostly an outline of Photoshop's tools and functions, and seems to focus less on tips directly useful to manga artists.
CONCLUSION
"The Monster Book of Manga" is overall very useful for artists who already have some basic knowledge of drawing the human figure and a more-than-basic knowledge of manga specifics. Buy it if you want to improve and experiment. It's wonderful for practice, reference and inspiration, but it will not teach you how to draw.
Good comprehensive book.......2007-09-19
This book has a great deal of information on how to draw, which is one part of the manga experience. For the creative/motivational stuff, try the manga story sites for inspiration (I go to www.JustExpressing.com, there are others). Combine the great drawing ability with the examples of well written story lines on these web sites, based on Japanese characters, and you'll be well on your way on experiencing manga.
A must buy!.......2007-08-29
This book is amazing. I was looking at in a store contemplating buying it cause it was a tad bit expensive, when a stranger came up and told me it was a great book. I bought it and it really was worth all the money. It has such detailed instructions on how to draw some amazing manga. I have to admit there are a few pieces of art in it that are a bit inappropriate for little kids but it's still a great book and worth the money. BUY IT!
Monster Book of Manga.......2007-07-12
The Monster Book of Manga is really helpful to me. Before this book, I could never do shadows or shades on my drawings. But thanks to this book, I am gettng better at it. If you want to draw Manga better, I reccomend the Monster Book of Manga. Its worth it. ^-^
It was okay.........2007-05-13
Book does have alot of visuals but it's not very informative. It's not for beginners but more advanced artists.
Customer Reviews:
Reference Guide for Manga.......2007-08-24
This book is a great reference for male anatomy; unfortunately being pretty much the ONLY one in the series based on men, this is great for learning poses, gestures, and how clothes overlay the body. Not so terrific for ideas, like clothing or characters. I recommend it for those who are having issues with how the male body is formatted (I use it as a reference in that way)
Disapointing.......2007-06-10
Its almost as if they made This book to shut up people complaining that they only focused on Females. It really was not hepful so i didnt shovel out the 20 bucks for it. They basicly Haft-tried with it.
How to Draw Manga.......2007-05-30
The entire experience was amazing. Shipped earlier then expected, in pristine condition, no hassles no worry.
The product itself is great. The guide truly helps with the basic structure of drawing characters anatonomically correct. It's always better to learn how to draw something right first and then learn how to break the rules later.
:(.......2007-05-13
At least this book hasn't got all the characters in sexual positions, but it does have very boring looking characters also... Maybe the specific male / female books aren't his best works.
Extremely Helpful.......2007-04-22
This book has definetely helped me in the area of drawing male characters. I have also been able to draw females with ease, but the males I always found frustrating. The step-by-step intructions really let you in on the main parts of the male and how to draw them correctly. It compares it to the female body as well.
Various poses are included in it as well which helped me a lot in my characters. If you struggle with the same problem as I did, then I highly recommend this guide. It also includes a fantastic section on hands, feet, and charaters wearing glasses. Any true artist should own this book!
Book Description
This volume focuses on animals and (animated) inanimate objects. It starts by introducing key points in drawing animals in that delightful chibi character/ultra-stylized manner. The book also contains instruction on anthropomorphism or how to make animated objects that frequently appear in manga and anime seem to move and talk like human beings.
Customer Reviews:
This is new!.......2005-11-27
This book teaches how to draw super deformed animals!I never would have thought of it!Even though SD animals are not as popular as SD people this book is still good for a manga fan.
A Super Deformed charater is a manga charater with a big head, slightly chubby body,and cute looks. SD charaters are usaully know as chibis. Useully SD charaters are human but hey this could be a new begining of chibi animals!Mabye SD animals can be just as popular too!
The reason I gave this book four stars is it just goes over millions of animals until the book ends. I would have give it five stars if it just teached more about the expresions, and the poses and how to make SD animals in motion because they practiclly rushed through those steps.
Over I do recomend this book though but you kind of have to have the basics on expressions and body movement of SD charaters down first.So before buying this book try buying "how to draw manga Super-Deformed charaters Vol. 1 people" first then buy this book.
~*~Purin~*~
Book Description
Manga Matrix presents an easy grid method for mastering manga, an increasingly popular comic style. Using this unique Japanese system, artists can plot and cross-section elements on a matrix diagram to create an infinite number of original characters, creatures, and multiformed beasts. Angels, demons, dragons, monsters, and robots are all included in this book, along with descriptions of costumes and personalities for each.
Manga Matrix is unlike any other manga instructional guide and is an invaluable resource for both the budding artist and the polished professional.
Customer Reviews:
A Great Book, Albeit Abit Difficult to Understand.......2007-08-18
This is a very good book filled with good information on how this artist logically compiles characters, but it's not easy to understand at times and the artist can be very vague and inconsistent on many details making this book a very tough read to process.
Pros:
This book presents a logical step-by-step process one could use to create unique characters. Gives a detailed working flow on how to CREATE, not just conceptualize, a character visually from head to toe. Example say your creating a half-robot character this book has a tree for the whole body and you can go into detail on what was robot and what was human from say something general like the torso right down to the fingernails. Much different from other general books like the "How to Draw Manga" series and others that just give a broad idea of how to start or just one or two examples of a specific character already made. Another good thing this book has going for it is how he has many different branches of creatures such as angels, devils, and dragons categorized with lots of suggestions so you can build or get inspiration if your stumped.
Cons:
The Artist is very vague on many details and his explanations leave something to desire. This is the way HE does his character design so likewise much of his workflow sounds like it comes from a long history of trial and error mixed with experience and he is having to explain something he most likely put together from different sources and compile them the best he can. As well he can be inconsistent on some details telling you to do one thing on one group of creatures but telling you to do something different later on, will be explaining one thing but leave you asking "But what happens next?" or "Wait, what do I do now?", or just graze on something interesting or important sounding then move on. Another complaint is how thin the creature index can be, some creature groups get more face time then others or just don't get enough explanations as if he assumes you already know how to do it or you already have a good working knowledge of the subject.
In the end this is a good book but it is in no way for beginners this is an ADVANCED book. It is possible to deceifer this book but it takes ALOT of brainpower to understand what he's talking about and fill in the blanks that he seems to assume you already know. The matrix he presents is a good system but it's hard to understand at first glance. But if you can overcome all these obstacles you can have yourself an extremely useful reference and guide to character design. The body part tree alone is a good reason to buy this book.
Rare book.......2007-08-04
There is a lot of very good "how to draw" books, including "how to draw manga". If you need such kind, go and get them.
But this one is completely not about the drawing techniques, but rather is about what to do before you start to draw. It shows you a regular method how to think of you character, how is it supposed to look from three points of view (form, costume, personality) and how to get deeper into all three directions by using complex tabular checklists.
The idea of matrix method itself is not too complicated, and the method explanation takes about 30 pages. But the rest of the book illustrates how to use it by examples of creating monsters, artifical creatures, faires, and many more others types of characters.
This book is of good quality, full coloured and contains a lot of amazing illustration.
Could be useful not only to anime/manga fans, but for any artist, including game designers.
Amazing!.......2007-06-08
I wish I had known of this book 4 years ago. Hiroyoshi Tsukamoto astutely created a simple system to help the designer "Save Time" when creating part- human characters. It elevates the quality of creativity, pushing the designer
into wider possibilities.Manga Matrix: Create Unique Characters Using the Japanese Matrix System
Let The Manga Matrix Take You!.......2007-06-08
I did not know what to expect when I bought this book. When it came in the mail I was blown away by the concept of this Japanese grid system. The possibilities of new characters and monsters are endless. I love it! A must have for the aspiring manga artists.
ehh.......2007-05-13
This book had good illustrations. I think this book is awesome but not for any beginners.
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Recommended Books
- Handbook of Modern Sensors: Physics, Designs, and Applications
- Children of Chaos
- Study guide and solutions book for organic chemistry: A short course
- The Warrior Prophet
- Wolf Kahn Pastels
- Apple Pro Training Series: Logic Pro 7 and Logic Express 7
- A Good Start in Life: Understanding Your Child's Brain and Behavior from Birth to Age 6
- Francis Bacon: Commitment And Conflict
- The Power of Images: Studies in the History and Theory of Response
- Garden Plants for Free
General
| Instructional & How-To
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art
Reinventing Comics: How Imagination and Technology Are Revolutionizing an Art Form
Graphic Storytelling
Comics & Sequential Art
Alan Moore's Writing For Comics Volume 1
