What are some of the art books that have inspired you or helped your work?

[Bojee]

What are the art books that have inspired you or helped your work?
I know that there are a lot of you guys that are as obsessed with adding good art books to your library as I am, so was wondering if you have any recomendations.

I'll start it off; "Hawthorne On Painting"? . It's just a small little book with notes from some of Charles W. Hawthorne's classes( a contemporary of William Merit Chase, I believe) . It's got sections on the outdoor model, "still life", landscape, indoor model, and water color. It's super cheap ( under 10$), very small, but very dense, and a little zen.

Also Robert Henri's "The Art Spirit", it's in the same vein as Hawthorne's book. Both are old school but the thoughts still apply and you should be able to find them at used bookstores.

Finally in a more straight forward vein, I like "Proven Strategies For Creating Great Art " by Dan McCaw, great stuff very straight forward and informative about painting in oils, but the lessons apply elsewhere as well.

I'll try to bring in pictures of these books when I get a chance.

Alright I'm back, here you go.

[The Iconoclast]

"The Art of Warcraft"



No seriously...just looking at the seemingly raw sketches and some of the more finished pieces and seeing the commentary and the creation of a game world is inspiring to me. It all depends on what stimulates you, man.

I also like to browse KChen's thread and some stuff from strych9ine over at Photoshoptechniques.com don't tell him I said that

[draxc0la]

"The Art of Warcraft"



No seriously...just looking at the seemingly raw sketches and some of the more finished pieces and seeing the commentary and the creation of a game world is inspiring to me. It all depends on what stimulates you, man.

I also like to browse KChen's thread and some stuff from strych9ine over at Photoshoptechniques.com don't tell him I said that

"The Art of Warcraft" it's my favorit

[Bojee]

Originally posted by The Iconoclast
"The Art of Warcraft"



No seriously...just looking at the seemingly raw sketches and some of the more finished pieces and seeing the commentary and the creation of a game world is inspiring to me. It all depends on what stimulates you, man.

I also like to browse KChen's thread and some stuff from strych9ine over at Photoshoptechniques.com don't tell him I said that

"The Art of Warcraft" Hmm, I'll look for it, and I totally agree that it's what stimulates "you".

I just thought some of these books we might end up talking about might stimulate or inspire other people. Gotta share the wealth! Thanks for posting!

Can you bring in a photo so people know what to look for?-B

[jg233]

"The Art of Warcraft" Hmm, I'll look for it, and I totally agree that it's what stimulates "you".

I just thought some of these books we might end up talking about might stimulate or inspire other people. Gotta share the wealth! Thanks for posting!

Can you bring in a photo so people know what to look for?-B

I also suggest the Okami Official Art book

[Bojee]

Oh yeah kchen's stuff rocks! couldn't agree more!

[The Iconoclast]

Here is an Amazon link to the book. It's not THAT expensive, but it's good to use the "Look Inside the Book" feature before buyin' anything

Also, here is another little scan of a page of the book.

[Bojee]

Iconoclast-Thanks, If you like that you might like these guys.


Heinrich Kley


Franklin Booth


Joseph Clement Coll

All three do amazing line work!

[Bojee]

You also might want check out www.bpib.com ( Bud Plant Illustrated Books ) They have bios on all the old school illustrators and some new too, I think you might find some of their work inspiring.

[Darkstrider]

Keys to Drawing, Bert Dodson.

Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...glance&s=books

What I really like about this one is it's about how to draw exactly what you see... no anatomy or anything, basically how to really look at things and techniques for doing contour drawings and drawing without looking at the paper. Really helps to loosen up your approach.

[Bojee]

Darkstrider- Thanks I'll look for it. Looks good. what I love is that most of the ones we've mention so far would be pretty inexpensive to add to your library.

[Bojee]

Here are a couple more that I think are good.



This book By Sarah Simblet is just beautiful in it's design as well as having some great information. It could be called Anatomy of "Beautiful People" cause the models are amazing examples of what the human body can be. Quite a bit of eye candy.



This book by Nathan Goldstein on drawing the figure is easily one of the best I've seen out there, thorough, bringing in many great but obscure artists as examples to the different ways to approach it.

A nice combination of good text and interesting visuals.

[wallychairmover]

i just picked up this book that's been really useful lately. It's by boris vallejo and julie bell of all people. It's called

Fantasy Workshop: A practical guide

it covers color useage and layout pretty good and simply with some step by step images.

[Bojee]

Cool Wally- I used to be a big fan of Boris's work and then my tastes started to change. I started to get away from the slicker finished stuff but I'd love to see how he breaks it down. Not sure I've seen this particular book, but I'll look for it. Can you bring in a link or pic??

Frazetta always will be the man for me though. Best of both worlds,Sci-Fi/ fantasy stuff combined with a classical painter, I love how his stuff still holds up today

Have you seen "Painting With Fire" Yet?? A documentary on Frank.
Pretty cool , the pacing is a little slow but it's good to learn more about him.

Thanks for sharing.

[cateaic]

Any Starwars conceptart book

Andrew Loomis Figure Drawing For All Its Worth

Monstruo!!! The Art of Carlos Huantes

uhhh...cant think of any others at the moment...

[Bojee]

cateaic- Got all the first three starwars books, especially like them for storyboarding examples.

I've seen bits and pieces of the Loomis book but I don't have it, sounds like everyones bible. Gotta download it.http://images.amazon.com/images/P/15...1.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

Carlos Huante- damn dude I had never heard of him before, his shit is dope! Gotta pick this one up



Found his stuff at www.designstudiopress.com , looks like a cool place. There were some other books there that looked good;

http://www.designstudiopress.com/boo...sign_cover.jpg

http://www.designstudiopress.com/boo...cles_cover.gif

Do you have them?? Thanks for the recomendation.

[Bojee]

For future posts if you guys could bring in pics or links to the books your recomending I'd appreciate it. We're all visual people and it just helps with the recomendation.

If you could also say why you like it I'd appeciate that also, in some ways that's almost more important since I want your opinion why we should check it out.

It'll just save me some time,and I spend enough time on here as it is.

Those that already have, thank you.

Keep'em coming, this is starting to be pretty cool. :thumbsup:

[Darkstrider]

Bojee, I'll bet you're already familiar with Phil Hale, right? Here's his newest book called Goad; the many moods of Phil Hale

You can see a few pics (and buy) at this link:


It's only the second book of his work, the first being the incredible Double Memory, in conjunction with another of my favorites; Rick Berry. That book is available at Amazon

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1880418053/qid=1083480291/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-5400525-6984950?v=glance&s=books


Here's a great site featuring lots of Rick Berry work http://www.braid.com/Androidiaei-0.htm

.....Reasons? Well, I guess just because these guys are some of the best cutting edge artist/illustrators of recent memory, and looking at their stuff is totally inspirational for me. In Double Memory there's a section of drawings that are mind boggling in their confidence and sureness at capturing gesture.

Then of course, Im sure everybody knows about Jeff Jones:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...#more-pictures
IMO the finest of the 70's fantasy illustrators to stand in the mighty shadow of Frazetta. His work is more lyrical that Franks, more poetic:

And he was a sort of godfather to Kent Williams

[Bojee]

Darkstrider- Now we're talkin, I love all these guys for the same reasons. I just got " Goad " with Foster's book " Progressions", but everybody knows about that one right?



Now Jeff Jones work is amazing, I first saw his stuff in " The Studio "
"With Bernie Wrightson, Barry Windsor-Smith and Michael Kaluta, Jones formed The Studio@. This 2000 square foot loft was shared by the four artists, but the hoped-for synergy seldom happened." quote from www.bpib.com, tried to find a pic but it's so hard to find these days.
And then later in his first solo publication on his work.I forget the title on that one too , I've got them both but they're in storage.

It's really sad that he's had a nervous breakdown. Ashley Wood is supposed to be working on a tribute publication to help him out.

DS we've definitely got the same sort of taste.
Thanks for the great addition.

[Darkstrider]

God, I HATE you!!! :bash:

...You've got The Studio???!!! Man, I have spent half my life searching for that book! Oh, well, at least now I've got the 2 Jones books (the first one was called Age of Innocence: the Romantic Art of Jeffrey Jones) and Opus by Windsor-Smith. Man, talk about a guy having a breakdown... have you read any of the text in that book? I think Barry Winsor-Smith has been having flashbacks since the 60's! Strange stuff, but great art. Actually, I didn't know about Jones having a breakdown, but I don't find it all that surprising. He's had a rough life. I always could tell from his art that there was something very strange about him, but I didn't fully understand it until I got the new book (the one I linked to above) and read that he had become a transsexual. The cover picture says it all... I guess that's his Anima leaning over his shoulder, or his alter ego. It explains a lot about the sometimes genderless figures, and the feminine males in his art. It's kinda scary, how many of my art idols have suffered these breakdowns.

About Wrightson, another Studio alum, I finally got ahold of his Frankenstein, and it just blows me away!! That's one I couldn't find for many years but finally located... got myself an old edition for like $50.00 just before I found out it was being reprinted! D-OHH!!!

When my copy of Goad came in Iremember going through it and kinda freakin' because all the figures in it seem like cadavers. It's oddly compelling... here they are, walking around and stuff, but their flesh seems to be diseased or dead, and the hands are clenched in contorted spasms. And it's ridiculous how well Hale can paint!

Speaking of inspirational art books, everybodu ought to check out Dover Publications: http://store.doverpublications.com/
They have a great selction of books on a huge range of artists, and the price is definitely right. A great way to build up your library without breaking the bank (especially if you can score used copies of these on ebay or Amazon). They have a really fantastic selection of books on the art of Aurthur Rackham:

[Bojee]

DS- Yeah I've got it , I didn't know it was that rare until I was looking for a picture of it to talk about it.

I've got quite a few rare books that I've inherited or have found in used bookstores, unfortunately a lot of them got a little trashed when we had the earthquake up here.I need to take better care of them.

"(the first one was called Age of Innocence: the Romantic Art of Jeffrey Jones)" I've got this one too, thanks for the reminder, I love that book, It's great to see the progression in that one when he's more Frazetta influenced and then he comes into his own.
The transgender stuff, yeah I just heard about that recently so I thought that came around the same time as the breakdown. I just went to his website and it sounds
like he's doing better.



I used to think after reading the studio that Jones was one of the more "normal" of the 4, whatever that is, but I think all of them were and are a little out there. Kick ass artists though and to me that's all that matters.

Berni Wrightson's Frankenstein is sick! Oh my god what an amazing book, I've had that one for a while but what a classic. The compositions and the amount of detail is crazy. It easily bumped him up to one of my favorites.


again really hard to find an image.

"It's kinda scary, how many of my art idols have suffered these breakdowns." yeah mine too , don't think I want to follow in that trend.


Thanks for the Dover link , it's perfect for what I'm trying to get going here. I use a lot of their books when I teach so my good ones don't get trashed.

I'm glad your bringing up Rackham, I wanted to talk about the old school illustrators. Didn't he do arabian nights or a aladdin? I remember liking that stuff a lot.
Do you know Dean Cornwells stuff?


Or Harvey Dunn? Saul Tepper ? Mead Shaeffer?Walter Everett? and N.C. Wyeth of course.
all these guys are from the "Brandywine School" which Howard Pyle taught.There's a book called
"The Brandywine School" that's really cool if you can find it, it talks a lot about Pyles teaching methods, which were way ahead of there time. There's a cheap one that's really pretty good called " Visions of Adventure" "NC Wyeth and the Brandywine Artists", that book talks about it too but not as thoroughly.
[IMG]http://images.amazon.com/images/P/082MG]

I'm sure your all about it but they're definitely worth mentioning.

One more guy "Nicolai Fecin", Do you have his book? I mention him cause Cornwell was influenced by him a little bit and met him off the boat when he came from Russia. Not to mention he's a kick ass artist too.





Whew! That's a lot of work! I'm done for now.

[Main Loop]

are you mostly talking about art instruction books? I look at a lot of them, and find a lot of similarity in the good ones, but 4 that ive looked at regularly are:

Alla Prima - Everything I know about Painting - Richard Schmid
Creative Illustration - Andrew Loomis
Painting People In Watercolor - Alex Powers (easy to find, pretty cheap)
Eternal Truths For Every Artist - Harley Brown (getting increasingly popular, i think i was the first person around here to order it, now you can find it easier)

[mtw]

"The Practice and Science of Drawing" by Harold Speed is one of the best books I've read. It opened my eyes to line and mass rhythm and how to use it to create interesting art work. It's what the old master's used in their paintings and drawings.

[Bojee]

Main Loop- Not necessarily all instructional books, could be other things as well as long as it relates back to the work and you find it inspiring.



Alla Prima I know but have yet to buy cause it's so expensive, but i hear it's worth it.

Loomis is the man I'm told but I don't own anything by him.

Painting people in watercolor I don't know but I'll look for it.

Eternal Truths for Every Artist I've only seen once and was just able to scan through it. I know it's put out or endorsed by international artist magazine and I like their other publications.The Dan McCaw book at the beginning of this thread is one of them and I think is worth a look.

mtw- Another dover publication, cheaply added to the library. I'll look for it.

Thanks to you both for the recomendations.

[Elwell]

Any fan of Wrightson's Frankenstein should check out his inspiration for it, Franklin Booth.

[Main Loop]

speaking of the International Artist books, one to look for if you like watercolor is Joseph Zbukvic's Mastering Mood and Atmosphere in Watercolor.. not only does it show you what colors to use, but what consistency of paint and wetness of paper to get a desired effect.. something ive never had explained to me.. im getting it soon..

I got a new Joaquin Sorrolla book from Bud Plant yesterday.. very cheap, very worth it.. www.budplant.com youll find too much good stuff there.. beware

[Bojee]

Elwell- Awesome! I totally agree, and Joseph Clement Coll's work don't you think? I love the story of Booth as a child learning to draw and seeing the silver point drawings in magazines and thinking that's how people draw by hand so he learned to draw that way. Excellent Recomendation! As you can tell I'm very big into the old school illustrators.

[Bojee]

Originally posted by Main Loop
speaking of the International Artist books, one to look for if you like watercolor is Joseph Zbukvic's Mastering Mood and Atmosphere in Watercolor.. not only does it show you what colors to use, but what consistency of paint and wetness of paper to get a desired effect.. something ive never had explained to me.. im getting it soon..

I got a new Joaquin Sorrolla book from Bud Plant yesterday.. very cheap, very worth it.. www.budplant.com youll find too much good stuff there.. beware

Main Loop- cool, International artist magazine is one of my favorite art publications out there right now and it's great to see their books are holding up as well.
Sorrolla's a stud, good choice, I was soo bummed when I was in madrid and his museum was closed.

Bud plant rocks! I've been getting their catalog for a while now and when I get it I just pour over it and drool over all the great books I can't afford. I love all the online bios on all the great illustrators.

Thanks for the great recomendations, if you could bring in visuals too that would be great. Pictures stick better than words sometimes.

[wallychairmover]

here's the cover of that book, a little clipped off but you get it i think one of the most fundamental books of mine though is "how to draw comics the marvel way" i still have the tattered copy complete with missing pages hanging around from christmas so many years ago

[Bojee]

Thanks Wally.