Figure Drawing for Dummies?

[Xeon_OND]

There's this book called "Figure Drawing For Dummies" by Kensuke Okabayashi : http://www.amazon.com/Figure-Drawing...3198737&sr=8-1

Anyone has this book or has read it? I'll be going to the city to get the book this Sat, but the stores here always seal the books up in clear plastic for some reason. How can we preview the pages this way?!

Specifically, I am curious to know how Kensuke constructs figures. Using Loomis's style? Or gesture drawings like Vilppu? Or a style of his own?

I assume the book teaches construction, which allows drawing from imagination (as oppose to realism, which teaches you to copy exactly the live model in front of you)

The Table of Contents in Amazon.com doesn't say very much.

Thanks!
Xeon

[Anid Maro]

Can't say I'd read that book, however if it's anything like all the other "... for Dummies" books then you'll get exactly what is advertised in the title: A very basic, relatively shallow, but pretty solid start in whatever the topic is (e.g. Figure Drawing). I've always liked the "... for Dummies" line but you've got to be aware of what they are for (e.g. Dummies), I'd put them on par with a particularly long Wikipedia article.

Also here are some links, the first to Kensuke Okabayashi's blog and the second to his professional website Piggy Back Studios. Maybe those could help you determine if the "Figure Drawing for Dummies" book is for you.

[Kaycy is tanning]

(see next post, has link with pages)

Hey Xeon,

I happen to have the book, he uses an egg shape with 2 construction lines, one across the eyebrows, the other under the nose, (Vilppu does this too btw, he prefers the 1/3, 2/3 method instead of doing 1/2 on the eyes, I use this method too, many use 1/2 too though).

He talks about the head planes for a page or 2, which is good, he shows how he constructs the head and shows how to draw hair in a lot of pages, he's quite good at hair.

He explains how to construct the body too.

What he does wrong is he shows muscles and doesn't show where their origin or insertion is, it's very useless like that and the book wastes a lot of pages like that.

Overall though, the book has a lot of pages and text and I personally got more out of bridgman and other books, but it's still a decent book if you need some overall help (especially the hair is really well done). Anyway, rambling on, it's an "ok" book. It's a very big book too, I just used it as a reference for some things and the hairstyles, I didn't read all of it since the muscle pages aren't any good, but the rest is good info.

Pages of the book are low-quality, like newspaper pages, 340 pages or so, it was a relatively cheap book so I don't mind.

[Kaycy is tanning]

Oh, here you go:

http://books.google.com/books?id=Ol0...age&q=&f=false

[Xeon_OND]

(see next post, has link with pages)

Hey Xeon,

I happen to have the book, he uses an egg shape with 2 construction lines, one across the eyebrows, the other under the nose, (Vilppu does this too btw, he prefers the 1/3, 2/3 method instead of doing 1/2 on the eyes, I use this method too, many use 1/2 too though).

He talks about the head planes for a page or 2, which is good, he shows how he constructs the head and shows how to draw hair in a lot of pages, he's quite good at hair.

He explains how to construct the body too.

What he does wrong is he shows muscles and doesn't show where their origin or insertion is, it's very useless like that and the book wastes a lot of pages like that.

Overall though, the book has a lot of pages and text and I personally got more out of bridgman and other books, but it's still a decent book if you need some overall help (especially the hair is really well done). Anyway, rambling on, it's an "ok" book. It's a very big book too, I just used it as a reference for some things and the hairstyles, I didn't read all of it since the muscle pages aren't any good, but the rest is good info.

Pages of the book are low-quality, like newspaper pages, 340 pages or so, it was a relatively cheap book so I don't mind.

Thanks a lot, Kacey!
Oh yeah, I read through that Books.Google.com link of the book and it seems that his book is pretty much the same as Jack Hamm's book, only that Hamm's book is better.
Since I already have that, then this one isn't worth it cos' it's pretty expensive here.

Heck, they both use exactly the same method to construct the front views of the head.

Oh yeah, if anybody knows of any modern-day author who has wrote an art instruction book teaching the style of Loomis, do let me know. I just feel that a book which teaches Loomis's techniques of drawing heads and figures and re-phrasing it and detailing in step-by-step using modern day examples and writing style is long overdue.

I've seen people on youtube whereby they draw heads using methods that doesn't belong to Bridgeman or Loomis or the usual suspects.