In my ongoing effort to ruthlessly get rid of all the crap I no longer want or need, I pulled some of these off of my bookshelf. I bought them back in the year 2000, when I wasn't really drawing much, but kind of felt that I wanted to. I haven't really looked at them in years; the last time was probably shortly after I started FT.
And now that I look at them again, they're really kind of crap. I don't know how many people (besides the authors) have actually gone on to fame and fortune based on these books, but I'll bet there aren't many. I think a lot of people buy books like these because it's easier than actually just drawing, as if there's some magical secret within the book that will unlock their hidden drawing talent. Obviously I was gullible enough to believe that too at one point. I must not have been the only sucker out there, since business seems to be booming: I see Amazon selling up to at least volume thirty-eight.
Not only is this notion of "just buy it and be an expert!" flat out wrong, but even if it were true, I wouldn't want to draw like what's in these books anyway. Some of the stuff is seriously worse than anything in FT. One of my favorites (in that so-lame-it's-awesome way) shows a drawing of some guy with a little caption that says "I want to draw like this!" and then proceeds to do crappy imitations of it. But the original drawing itself is crap to begin with. The guy's chin is shaped like a cheese wedge, his face is all squished, and his hair is a weird Final Fantasy knockoff. Then there's the time the author tries to draw a person from below, resulting in a skyscraper body and a teensy-tiny head that's basically just drawn from the side. Or the reverse: gigantor heads on teensy-tiny bodies, even on characters that aren't in some goofy perspective.
The most egregiously worthless book I bought was one about drawing with color. It was literally a 100-page advertisement for a certain brand of marker: "Draw it! Then use Cornholetm brand markers to shade! Don't forget to buy a Cornholetm brand blending marker too! For extra special effects, use Cornholetm brand chalk pastels!" It was astonishing.
What's even more puzzling is that some of the material in these books is not bad at all. Many of the backgrounds are very nice. Unfortunately, they get glossed over entirely. (I think background artists don't get nearly the respect they deserve.) I get the impression that the good stuff came from the artist's own work elsewhere, and the crap was just phoned in for the purposes of the book. In fact I'm almost certain of it, because you see the exact same bad example images in more than one book. Of course, the good stuff is never really explained much, which doesn't seem all that helpful either.
Looking at these books now, about all they seem good for is reference material. Some of the books have a variety of things collected in one place, which I guess might be easier than going out and looking for stuff on Google Images.
Please don't waste your money on these. If you want to get better at drawing, here's how you do it: draw a lot. That's it, that's the secret. With or without the books, you're going to have to draw a whole bunch in order to get better at it. If you really want to spend money on something, take a class at a community college. It's cheap, the instructors have a clue (usually) and can give you constructive feedback, you get to try out a variety of media, and you get to draw real people. It will help you a lot more than a series of mediocre books.
Things that suck, part one
The Bman - January 31st, 2006 - 8:00 AM
Those How to Draw Manga books. Those suck.
In my ongoing effort to ruthlessly get rid of all the crap I no longer want or need, I pulled some of these off of my bookshelf. I bought them back in the year 2000, when I wasn't really drawing much, but kind of felt that I wanted to. I haven't really looked at them in years; the last time was probably shortly after I started FT.
And now that I look at them again, they're really kind of crap. I don't know how many people (besides the authors) have actually gone on to fame and fortune based on these books, but I'll bet there aren't many. I think a lot of people buy books like these because it's easier than actually just drawing, as if there's some magical secret within the book that will unlock their hidden drawing talent. Obviously I was gullible enough to believe that too at one point. I must not have been the only sucker out there, since business seems to be booming: I see Amazon selling up to at least volume thirty-eight.
Not only is this notion of "just buy it and be an expert!" flat out wrong, but even if it were true, I wouldn't want to draw like what's in these books anyway. Some of the stuff is seriously worse than anything in FT. One of my favorites (in that so-lame-it's-awesome way) shows a drawing of some guy with a little caption that says "I want to draw like this!" and then proceeds to do crappy imitations of it. But the original drawing itself is crap to begin with. The guy's chin is shaped like a cheese wedge, his face is all squished, and his hair is a weird Final Fantasy knockoff. Then there's the time the author tries to draw a person from below, resulting in a skyscraper body and a teensy-tiny head that's basically just drawn from the side. Or the reverse: gigantor heads on teensy-tiny bodies, even on characters that aren't in some goofy perspective.
The most egregiously worthless book I bought was one about drawing with color. It was literally a 100-page advertisement for a certain brand of marker: "Draw it! Then use Cornholetm brand markers to shade! Don't forget to buy a Cornholetm brand blending marker too! For extra special effects, use Cornholetm brand chalk pastels!" It was astonishing.
What's even more puzzling is that some of the material in these books is not bad at all. Many of the backgrounds are very nice. Unfortunately, they get glossed over entirely. (I think background artists don't get nearly the respect they deserve.) I get the impression that the good stuff came from the artist's own work elsewhere, and the crap was just phoned in for the purposes of the book. In fact I'm almost certain of it, because you see the exact same bad example images in more than one book. Of course, the good stuff is never really explained much, which doesn't seem all that helpful either.
Looking at these books now, about all they seem good for is reference material. Some of the books have a variety of things collected in one place, which I guess might be easier than going out and looking for stuff on Google Images.
Please don't waste your money on these. If you want to get better at drawing, here's how you do it: draw a lot. That's it, that's the secret. With or without the books, you're going to have to draw a whole bunch in order to get better at it. If you really want to spend money on something, take a class at a community college. It's cheap, the instructors have a clue (usually) and can give you constructive feedback, you get to try out a variety of media, and you get to draw real people. It will help you a lot more than a series of mediocre books.