How to Draw Dragons and Other Mythical Creatures
Emmett Elvin
Kandour Ltd.
Nonfiction, CH Art
Themes: Dragons, Gryphons, Unicorns
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Description
So, you love dragons and want to draw them better, but how do you begin? It looks so complicated, and every time you try you end up with a mess of scribbles or a wad of crumpled paper. Fear not - help is on the way. The artist/author starts with the most basic of shapes and lines. Following his step-by-step lessons, build your way to a fine-figured firebreather, or try your hand at one of the other creatures, such as unicorns, griffins, or centaurs.
Review
I rated this based on the target audience: the younger or inexperienced artist who wants to draw well, but is still at the tail end of the impatient/draw-it-now phase. I remember what that felt like, and this is just the sort of book that would've helped me. No deep anatomy lessons or perspective overviews here; Elvin starts with a nice, quick description of why it pays to start with simple shapes and construction lines rather than rushing ahead. He then walks the reader/artist gently through each lesson. The drawings build on each other, developing skills already learned until, by the end, (assuming one has been following along), it is possible to draw surprisingly complex and detailed beasts. The text reads fast, though sometimes it's hard to follow paragraphs because of cross-page illustrations that break up the writing. I liked the variety of poses and details he offers, as well. If some of his proportions, anatomy, and explanations are overly simplistic (it is not the "elbow" that the wing vanes fan out from, but the wrist/palm, if you're comparing it to an arm!), then his target audience benefits from the brevity, if his art itself does not. After going through this a few times and seeing their skills grow as they take things slow and think drawings through, aspiring young artists may well start looking for more involved art books to carry them over to the next phase of artistic growth. No, it isn't a book for advanced artists, but it is a book for those who may want to become advanced artists someday, even if they happen to be nearer the start of the trail. We all gotta start somewhere, after all, and as starting places go, this isn't a bad one. Simplistic as it is, it still made me want to draw, and I consider that the ultimate purpose of drawing books.