Graphics Books

Reading this book is like hangin with a good friend. There are things about him (the book and its diverse characters) that make me think of me. Other things make me think, I'll never fully understand why he does what he does? Would I find myself in similar situations? If I had a cupcake, would I hand it over to wee man? Is every diversion from the norm a fulfilling life experience? Sure it is. And so is my friend Grickle.

Annable's fresh humor and honest wit shine in this collection of short comics. You can't help but relate to his endearingly odd characters. Somehow, Annable conveys more than just emotion in them, which is an impressive feat in itself given the deceptively simple artwork. But he manages to portray their conscience and their deep-rooted fears and hopes as well. I love how adeptly such subtle themes of loneliness, self-doubt, relief, and satisfaction are packaged into such an enjoyable work of twisted humor. Do yourself a favor and read it more than once. It is at once leisurely, funny, clever and insightful, so you might not be able to catch all that the first time around.

Deceptive in its clean and simple art, Grickle is full of dark comedy and tragedy in its assorted stories. A great use of the medium, Grickle makes you think about the world around you even as you jump at the conclusion to each story. Never sure if you should be laughing or cringing, Grickle is a great introduction to Graham Annable's works; I want to see more, please.

It's got range, it's got scope, it's got depth, it's got grasp, it's got cute fuzzy aliens, it's got charming homicidal ghouls, it's got pathos, it's got instant photography, it's got a fish.

There's this knock on the door, so I go and answer it, all right? And there's this copy of Grickle standing on the mat looking really pissed off. It doesn't even say "Hello" or "Hey you!" or nothing. It just jumps on my chest and starts wailing on me. Bam! Bam! Bam! And so I'm, like, "what the f*ck?" I try to tear it off of me, but I just get a bunch of paper cuts all over my hands. Paper won't tear. Too tough. Next thing you know, I'm on the floor crawling around trying to get out my lighter, but it sees me reaching for my pocket and it kicks it away. I gotta tell you, I was scared. Anyway, just when I thought that was it, lights out for old Alphonse, the book sees the copy of Grickle I got last month ago off of Bruno. It hops off of me and kind of grunts an apology. I could tell it was all embarassed and sh*t. Then it just takes off. Never seen anything like it.

As a teacher and part-time research professor in the field of biometrics, I can recommend this book to anyone interested in the technical aspects of digital fingerprint biometrics.
It is studded with references to the key papers in the field.
You will also find a chapter on security and spoofing issues, which reviews everything from gel methods for faking a fingerprint through coding, encryption and the possibility of intercepting code transmissions to a server.
The book comes with software on a CDROM, an artificial fingerprint generator. One of the chapters reviews this generator and discusses its performance relative to collections of real fingerprints -- in particular, it can be used to generate a large set of mutated prints of a "same" finger, something needed for an authentics distribution, that most biometric data sets lack.
Those interested in other biometrics (face, iris, hand shape, etc.) will find a brief discussion of these in the first chapter.
Warning: while most non-technical readers will find this a useful reference book, it does not hesitate to discuss in depth the mathematical statistics and software issues involved in fingerprint biometrics.

"This book is intended for researchers, practicing engineers, and students who wish to understand and / or develop fingerprint-based recognition systems." So the introduction, and right they are. The authors have chosen a more informal style, but still give some of the Mathematics necessary. The references are extensive and ultimately the reader will have to go to them to make a contribution.

I would recommend buying this book with "Automatic Fingerprint Recognition Systems" by Ratha and Bolle (ed.) It would be hard for me to make a decision between these two books.

Lo recomiendo si desean implementar nuevos algoritmos para reconocimiento de huellas dactilares y/o una revision a profundidad de como funcionan los metodos existentes.

Imprescindible concimiento de gradientes y algoritmos digitales en el tratamiento de imagenes.. para comprender el contenido.

This book is a "must". Very useful for my research on Biometrics and Multibiometrics Systems. No wonder this book received the 2003 PSP Award (Computer Science) from the Association of American Publishers.

The applications of Biometrics technology range from federated identity management to digital rights management, time and attendance, background checking, and homeland security. None of the biometric characteristics has received more attention till date than fingerprints. Fingerprint recognition is the most cost effective and accurate biometrics, which is evident from its rapid deployment in the widest range of security applications.

This book contains a plethora of information on every aspect of fingerprint recognition technology - introduction to biometrics and fingerprints, fingerprint sensing devices, feature extraction, matching, classification, synthetic fingerprint generation, multimodal systems, secure design, fingerprint individuality - you name it. The DVD accompanying this book will save you a lot of money and trouble of collecting your own data to test your algorithms.

The authors of this book - Davide Maltoni, Dario Maio, Salil Prabhakar, and Anil K. Jain - are undoubtedly some of the most well known and respected experts in the world on the topic of fingerprint recognition. It is no surprise that such extraordinary researchers have produced such an exceptional masterpiece.

Whether you are an inventor, developer, practitioner, forensic specialist, or system manager in this field looking for an excellent reference or just a novice looking for basic information on biometrics and fingerprint recognition technology, you must read this outstanding book.

This is a very nice reference work for image processing professionals. It is a collection of articles by various experts in aspects of image processing, reporting on the state-of-the-art in their particular domains. The coverage is broad and deep. However, it is not for everyone. The writing style is that of a refereed journal. If you are not comfortable with that style of exposition, or if you are simply trying to find a snippet of code to implement a particular algorithm, this is not the book for you. At the other extreme, do not expect to find new and startling insights into the field that you did your dissertation on. However, if you want to understand the current state of the art of a colleague's field, or if you need to expand your expertise into a new area of image processing, this is a very good place to start.

This is an encyclopedia of image processing topics. It contains some introductory material to help people understand what images are and how to process them. The majority of the text, however, is for experienced people wanting to look up topics.

This book is big. It is about 8"x11" by 900 pages. It contains material from 100 different professionals on 50 different topics.

The style is academic. The editor is the editor of the IEEE Transactions on Image Processing. The page style is similar to what you would see in an IEEE Transaction.

There is plenty of math. The text explains the mathematics, but not to the depth I would like to see.

The authors illustrate the techniques with many images. If there are no "before and after" images in an image processing book, reject it. Well, this book has plenty of images. That is a strong point.

A week point is there is no source code illustrating the techniques and algorithms. I find this a major weakness, but one that is not unique to this book.

The authors leave much to the reader. This is not a read from cover to cover book. The reader must go slow, take notes, study, and read again to understand the material.

All in all, this is a good source of knowledge on image processing. If you work with images and write software to process images, you should have this book on your desk.

There is a 2nd edition of this book that was published in July 2005, so all reviews earlier than that are referring to the first edition. Regardless, the second edition of this book is just as good as the first. There are many texts that do a good job of covering image processing, but few do such a good job of covering all of the aspects of video processing - motion detection and estimation, video enhancement and restoration, and video segmentation. There is an entire section on video compression which discusses the H.261 standard, wavelets and video compression, object-based video coding, and the various MPEG standards. There are also articles on video indexing and retrieval and a unified framework for video browsing and retrieval.
In the area of image processing, there is much good information here, but the basics are better explained in "Digital Image Processing" by Gonzales and Woods. Once you master that book, this makes a good secondary reference on image processing. Although this book does go over some image processing basics, it is better at explaining more advanced concepts such as multiframe image restoration, wavelet denoising, 3D shape reconstruction from multiple views, and statistical methods for image segmentation. There are many bad books out there that are collections of articles, but don't let that scare you off. This really is a collection of very good articles published together in a coherent fashion.
There are plenty of equations, example images, and instructive figures in the articles to help explain each concept. Highly recommended.

This is the book to have on the subject! It covers almost any aspect that you can think of in image/video processing. This is a MATH intensive book and it will not tell you how to directly implement any of its concepts in code. The author assumes that the reader will be able to do this on there own. Topics are very well explained, but sometimes I needed to reread a topic 3 or 4 times and go over the math a couple times to fully understand. Great book to have as an encyclopedia like resource on the shelf.

This book is just GREAT.
It covers almost every single ascpect of image and video processing. Everything is in deep and very good explained. A lot of before-and-after example pictures (important ones in color) are provided too. But beware. You need a fairly good understanding of math to read the book. It is not intended to explain how to use Photoshop, but rather how to write your own ;-)
This book is not a read-along book. Sometimes you have to read a section 2 or 3 times to understand it.
I think sometimes a good Snippet of C-Code would help to understand, but this is acceptable.
Again: A outstanding book, which fully covers all my needs.
The price of 100 us$ is ok, because it's a lot of a book...

Just picked up this series and, FINALLY, a plot that doesn't revolve around "oh, they like each other, but doesn't know the other does/can't say they do" or "somebody discovered they have powers and now lets go on a lengthy training montage as they get better/their sword is better/grows up" or that ilk. Well, there is love. Hyoue likes Amane, but she doesn't know it (she's socially clueless, but not in that ditzy way that every anime seems to go for). But it's not the same thing.

Hyoue is an Inu Gami (dog demon) that feeds off Amane's lifeforce. Kind of like Chrono Crusade, but Hyoue needs the nourishment more often. This leads to all sorts of misunderstandings, as he insists on getting a kiss-transfer method (which ticks off Amane's cousin Hayate). I don't know if this sucks away her LIFE per se, or just her energy levels.

Either way, I was hooked. Some horror, but not over the top nasty.

it was excellent,funny and everthing i was looking for.my 2daughters loved it alot. they are excited for more of it.i think it is the best.thank you so much victoria blair

How can you not like this manga? I admit, the cover was the first thing that had attracted me-bondages maybe? After glancing at the artwork, I soon fell in love. Ayume and Hyoue are two very likeable characters, each filling in what the other person lacked. I always find myself looking for the next volume when I go to a bookstore. Amazing storyline, I would recommend it to everyone.

About six months ago I came across a display of manga books. Although I've never been a big comic book fan, I fell in love with the beautiful cover illustrations and began to browse through them. One manga in particular caught my attention, not just for the cover art but also for the book description. The story of a teen psychic and her guardian demon is a tale that sounds right up my alley. However, I just wasn't sure. After all I am a bit older than your usual manga fan. For months every time I would into a book store I headed to the manga section, pick it up and put it down again. Last weekend I finally decided to buy the first of the series. I'm so glad I did! Despite my confusion over the format (read back to front and, I think, in the opposite direction of American books) and the very short actual reading time spent on the book, I found it facinating. I loved the storylines about malevolent spirits, the innocent girl and her overprotective guardian. In fact, I not only read it once, I've re-read it four times already. I totally recommend it to anyone who enjoys horror/romance and the supernatural.

I didn't want to like Her Majesty's Dog....I realy, really didn't. But I can't help it. I like--no, I REALLY like it. At first I didn't want to read it because at the time of it's release I was SO into InuYasha, and one day I was casually flipping through shojo beat magazine and I saw an ad for Her Majesty's Dog. When I saw the cover , I was like "it's a shojo version of InuYasha! What a rip-off!". Then, when I was at Borders one day, I saw the book and, just to see what it was like, I took a look at it. I decided, when I read the back cover and had read the first few pages, that it was a total copy of InuYasha! The fact that Hyoue protects Amane like InuYasha protects Kagome was especially hard to enjoy, and Hyoue's personality was almost exactly like InuYahsa's (almost always angry, over-protective, easily jealous, etc.). Amane even looks like Kagome to some extent. But about a year after Her Majesty's Dog was first released, I had grown tired of InuYasha (it's just so long and the story never gets anywhere). I was once again at Borders and I decided to give this another try. And I am so glad that I did. Her Majesty's Dog may sound a bit weak form the outside, but once you've read it, you see that it is deep and very entertaining. Mick Takeuchi has beautiful artwork and her story is very good, actually. Now, when I look back, I hardly see any similairities at all between Her Majesty's Dog and InuYasha. So far, my favorite thing about the books are the relationships between the characters and the little omakes at the beginning of each volume (the ones where Amane is treating Hyoue like a dog: for example, in this volume she is in chibi form and telling him to stay in his dog house and Hyoue is glaring up at the sky. It is very very funny and cute). So, for anyone who is suspicious about trying Her Majesty's Dog, I ask you to give it a shot. It is much better than it appears.

i love the professional bachelor and pre-ordered this book when it became available. tate gets ripped for spelling mistakes, grammar, etc, but does anybody really give a damn when reading this type of book? if you know tate, you will love this book, guaranteed. although not a guide like his other two, still offers insight to the man's unique thought pattern through a 4-day story in moscow. gentlemen, start your engines...

Fast-paced stories with unexpected hilarious twists and turns, documenting some out of control gangsters living the dream in Moscow. A fascinating page turner that has you shaking your head with envy. Every chapter is full of wild drunken rampages with gorgeous models and strippers with sex drives like Penthouse pets. I've had some clients travel to Moscow a few years back, and this book is exactly what they described.

Imagine Dennis Miller getting drunk and documenting Penthouse stories. Whatever you've heard about this book, it's ten times better. It's so raunchy and fun you keep looking over your shoulder hoping you don't get caught. Like it's against the law. Sounds strange now. But you'll know exactly what I mean once you start reading it. It's a photo-documentary of debauchery following three rich young gangsters in Moscow. Edgy characters and brilliant writing seemlessly documenting radical twisted lifestyles. It drips with adrenaline pumping, sarcasm, vodka, and laughs from the very first page. Every other page has erotic photography of the sexy girls they hook up with. Seriously funny, interesting, and entertaining book.

Flat out the funniest thing I've ever read! Outrageous tales of some wealthy studs with an insatiable appetite for vodka and gorgeous women. I read this cover to cover grinning and howling out loud like I was losing my virginity. It's like nothing you've ever read; like combining Hunter Thompson's wildest tales with a stand-up comic's slant. Raunchy stories that are so out of control and over the top that I was stunned, despite my own dysfunctional dark years that would make most people cringe.

Sarcastic, hammered gangsters tearing it up in Penthouse erotic stories. Some scenes I had tears running down my face I was laughing so hard. I finished reading this and I was speechless. The whole lifestyle is overwhelming and you can't put it down till your done.

Tate and some filthy rich thugs hit the Moscow nightclubs and brothels, hook up with packs of strippers and hotties and get into some incredibly raw, outrageous situations. AND there are hundreds of erotic photos of scorching hot girls from all the stories. Pretty much every sexual fantasy you could imagine happens to these guys in 4 days, with more women, drugs, alcohol than you think would be even possible.

I can't recommend this book highly enough! If you are serious about getting into the cartoon business, this book will tell you how!

A very good book to develop ourselves as a cartoonists

This book reveals many answers to the questions even I asked when I started my career in cartooning. The interviews and thoughts, efforts put in to this book is one reason why even after 16 years as a cartoonist I still enjoy being able to read through this book and get something out of it every time. This isn't just for those starting out, it's also a reminder for those in the industry.

Great stuff! Required reading for any serious cartoonist! I got more out of this book than most of my other cartooning books combined! A must read!

This book has so much to offer the budding cartoonist! Covering such things as: getting started, tools and techniques of the pros, developing great style and characters, creating funny cartoon ideas. turning your cartoons into cash, as well as resources and extra stuff, this book answers all the questions as well as shows you various styles of cartooning by many "strippers" from today and yesterday. I highly recommend this!!!

The shipping was really fast. I bought this book as a gift and they liked it!

This is by far the most in-depth and detailed How to Draw Manga book I have in my collection thus far.

It holds true in it's claim to bring "Daily Actions to Life",with illustrations that are full of life,and emotion.

A lot of information is covered in this volume,and though this may be for a more experienced manga artist,it definitely presents the basic structure of drawing manga characters,which may also suit the beginner or novice.

An all-in-one solution to drawing manga,in a very well presented manner.

This book is so good it's scary it teaches stuff from poses to move ment step by step so you can get it really easyly. At first I was terrible at drawing movement so every piture I drew was a charater standing but then I got this book at the libray. And now I know how to draw people jumping running and much more. Very helpful and useful it should have ten stars. Cool as it gets the person who made this book worked for Studio Ghibli!
~*~Purin~*~

I must say, I really enjoyed this book. I love how the book displays the body in different views and in different positions. This is especially useful when you can't draw a character from a certain sitting position. For those who are a little concerned about nudity, don't worry. There is some nudity, but it's mostly the guys. I really wouldn't call it nudity though, since they do not draw the nipples on the females at all. It's merely a silhouette of the naked form. Other than that, this book is a must have. It really shows daily activities (like the book suggests)it also has some activities like karaoke. I wouldn't call that a daily activity, but that pose can come in handy if one wishes to draw a karaoke scene in their manga.

Ozawa does a wonderful job again! He inititally starts the book on drawing your character using perspective giving a numerous amount of pointers and examples. Then giving basic action poses (walking, running, sitting, standing, laying down, etc) and going into variations of those actions by using multiple examples of characters. A typical example page consists of a stick figure in a particular pose, a block figure, and the actual finished character in the same pose. Front and back, or other view of the pose is common and he even gives pointers and tips of details to look out for.

Besides teaching you how to draw real believable characters, this book is an excellent edition that you may later use as a reference book for poses. Like his earlier books, Ozawa covers nudity tastefully and this book can be used by young artists without fear. A book well worth the money, imo.

I own 3 books by Luis Royo: Dreams, Secrets and III Millennium. Of these 3, Dreams is the worst (though I would rate it 4 stars). The problem with Dreams is not the artwork, which is magnificent, as always, but the size of the images. When I buy a book like this I don't expect to find thumbnails inside or even half page pictures. In my opinion, Royo deserves one painting per page and every now and then a two-page spread.

With III Millennium you get exactly that.

As for Royo's art, whether it's sombre, erotic, futuristic or medieval, it is always at top quality, and its most unique characteristic is, undoubtedly, the way he handles light - the reader's eyes are literally drawn to whatever he whiches.

I haven't found a Royo art book I didn't like, but this is one of the best ones. He depicts harsh future worlds: some with machines, some with fallen angels, others with a "Planet of the Apes" theme. One of my favorite types is the kind with a mostly abandoned world, complete with the skeletons of buildings and torn yet sexy clothing of the women who still inhabit that world.

His women certainly are sexy, but much more than that. The women suffer, but endure these future worlds, and often come out the stronger for it, making the illustrations more touching and powerful.

There are also a few cover arts for futuristic space novels by Julie E. Czerneda, which also have strong women as depicted in Royo art.

Wow! When I heard about Royo, I decided to look around for some of his work. When I bought this book I was delighted to see that my favourite picture, "The Announcement" was in it. The subtle blue in the eyes of the child are beautifully hypnotic. I personally enjoy drawing and I have to say Royo inspires me deeply. His blend of the female flesh with cold automatons is beautiful. What might seem like weird to individuals who look at this book, aesthetically, Royo has won my admiration because he is bold and different and that's what makes a unique artist.

Once again Luis Royo has created a world of wonder for his fans. Anyone who is a serious collector of his work should own this book. His imagination has created a world of the future that only pure talent could capture on canvas, and make us believe that Three Millenium may look just as he presents it. Incredible!

This book will lead you into the future, as Royo sees it. It's dark, ice-cold, scary. Barren landscape, ruined cities, machine making love to astonishingly beautiful women; monkeys control humans. Fallen angels turned to stone, yet capable to make love to each other. The colors are grey, brown, green, which make the light even more vivid. The details are painstakingly taken care of - just like everything Royo makes. You will find women in this book (too) which you wish you'd meet in real life - if you're a guy, like me :)

Rumiko has certainly done it again with Vol. 3. I love every minute of this book. I was practically on the floor laughing. It is hilarious. Yet, it still has the action we all love. Believe me, this book is awesome. This is thee best book series I have EVER seen. You'll love this book. It's great!

All I have to say is if you love Anime you will love this series. The graphics are wonderful. The stories are great. It has good humor with a touch of romance and horror. I could read these books over and over again for hours. I'm not just saying this about vol 3 either. All I have read so far are wonderful. But a slight warning, these things are so addictive.

This is the best manga series Ive seen so far. It is an EXECELENT drama, comedy, and fantsy, all in one.
In the beginning Kagome is a normal Jr. High kid but when she accedentally falls into the sacred Bone-Eaters well she is tranported to the Fudal Age of Japan. When she finds herself there, she goes exploring for her family owned shrine. Except it's not there. instead she finds a demon boy named Inu-Yasha.
When she finds herself surrounded by the local villagers she is taken to the village where the preistes examines her to find a remakable resemblance to the high priestes and protecter of the sacred Shikon Jewel. This jewel can give the posesser vast powers wether good or evil. Kagome is in grave danger because many demons in the fuedal age seek the jewel. but when Kagome finds that the jewel is inside her body pretecting it, it gets blown apart by an enchated arrow that Kagome shot, it breaks and the shards cover the feudal japan. Now Kagome has to team up with Inu-Yasha to set out across the feudal Japan to find all the shards before the demons do.
THIS IS AN EXCELENT MANGA!! ...

This Manga brings us into the present and past at a cross roads. We learn a few things about the Half Demon and his disposition towards Kagome.Kagome's school and family make a few guest appearances.I'm really interested in getting Vol 4 and Vol 5 for my birthday and I recommend this as a birthday gift to a friend or a fan with the same enthusiasm towards this series!

I love each of the books in this series. I'm a fan of all of the other things I've seen by Rumiko Takahashi, and this series is definitely no exception. In each book there's a serious plot combined with just the right amount of humor. This series isn't quite as silly as Ranma 1/2 (I always get strange looks when I try to explain that one to anyone I know). In this book, Inu-yasha and Kagome meet Nobunaga, a young man who wishes to save a princess in trouble. The three of them end up having to battle the demon that has possessed the princess' husband and is devouring the souls of young women. In the second half of the book, Kagome has decided she needs to go back to her time in order to study for exams. However, demons exist even there, and this one has a shard of the Shikon Jewel. I think this is the first book that includes a little of the incredibly gullible Hojo, and there are hints of a possible romance between Kagome and Inu-yasha. Of course, knowing Rumiko Takahashi, that romance will be very very far in the future, but it's still fun to read about and very cute. I would recommend reading this series in order, or you might become very confused. This is definitely a worthwhile read.

I enjoyed this little book. The story was fast paced, and the drawings awesome. I highly recommend the book for everyone to read. I love children's picture books, and I am not a kid.
I also write for children myself.

Jacqueline Rankine-Van Wassenhoven.

Check my books out if you like.

I am a first grade teacher. I bought this book as a read-aloud for my classroom. It has very rich text, which makes it a wonderful story for a read-aloud. The pictures are vivid and engaging which kept my students attention. It is written like a folktale which teaches a moral and a value that is simple for the students to understand, and brings in a different genre for them. My students loved it. My own children loved it. I would recommend this book for all teachers of all age groups. I look forward to more books by this author.

Each page is rich, beautifully detailed and has little surprises to make me smile. You won't mind reading and showing this book, over and over, to your favorite, youthful soul.

I too found this book through a blog about making and marketing books. Most books don't get this kind of attention. His does because it's so well done.

I stumbled across this book and it's author on myspace. After looking at Mr. Milteer's work, I couldn't wait to cop my own copy! This book is AMAZING and should be on every child's bookshelf! Not only is the art beautiful, but the story is fast paced, engaging, and the plot uplifting! I can't wait to get my hands on Mr. Milteer's future work!

I met Marcello online via various blogs discussing book marketing etc. and after one look at the book's cover art, I had to buy it. I asked him about the book, considering I have a second grader at home who is required to read every night. He explained the reading level was perfect for my son and he was right. I ordered the book, it came in right away and I was very impressed. The story is great for kids and it's easy to read. My son very much enjoyed the story (he reads it over and over again now...) and again, the illustration is amazing.

If you're looking for a great read for your grade-school students, I highly recommend this book. Being so actively involved in my children's education, I would recommend this book as part of any school's required reading list. An added bonus is the ease of access to the author. Again, he was very cordial and apart from being a writer, I am a parent first, and he answered my questions regarding the reading level for my son promptly and that always helps when the artist makes themselves available to the fans.

~Bobby Ozuna
author of Proud Souls