Paint Books

This Singer series book is quite nice. However, it turns out to be a shorter version of another book, Exploring Textile Arts, published two years later by the same publisher. Nowhere does either book indicate this relationship, but the text and illustrations for the various techniques described are identical. Buy one or the other, but not both!

The variety of fabric and paint techniques inside this book were numerous. As an artist who works with both fabrics and paint; as well as various other media I was very impressed and pleased. The book features step by step instructions; great illustrations and photography. All in all a beautiful and very useful tool for an artist; home decorator; fashion decorator; designer; fiber art major; textile artist; and anyone fascinated by creating cool works of art or fashion! (...)

Pros:
This is a beautifully illustrated guide to the terminology with examples of the production and techniques of Anime in the Japanese/Asian style. It is 'complete' in the sense it covers the vast majority of terms, forms of style and applications. It even includes a section on various softwares available (2006) and what to expect to pay for them by the 'free - $$$$$' rating. That is it in a nutshell. If you are expecting the essentials (ONLY) of how-to this is it.
Cons:
IF you are however looking for a guide to help you produce on desktop computer and are a beginner, and looking to do a barebones small studio production... There are better places for the fleshing out of 'How-To' in detail.
Overall:
The book is a tease, a pleasing tease, but just a tease. Keep it for referencing terms. And face facts, to do really professional Anime, you are going to have to PAY PAY PAY! SO save your dollars for the software for editing compositing and production... and sound recording and editing needs you will have. And if you have the money for that, you can then consider writing your own 'how-to'.
P.S. Really didn't like the comment on page 41, "where a western artist may have a darker, grungier look for the clothes and expressions." I really felt that was uncalled for! Their main audience is future 'western artists'... just a thought.

Japanese animation is an influential media style with bright colors and dramatic entertainment value, and any who would draw or create anime characters would do well to begin with The Complete Guide to Anime Techniques, which surveys the basics of artwork, working with 3-D graphics, and more. From creating the script to storyboarding to distributing a finished movie, this moves beyond the usual focus on drawing to embrace the whole of anime, and is a top pick for any library where patrons favor anime discussions.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

When you picture a "directory", what comes to mind? Perhaps a huge, bulking monstrosity, with the weight of a phone book and the sort of exhaustive info you'd expect from Encyclopedia Britannica. At least that's the type of visualization I have; and, that said, a massive volume is what I expected to pick up from my local library when I put THE COMPLETE SURAFCES AND FINISHES DIRECTORY on hold.

Alas, SURFACES AND FINISHES is more like a "home décor 101" guide than a directory. In seven chapters, author Emma Scattergood introduces newbies to simple paint techniques, paint finishes (faux finishes), plaster and concrete, wall coverings, tiles, wood, and glass and metal, in that order. The final chapter offers some suggestions for tying the materials together. While marginally useful for the beginner, SURFACES AND FINISHES doesn't offer any advice that can't easily be found online (for free, to boot!) using The Google (as GW would say). Any one of dozens of home improvement websites are just as informative, if not more so. If you're a first-time homeowner who needs some inspiration to get your creative juices flowing, SURFACES AND FINISHES might be worth a look (it does have some pretty pictures, I'll give it that). However, it's hardly the be-all, end-all directory it claims to be. Rather, it's a decent starting point; nothing more, nothing less. Save your dinero, unless you can browse SURFACES AND FINISHES via your biblioteca.

This is a wonderful idea book for home decorating. It is a guide to a variety of surfaces and finishes including paint, plaster, concrete, wallpaper, tile, wood, glass and metal.

The book is divided into sections on various materials and finish types such as types of wood, paint types, paint effects, and glass styles. Each section includes background information and sample pictures. I have lots of interior design reference books and I found more examples I liked in here than in many of the larger books. A chart listing all the finishes in the chapter and their applications concludes each section.

Each section includes one or two full projects as well as many other ideas. The projects are rated by difficulty, but they are very brief and do not include step-by-step demonstrations. Some projects include colorwashing a wall, tinting and polishing plaster, using fabric as a wall cover, making a tile border, creating tongue and groove paneling and building a copper paneled cupboard.

In the back there is a nice section on putting it all together. Here you find advice on everything from using texture to choosing upholstery. It also helps you choose your own style and decorate every room in your house. There is also a good list of suppliers. This is a great book for anyone who enjoys creatively decorating their home.

This book offers some wonderful inspiration. The author is very generous in sharing photographs, and does a nice job of sharing some techniques. Her work is fanciful, professional, and fun. This is a great source for clever design ideas - the author is a truly talented artist. The serious furniture painter will want an additional reference with more information on prep and finishing. This makes a nice addition to the craft painter's library.

I thought this was a fantastic book for the person who has some decorative paint and/or design experience. This book gives you very good instructions for specific and general projects, but does not give specific color info and would not be appropriate for the unsure beginner. The photos are beautiful and clear, and I felt really inspired with Ms. Rosenberg's fresh work and ideas. The recommnded reading and resources in the back is fantastic--I found a new paint supplier and saved money. Plus the author puts her personnel information in the book. I had a question and emailed her regarding something I was unclear about in the book, and she responded with an answer within a few hours. Great Book--I refer to this book more than any other in my painting library.

This book is great for someone with limited knowledge of painted furniture. The pictures are nice, covering both the older flowery country style and the new funky multi color style. It is short on in depth details of paints, supplies, and preperation. But there is enough info to get you through a project. For those that cant draw there are some patters for flowers ans such. The projects presented are inspiring and unique not cheap or tacky looking. The book does not cover classical faux paint techniques that could be combined into the projects presented. If you need that type of information I highly recommend The Art of Painted Finish by Isabel O-Neil.

The projects in this book are fun and eye-catching. It contains a broad range of do-it-yourself furniture painting, as well as sponging, stamping and stenciling. There's sure to be at least one project you'll want to try.

This is the very first watercolor book I've come across that is specifically designed for people who have never picked up a brush before or ever tried to mix colors. He takes you step by small, very detailed step on how to paint 8 different pictures (mountain landscape, seascape, winter landscape, still life flowers, misty hills, woodland scene, crofter's cottage, rushing stream). With extra information on materials, drawing, using the brushes, framing, a tid bit on composition, mixing colors, and painting washes. It really is the best book out there for complete beginners! He explains that ANYBODY can paint with watercolors, and emphasizes how easy it really is if you have the right information on how to go about painting one. It's really helped me a lot.

Clark's books are some of the most helpful for beginners. Many of his exercises are simple, maybe too somple, but they are fun and they give you confidence. His instructions are easy to follow.

This book has been around for years.Although now outdated it was a good book for its time.Its an overview of custom painting and techniques.Plenty of basic information here.It might be a bit outdated but its okay for someone learning.I hope this book gets updated soon.It would be a great book in colour."Motorbooks" are known for their high quality books and this book is no exception.

If you are going to do a custom paint job yourself, it would make sense that you're an experienced painter. This book has some unneeded information, as basics on painting in general, like surface prep, mixing paints, etc. I don't think a custom painter would want to waste his/her time reading this information all over again.

This book is not all that bad, as there are some good information within it's content.

It shows you how to mask custom flames/stripes, etc. I would not rely on this one book as your only source of information for custom painting.

The main reason I like this book is because in the back it has a chart for whichever kind of surface you'd like to paint. The chart will tell you how to prepare the surface and which kind of paint would be best to go on that particular surface. If I want to go paint my walkway, the chart will tell me exactly what needs to be done so that it will last.

The book gives you a lot of good ideas but they don't seem to be anything different than what the BHG website offers. My opinion, check with the website first before buying the book. If you don't find it in the website than I recommend it.

Since I believe all art is an impression - whether it is a photo, an oil painting, or a cold sausage lying on the bottom of a bath - I should always advise someone to develop their own 'style,' but a little help can go a long way.

This is a very helpful book - the best I've found on this subject so far.

I love impressionist paintings so I purchased this book to learn how to paint like the impressionists. The book's goal is quite ambitious. Teaching you how to paint like each of the impressionist masters in less than 150 pages just isn't possible. But the author does as good as a job as possible in this setting. The book is evenly devided amongst the artists, so you can get a feel for the differences of each artists. Instead of copying an entire painting, which would be much more challenging, she focuses on a small area of the painting. This actually makes sense to explain the techniques.

The shortcomings of this book in my opinion are that I felt the book was more about copying the impressionist paintings rather than learning their techniques. In many cases the copies were pretty good but close examination showed completely different textures and it's obvious the technique was in fact quite different. In other cases the copy wasn't very close to the original.

I've also read "Paint With the Impressionists" and the author took a different approach: He painted original scenes in the styles of the various impressionists. I think that one gives a little more insight to their technique.

I think a better title for this book would be "How to copy impressionist paintings". Overall if you want to learn about the impressionists and need some guideance in copying their paintings, this is not a bad book. However if you do some studying on your own, and have access to a museum to study some original paintings I think you can do equally well without this book.

This is one of my all-time favorite books. Reading it slowly, I learned to see the interplay of relationships in which no firm line is drawn between objects, and so to see beauty. I learned that wrapping my imaginative body around my experience is essential to loving and knowing reality. The author sees her struggle to paint symbolized in her key painting of a parrot, that part of us taught in schools to regurgitate, as it angrily fights to protect the treasure of imagination which lives within us.... She compares the eagle-eye view--wide and expansive-- with the narrow focused view emphasized in our schooling.

On Not Being Able To Paint would perhaps be better title, Why One Should Paint. Trained as Freudian psychologist, Joanna Field all too painstakingly analyzes her rudimentary drawing and painting efforts in an attempt uncover what ultimately transpires in the process. An ancient quest for sure but depending upon one's knowledge in either the art, education or psychological fields, the road thus traveled is relatively interesting. As a professional artist, I found her all too subjective diatribes tiring, boring, even stretching the limits of believability in the sense that she was able to draw such cataclysmic conclusions from the bad visuals she produced. Her analytical training was obviously taking the upper hand as she "read" so much into own work. However, at the end of each segment, she manages to pull her rantings together for some thoughtful and genuine insights as to what took place throughout her process. Midway through, she departs from her dependence upon the sketches, begins to analyze in a broader, more universal context and salvages the book. She then rather clearly and poetically takes us through dreams, visions, both disillusion and illusion, realizing that, "the inner subjective and outer objective aspects of reality are in a continual state of change and development" and feels that a painter beautifully solves the problem of navigating these (constructed) worlds by inventing a "half-way house between the dream receiver and the external one". She then offers rather keen insight as to how the artist has to "pay" in communicability for this navigational privilege for with others able to share his/her dream, s/he is more "absolved from the guilt or defiance of common sense reality". Of course then, there is the psycho-analytic relation of visual symbols to our sexual development but here her training shines and I found myself thinking of parts of my visual practice in a new light. A colleague, well versed in the history of psychoanalytic development made the astute comment that considering the limited scope of the practice at the time, (she comments on just finishing a drawing at the precipice of WWI), the relationships she manifests are insightful and progressive. Her final strength is her exploration of how this new found knowledge should be boldly carried forth into the classrooms as it would all but revolutionize not only our thought process on the role of visual creation, but our perception of our reality as well. One is deeply saddened however as we realize how we have seemed to regressed rather than progressed in that area in our society's educational role. One absolutely maddening fact however, is the that this current edition omits the a crucial drawing to which she constantly refers on its cover; something the publisher should be taken to task for sure. She ends on a phenomenological note, finding it a pity that the word `reverie' is no longer a part of the language of psycho-pathology for painting, like analysis, provides a safe setting where one can be indulged in its grace and produce the same subsequent and ultimate effect for the person who looks at it. Great for an educator interested in the arts, probably a bit stale for the professional analysts of today and a bit too naive for those in the professional arts.