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The Complete Book of Poses for Artists: A comprehensive photographic and illustrated reference book for learning to draw more than 500 poses
Packed with helpful photographs, hundreds of techniques, and loads of expert instruction, The Complete Book of Posesfor Artists is the perfect resource for artists of all skill levels.
The human figure is one of the most difficult subjects to capture in drawing. The Complete Book of Poses for Artists combines photographs and illustrations that demonstrate how to accurately render the human form in hundreds of realistic poses. The book guides artists through the process of drawing the human figure as it pertains to anatomy, proportions, volume, mass, gesture, movement, and expression. From there, the book reveals how these characteristics come together using light, shape, line, and form to accurately depict the human figure in a variety of everyday poses, including standing, sitting, reclining, and action. Each section features color photographs of people in several "core" poses (e.g., sitting, reclining, and action), as well as multiple variations of those poses. Step-by-step artist illustrations demonstrate how to render the core pose, whereas illustrations and professional tips demonstrate how to turn the core pose into a new variation. In addition, step-by-step drawing instructions and techniques demonstrate how to capture realistic poses as they differ from one person to the next across a range of human characteristics, such as age (child, teen, adult, senior citizen); body type (ectomorph, mesomorph, endomorph); gender; and activity (e.g., athlete, dancer, etc.). Packed with helpful photographs, hundreds of techniques, and loads of expert instruction, The Complete Book of Posesfor Artists is the perfect resource for artists of all skill levels-and one that will be referred to over and over again.
The human figure is one of the most difficult subjects to capture in drawing. The Complete Book of Poses for Artists combines photographs and illustrations that demonstrate how to accurately render the human form in hundreds of realistic poses. The book guides artists through the process of drawing the human figure as it pertains to anatomy, proportions, volume, mass, gesture, movement, and expression. From there, the book reveals how these characteristics come together using light, shape, line, and form to accurately depict the human figure in a variety of everyday poses, including standing, sitting, reclining, and action. Each section features color photographs of people in several "core" poses (e.g., sitting, reclining, and action), as well as multiple variations of those poses. Step-by-step artist illustrations demonstrate how to render the core pose, whereas illustrations and professional tips demonstrate how to turn the core pose into a new variation. In addition, step-by-step drawing instructions and techniques demonstrate how to capture realistic poses as they differ from one person to the next across a range of human characteristics, such as age (child, teen, adult, senior citizen); body type (ectomorph, mesomorph, endomorph); gender; and activity (e.g., athlete, dancer, etc.). Packed with helpful photographs, hundreds of techniques, and loads of expert instruction, The Complete Book of Posesfor Artists is the perfect resource for artists of all skill levels-and one that will be referred to over and over again.
240 pages, Hardcover
Published January 16, 2017
22 people are currently reading
364 people want to read
About the author
Ken Goldman
25 books7 followersLibrarian Note:
There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
March 9, 2017
A good book of poses, however my personal focus requires personal models that are not reflected here.
Even if this book does not have the poses you are looking for, it can be used as an outline reference of what poses to seek so that you can develop your own model reference collections.
Even if this book does not have the poses you are looking for, it can be used as an outline reference of what poses to seek so that you can develop your own model reference collections.
June 21, 2022
Many good poses, and some have excellent visual aids to assist the artist in the quest for good life drawing skills. Sounds like 4 or 5 stars, but the drawings [photos are not used] are very small making the book much less useful. Thus , 3 stars.
The problem for the author and publisher is in order to include a lot of poses they have to either increase the number of pages to make the drawings a good size or decrease the number of poses. The publisher and author in this case decided to put in a lot of poses and limit the number of pages, thus the drawings are rather small. Nonetheless, the drawings are very good and there is a huge number of poses.
The problem for the author and publisher is in order to include a lot of poses they have to either increase the number of pages to make the drawings a good size or decrease the number of poses. The publisher and author in this case decided to put in a lot of poses and limit the number of pages, thus the drawings are rather small. Nonetheless, the drawings are very good and there is a huge number of poses.
March 1, 2021
A sound book for novice or intermediate level artists ft. a decent collection of poses organized by complexity of motion as well as age and emotion. The poses are broken down in detail so the reader can learn how to render not only the given examples but variations of the examples as well.
The style of the drawing examples is a bit old fashioned comparatively to contemporary trends but it's a good source of foundational art education and there is a decently wide range of models provided, in both age and ethnicity, although perhaps not much in model weight/size.
The style of the drawing examples is a bit old fashioned comparatively to contemporary trends but it's a good source of foundational art education and there is a decently wide range of models provided, in both age and ethnicity, although perhaps not much in model weight/size.
March 24, 2018
Amazing, and SO helpful! You need to read this if you draw people at all. . . . But, not really, I just enjoyed it a lot.
December 5, 2019
This is a good book for beginner artists that have trouble sketching people. Though for me this is not actually a full set of poses. Still, artists could use this book as an outline.
September 16, 2020
Informative and helpful.
February 1, 2024
This book is great start to understand poses, there are many examples of different poses, you can train on them.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews