If
you have ever wanted to capture the power, grace and majesty
of dragons after reading a fantasy book or watching a film,
this workbook is for you. It goes a stage further than most
art books as you draw in the book itself, generating a record
of your work as you learn each stage of dragon anatomy.
This is a handsome volume with its gold printed cover, vintage
appearance and marbled endpapers, akin to a magical tome. You
feel that Harry Potter might have come across it in Hogwarts
library and used it in art classes. Of course dragons don’t
exist, but parts of them do, as we have reptiles, birds, dinosaurs
and other creatures to inspire us when we imagine them.
This
book is organized in three sections and initially takes a
look at body parts, types of dragon, and how to bring your
work to life. Start by looking at the heads, eyes, wings,
skin, teeth, etc., of real animals, and have a go at drawing
them in the boxes provided. There are whole pages to sketch
other animal parts from your own research, as well as exercises
on how to capture expression, flight and movement.
The
second section deals with six dragon types, which you can
copy first before creating your own version Finally, you can
put it all together to make your own drawing. Interestingly,
this section opens with exercises involving drawing real objects
and animals first by having them in front of you, and then
drawing them from memory. More exercises follow this time
with the dragons, getting them to fly and making their textures
looking lifelike. Finally, draw the culmination of your work
– your own dragon.
At
the back are some useful sketches of dragons to inspire, together
with captions about them for more ideas. I liked the workbook
style and can imagine artists of any level enjoying working
through the stages, particularly those with some drawing experience
in other fields who want to try their hand at drawing dragons.
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