Drawing: Dragons by Michael Dobrzycki

Drawing: Dragons by Michael Dobrzycki ISBN-13: 9781633227859 Paperback: 40 pages Publisher: Walter Foster Publishing Released: May 7, 2019

Source: ebook review copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

Book Description, Modified from Goodreads:
Drawing: Dragons invites you into the fantastic world of artist Michael Dobrzycki and teaches you how to draw imaginative fire-breathing creatures from start to finish. Featuring step-by-step lessons on drawing legendary dragons from around the world, as well as a wide variety of shading techniques in ink and graphite pencil, Drawing: Dragons covers everything you need to know to draw these fantastic beasts.

Some of the amazing dragons you'll learn to draw: Fire Dragon, Hatchling, Drake, Hydra, Lindworm, and Drachenstein.

Designed for beginners, the How to Draw & Paint series offers an easy-to-follow guide that introduces artists to basic tools and materials and includes simple step-by-step lessons for a variety of projects suitable for the aspiring artist. Drawing: Dragons allows artists to develop their drawing skills, demonstrating how to start with basic shapes and use pencil and ink techniques to create varied textures and characteristics, such as scales, feathers, wings, claws, and more.


My Review:
Drawing: Dragons is a short, step-by-step guide on how to draw 9 dragons using pencil (and occasionally black ink wash or ink pen) and paper. The author very briefly covered tools and materials, basic pencil techniques, how to use basic shapes in drawing, and how to create several dragon scale textures. While this book is targeted at beginners (probably tweens and teens will enjoy it most), he assumed the reader already had some basic skill at drawing as his instructions were mostly "do this next" rather than "here's how to do this."

Most of the book focused on the 9 step-by-step projects: drawing a Fire Dragon, Hatchling, Drake, Hydra, Amphitere, Lindworm, Wyvern, Eastern (Asian) Dragon, and Drachenstein. The author taught how to create these exact dragons by explaining (in four to nine steps, usually about 7 steps) what tool and technique to use in what order. He didn't really talk about how to create your own dragon design, but he did teach the general steps of first drawing the basic shapes of the dragon, then refining the lines, and then adding details, textures, and shading. If you're looking for a guide for drawing specific types of dragons, this one provided good instructions and illustrations to follow.


If you've read this book, what do you think about it? I'd be honored if you wrote your own opinion of the book in the comments.


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