The Urban Sketching Handbook People and Motion: Tips and Techniques for Drawing on Location (2) (Urban Sketching Handbooks)

I have a lot of art books, but I am particularly enjoying this one. This is not a 'how to draw' book, the writer/artist assumes prior knowledge of both drawing and materials. At first glance, I was surprised at how little text there was and wondered if it would become a 'coffee table' book, but once I sat down to really look at it I found it was crammed full of tips, which are perfectly illustrated by graphic examples from many urban sketchers. It's the perfect size to carry around, too and I think I will be dipping into and learning from this book for many years to come. An absolute gem!

Candid sketching people can be tricky, this book explains some ways to do so discretely and achieve spontaneous sketches, but you need to practise so you can develop your skills outlined in this book.

Handy great format and size to keep with sketch book for on the spot advice "comfort blanket ".

I return to this book again and again. Some reviewers claim that the subject covered is basic. But I believe if you practice the core principles and techniques, over and over, then you shall see clearer results.

Small and compact, this is a great book to carry around. As a beginner, this is a lovely resource to dip into. I tend to carry it round with my sketchbook and dip in before I start sketching to help me focus.

Ag reat little book packed with useful and clever ideas. I would recommend an Urban Sketching Handbook to anyone who likes or wants to start sketching. The book was also delivered promptly.

Great little book, well presented, easy to access and carry around. Information it contains is also worth having.

great service and great book

Must read. Great book in fact the whole collection is highly recommended. To the point and a great approach to improving your skills

esta en ingles pero de nuevo ,eso no es un obstaculo, el libro es muy ilustativo

Dá uma ideia do que é urban sketching, mas pode decepcionar que espera aprender um guia para aprender a desenhar

The second book in Gabriel Campanario’s Urban Sketching Handbook series has just been released: People and Motion: Tips and Techniques for Drawing on Location. Identical in format to the first in this series, Architecture and Cityscapes, the latest book is a succinct, compact volume that focuses this time on people in the urban landscape – how to capture their poses and moves accurately and expressively. It’s jam-packed with practical information and inspiring examples for both the beginner and the more seasoned urban sketcher.Although we could study and practice drawing the human form by attending traditional life drawing sessions, Campanario sees sketching people in their natural settings as having the additional benefit of teaching us about our community. “People are the life of a city. To draw them is to get to know the place,” he says. While acknowledging that drawing people can be challenging and frustrating, Campanario emphasizes the fun in sketching people around us and encourages interacting with subjects. “Learn their first and last names,” he suggests. “Ask the market vendor where his fruit comes from. Or compliment – and tip – the busker for the song he played while you drew him.” Including people in sketches “can introduce you to some very interesting folks with great stories about themselves.”The meat of the book examines six keys as they relate to drawing people: proportion, contour, gesture, expression, context and likeness. While including tips such as classic studio drawing lessons (an adult’s total height is about seven-and-a-half to eight times the head height), Campanario stresses ideas that can be practiced in the real world, such as while using public transportation or in a cafe.Most interesting and useful to me was the section on capturing gesture. As I’ve seen week after week in his Seattle Times column, Seattle Sketcher, Campanario is a master of this principle. How does he manage to “freeze the moment” in an often rapidly moving scene and put it on paper? “I like to take as much time as I can just watching until I can spot the move that I want to capture,” Campanario says. Showing an example of basketball players, he explains, “I watched several free throws at my son’s basketball game until I ‘saw’ the pose I wanted to sketch.”Another useful section is about capturing body and facial expression to indicate a subject’s emotions. “Internalizing the emotions of your subjects will make your sketches of people livelier and full of expression. Is the person you’re drawing alert, relaxed, cheerful, or concentrating?”Context, another of the book’s keys, is an important element of urban sketching. Three years ago when I first began taking my sketchbook out with me, I used to sketch a lot of people’s faces while riding the bus or in a coffee shop. Although I remembered exactly where I’d been when I made those sketches, the sketches themselves didn’t show any information about that. Where was this floating head sketched? It took me quite a while to understand that if I’d just include a little of the context, the picture would tell more of a story. I could have figured this out much more quickly had I read Campanario’s succinct instruction:“A hint of the environment is enough to turn an isolated portrait into a true scene that captures a moment of time. Even if you are focusing on the subway commuter sitting across from you or the musician playing on the street, adding elements such as windows, the city skyline, or a lamp post will make the sketch more complete.”The final section of the book is a gallery of sketches by artists in the worldwide urban sketching community, including many of my favorites. An illuminating aspect of all the sketches featured in the book (as well as in the series’ first book) is that the artists have included the approximate length of time they took to make each sketch. Although I am a relatively fast sketcher myself, I am amazed and inspired by how much story can be told in a mere 10- or 20-minute sketch. If you have an hour or two to spare, it’s wonderful to be able to use that time to flesh out an entire urban scene. But what if you have only the length of a coffee break? You can still tell a story with a sketch – one that only you can tell. That’s what urban sketching is all about.

Ce livre vient en complément d " Architecture and cityscapes" et présente les mêmes qualités pédagogiques : excellente progression, excellents exemples. Correspond parfaitement à mon attente et je le recommande vivement .