Rating: 
Summary: Great book but not for beginners
Review: I am a college student enrolled in a figure drawing class. My instructor told me to get any figure drawing book, so I got this one. The author does amazing work with his tone and shading, but I did not find it useful for the basic fundamentals to figure drawing. This is a book for people with figure drawing background who want to improve their style.
Rating: 
Summary: 6 STARS PLUS!! The beginning of the journey...
Review: I am a guy who has been drawing all his life, but has never gone to an art class or drawing session. I've bought books from Bridgman, Hogarth, Rubins, Tiner, and now Ryder. I must say that the previous books really help me with anatomy, foreshortening, and perspective. Reading these authors is like having them as teachers standing over you. Now, Ryder took my level of drawing to a new level...realism. His methods WORK!!
But, it's not instant in any way. Realistic figure drawing takes time and patience. The masters never rushed their work. True art takes focus and time. The classical masters knew this and so do the contemporary ones, like Ryder. Have fun with learning!!
Rating:
Summary: 6 STARS PLUS!! The beginning of the journey...
Review: I am a guy who has been drawing all his life, but has never gone to an art class or drawing session. I've bought books from Bridgman, Hogarth, Rubins, Tiner, and now Ryder. I must say that the previous books really help me with anatomy, foreshortening, and perspective. Reading these authors is like having them as teachers standing over you. Now, Ryder took my level of drawing to a new level...realism. His methods WORK!!
But, it's not instant in any way. Realistic figure drawing takes time and patience. The masters never rushed their work. True art takes focus and time. The classical masters knew this and so do the contemporary ones, like Ryder. Have fun with learning!!
Rating:
Summary: Comprehensively Inspiring
Review: I am totally inspired by this book. The book is filled with wonderful drawings, well written content, great structure to follow and bunch of excellent instructions. I can basically open a page and enjoy the classical art work while reading a section or a caption and learning something at the same time. It reflects Tony's teaching style: comprehensive and inspiring.
Rating:
Summary: Worth every penny!
Review: I began learning figure drawing last autumn using the constructive, anatomical approach. My main references were Bridgman and Peck. I've always been a little suspicious of the "holistic" approach to learning art. However, I kept seeing Ryder's book recommended so I decided to take a chance. The chance paid off; this is a great book and the top-down approach to figure drawing has improved my drawings in only a few days of work. Anthony Ryder has a real gift for teaching drawing. Having said that, I still recommend studying anatomy -- it's a great help to know what's "under the skin." My recommendation is to buy this book, copies of Peck and Bridgman, a little plastic skeleton, magazines with lots of pictures of people, and then practice, practice, practice...
Rating:
Summary: Great for shading guidance
Review: I bought this book a few weeks ago. Agree that this book is not for beginners looking for "formulas." Ryder is basically just using that good-old, erase and redraw until it looks right method, which is the only way to go for high realism anyway if you ask me. This book was most useful to me as shading reference material since I draw from imagination mostly. The book needs some more poses to be a better reference guide, but that may not be a major goal of the book, although it should be. Beautiful models, beautifully modeled. A great book to get you motivated to try harder for sure.
Rating:
Summary: Definitely Odd....
Review: I bought this book because I found the artist online and loved his painting "Josephine." When I saw he had a book for sale, I wanted it. I commend Mr. Ryder for using models of different shapes and ethnicities. The variation in models is wonderful. I think his style of rendering in pencil is precise, very sensitive, and very pleasing to the eye. I am unhappy with this book because the drawing process is not broken down sufficiently to my taste. I like seeing many steps, and all of the marks that go into a piece, regardless of whether or not they eventually get erased. There are no gestural renditions in this book, and all of the models are outlined. I hate outlining. I think it's very grade-schoolish and a real detriment to Ryder's overall craft. So my final judgement is that this book is not essential to your collection. It is NOT a guide to anatomy. However, if you are looking to expand your knowledge of technique and application, Ryder is more than worth purchasing.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent instruction
Review: I found this book to be extremely useful in describing how to get proper proportions and shading. This information can be applied to any type of drawing, not just figures. For proportion, you draw a box-type outline around the complete item and then a contour drawing is done. Shading takes care of the inside of the item. Shading has a light side that has shades from light to light-dark, a terminator which is the darkest portion inbetween the light side and the shadow side and then the shadow side which is lighter than the terminator because of reflected light. Beautiful figure drawings are included.
Rating:
Summary: Not for beginners but my best book so far!
Review: I have studied numerous drawing books and by far this book I have owned. I often reread and reference it to inspire me, and i can honestly say my work has improved immensely. I had been a portait artist for about a year and the face is not a problem to me but the figure was a time-cosuming challenge, that is until I was opened to Anthony Ryder's technique of envelopes, blocking-in and contours. It made drawing the figure so much easier, well proportioned and realistic. Using cylinder and blocks just doesn't do it for me. The rendering is awesome and it already has an impact on my art.
This is not to say I simply copy his style but rather to combine his with mine to produce even more amazing results. Lastly this is NOT your beginner basic learn-how-to-draw book. You should have sound drawing ability inorder to tackle this book. So don't complain if it doesn't instruct you step-by-step on drawing the hand or head 5 eye-widths apart(a pretty bad method anyhow). You'll learn to draw the figure as a whole and not as broken down indivual figure elements.
Rating:
Summary: Beginners to expect some learning curve. Great book though!
Review: I just finished reading this book at one sitting of several hours straight. It is a great book, and without any hesitation, I'd like to give it a FIVE-STAR. The following are my opinions to readers who have not read the book. These opinions are NOT based on beautiful works presented in the book, although they are also a strength of this book. 1) I enjoy a lot the method presented by Mr. Ryder. Incidentally, it is also my approach in life figure drawing. To me, this approach is very NATURAL and INTUITIVE, and largely based on the artist's OBSERVATIONS of the objects. This may be the key to the approach, as the author emphasized not on "how to draw", but more on "WHAT TO DRAW". 2) Figure-drawing beginners, who expect to learn from the book how to use simplified 3D shapes, such as an egg (for the head) or deformed cylinders (for torsos, limbs, etc...), will NOT see those techniques in this book. Instead, they may find it NOT TOO EASY to learn the "block-in", "contour", and "drawing the inside" presented in the book. A learning curve is expected, but in the end, it will pay off when this approach has been mastered. Readers who follow this approach would be able to draw "what they see" in a very natural manner (like a pro artist!) 3) I enjoy most the chapter about shading. In my humble opinion, however, it will be the most challenging task for beginners to distiguish and render different shading shapes and tones. 4) Keen observations seem to come naturally in the so-called "borned artists". For the rest, it takes practice. This is a good guideline for any of us artists (borned or not) who would like to sharpen our observational skills in drawing such complex (yet intriguing) objects as human figures.
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