Rating: ![1 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-1-0.gif) Summary: Not worth your time Review: After having heard rave reviews about this series I decided to pick it up. Boy was I disappointed.
While there may be valuable information to be garnered from this book I found the style not at all to my liking.
The book is extremely busy and disorganized. The images of what they're trying to teach appear to follow no linear pattern. What's more the little chibi boy and girl that give out pointers are splattered all over the page so much that it actually detracts from the lessons instead of enhancing them. What's more, there is some nudity in this book. To me, a book like this has no place for the nudity unless it's about drawing hentai or something. The book also uses comic strips to make a blind stab at humor in trying to teach you what to do and what not to do. Unfortuantely they focus on it so much that by the time you're done you've forgotten what exactly it was they were referring to to begin with.
But then everyone is different especially when it comes to art. Go to your local bookshop and thumb through this book. If this style works for you then more power to you but if it doesn't then pass it up. I have really grown to detest this series given their way of instruction and hope that another decent series will arrive to take its place that follows some coherent pattern.
Rating: ![4 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-4-0.gif) Summary: You need a little talent first Review: After searching for this book for SO long I finnaly found it. I was so excited that I could finnaly sharpen my techniques. But... It was kinda disapointing... I mean they use terms like, "3 point perspective" and "vanishing point" without telling you what they are. I mean I know now, but it was confusing! And really, I just didn't like there models, they weren't my style. But the face section was great! But sadly, when it comes to drawing, it's not a matter of learning how to do it. To make something look the way you want it to, you have to draw with your heart and mind, and work very hard at it. Unfortunately it's not something that's easy to teach. All in all, the books give you some ideas. But really it depends on how much skill you have and what technique you like. ...
Rating: ![5 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-5-0.gif) Summary: Great Book Review: Excellent book, shows how to draw using blocks and lines. Mostly very easy to understand, with cute little characters showing you what to do ^_^ Also showed some Japanese words and there meanings. This book had 2 or 3 wrong translations but was overall a really good book ^^
Rating: ![4 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-4-0.gif) Summary: Useful, but not great. Review: I agree with the other reviewers. The translation is horrible and a lot of the book was wasted on the dicussion of materials and such. However, the book also contains very useful information, like body types, character types, and basic manga face drawing. This is a good book to start out with, as long as you have some drawing skill and want yor pictures to look more manga-like.
Rating: ![4 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-4-0.gif) Summary: Amazing Review: I ordered these books over Amazon[.com] and let me tell you, When I got them I was expecting to get a book about how to draw things like the characters you would see on Cartoon Network or Adult Swim. But the beauty of this book is that it isn't about drawing other peoples manga it's about dawing your own. This thing even has a guide to making and organizing your own storys. It has examples of how faces represent personalities. It has all the products used, from pen tips to paper. This thing show you all the skeletal structures and how they affect the positioning of clothes and weapons. It shows the way the hand looks andmoves in three full pages[and by the way these pages are LARGE]. These books are a must have for any person who would like to learn how to draw manga or intermediates for tips on how to further their drawing skill and tachnique. The only bad point to this book is the fact that they don't show how to draw the pupils and the shine that has become such a trademark in anime. All in all this book is something that will teach you much and have you going back to reread each section over and over.
Rating: ![3 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-3-0.gif) Summary: Good, but may not be what you're looking for Review: Note: Since Amazon doesn't tell you in their description, this is Volume 1 of the How to Draw Manga series.This is a rather short book, only about 100 pages once you take out the title pages and index and whatnot. Furthermore, the first 15 pages are a short comic whose informational content could have been summed up in a page of text. So, there's not a whole lot of room left for instruction. The informational content of the book is high quality, though it may not always discuss what you want to learn about. Some of it is only likely to be useful if one was going into the professional manga field, such as discussions of manuscript paper, and how a work needs to be prepared before being sent to the printer. A section at the end very briefly discusses character and story design, but goes so shallowly into it that anyone planning on creating complete stories would be much better served by taking a course/reading a book on creative writing. There is also no explicit discussion of how manga differs from other styles of drawing. All in all, I would say that if you already know the basics of figure drawing and facial expressions, simply picking up a real manga and examining it will give you a better idea of how to adapt your art to have a more manga-like style. If you're a novice, then this may be a good book, but you may want to pick up a more general drawing book in addition to or instead of this to get more breadth.
Rating: ![4 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-4-0.gif) Summary: Turns it's reader into an artist! Review: Since it explains every step to draw a character completely, this book could be used as a reference for amatuers and professionals alike. Before having this book, I had never drawn an impressive character like the ones I can darw easily now! Every thing is explained here; Drawing heads, hair, bodies, hands, Feet...etc. The only thing absent here is drawing clothes on characters. But generally, the book explains the basics and helps everyone to improve their drawing skills with some talent. I suggest buying this item with(How To Draw Manga Pretty Gals) of the same series.
Rating: ![4 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-4-0.gif) Summary: Fantastic! Except.... Review: This book is a wonderful start-to-finish guide for drawing manga. (What this book is *not* is a step-by-step guide for drawing anime/manga characters -- for that, get the related Drawing Anime and Game Characters series.) It goes over the processes of professional mangakas getting published, usings pens and tones, planning a story, designing characters, drawing faces and bodies, creating a manga-type mood, drawing dynamic scenes, all with the aid of a mini-manga of "Mr. Mangaka" and all his assistants acting everything out for your personal enjoyment. I have never, ever encountered any book, online or in print, that covers so professionally such a wide range of topics. (Someone noted correctly that this book requires a little bit of talent and practice on your part -- after all, it's a "how to draw manga" book, not a "how to draw halfway decent" book, so supposedly you already have some interest in drawing and anime to even take a second look at this book.) The rest of the How to Draw Manga series is specilization; this book was all-encompassing. If you get no others from this series, get this book, if you seriously want to draw pro manga right away. However, this book has one weakness, and, unfortunately, it's huge: the translation. I happen to have access to the Japanese version and all I can say is... dang, the English version hurts. The diction is off on every page, the grammar has shadows of Japanese syntax, the fonts (Chicago and Arial, everything!) and the spacing are horrendous, and most rules of layout and white space management are thrown out the window -- making that aspect of the book look amateurish. They didn't even doctor the SFX correctly -- in some places they are whited out with no attempt to clone the background, leaving ugly white holes, and the English SFX they replace them with (if any) are bizarre and stilted, and usually in a stupid font like Chicago.... In other places the SFX are left completely untouched -- left in Japanese, so those who can't read katakana can scratch their heads in confusion. (As stated in the book, SFX contribute heavily to the mood. In this case, they fracture it .) Conclusion: Would have been a 5 star if the translation was done better...even slightly so. However, the content is sooo good that it's still completely worth getting the book -- unless you know Japanese and can easily get the Japanese version, in which case, go for the original by all means. (Warning: there is some mild H (perverted) content on less than half a dozen pages -- nothing much, PG+ or PG-13 tops, and nothing at all compared to the nudity and more offensive poses that can appear in the other books of this series.... In any case, just a heads up.)
Rating: ![4 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-4-0.gif) Summary: I'm Impressed Review: This book is awesome for beginners and intermediate manga artists who want to take their art to the next level. It shows you everything you need to know to make characters and a good storyline while keeping you entertained and informed. I was an intermediate artist, and this book showed me a few tricks of the trade. The only thing that could have used a little work on was the translation, but other than that, it's worth a buy.
Rating: ![4 stars](http://www.reviewfocus.com/images/stars-4-0.gif) Summary: A Must Buy Review: This book is good for people who have never even tried to draw manga if they can already at least kinda draw. I read it on the day I got it and the next day at school I managed to draw a pretty good head part just from memory. It isn't a miracle... I have gotten other books and I use them all for reference but I have a friend who is a really good artist(better than me I think) and she asked me to teach her to draw manga. I didn't give it a full 5 stars because they didn't have different styles of eyes which are one of my favorite things to draw and I always love learning new styles... Still it is good overall.
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