Making Faces: Drawing Expressions For Comics And Cartoons

Great Tips and Tricks Really appreciated the few simple tips to add great expression to eyes and lips. The eyes are the most important feature of the character, and this book enabled me to get just the right expression I was looking for. Rating: 4 (Making Faces: Drawing Expressions For Comics And Cartoons customer review by Kristen Miller, 2010-04-13)

making faces book this book is perfect i've learned a lot on drawing facial expressions, it has very practic steps to follow, useful tips and amazing artwork in each page. I loved the drawing style of every single artist. I recommend it for everyone looking for more appealing drawing. Rating: 5 (Making Faces: Drawing Expressions For Comics And Cartoons customer review by Miriam Almeida, 2010-03-04)

Decent, but there are better books out there... Let's face it - drawing faces is probably the most difficult task for an artist of any skill level and no single book is going to teach you what it is you need to know. As it is, "Making Faces" is a valiant effort but spends too much time on "fluff" that really isn't helpful. The goal of "Making Faces" is to teach the eager student of drawing how to draw facial expressions - specifically, to get beyond the big expressions like, as the book says, "happy," "sad" and "angry" and be able to communicate more subtle emotions. Here, the author (8Fish, an animation/design/illustration group) attempt to do this via an exaggerated, cartoony style meant to help those interested in comic book and cartoon illustration. The book begins with some words of wisdom (principles behind expressions, the tools of the trade, basic facial features and construction) and then gets into little mini "tutorials" for drawing expressions based on different scenarios (a superhero slugfest, for example, or a first date). Here they focus on one or two characters in each scenario and discuss how to portray their expressions. The final chapter focuses on storytelling, encompassing body language, page layouts, etc. The Good: There are some great tips in this book, everything from how to slowly build up a drawing with light sketches first and then darken what you want to emphasize, all the way to how to maintain an expression when a character you're drawing is far away (something I've always had a problem figuring out). Also, the methods presented for how to initially construct a face are well presented and easy to learn overall. The Bad: For all of that, what this book offers is a little too shallow and fast. There are discussions on how to construct draw faces head-on and from profile, but the more difficult and frustrating 3/4 views are rarely, if ever, covered. Additionally, the "tutorials" aren't especially helpful since they don't teach how to apply the lessons learned into other drawing styles. Essentially, the expression being drawn works for the particular character, but the underlying principles aren't clear enough for you to transfer what you learned to your own creative work. For those just starting out in drawing and trying to learn how to draw faces, "Making Faces" will probably be a good purchase. However, those who already know the fundamentals and want to innovate their methods will want to look elsewhere. Probably the best books on the subject are Facial Expressions: A Visual Reference for Artists (a must for any artist of any skill level), Secrets to Drawing Heads (an ingenious and easy-to-understand book that will revolutionize your artwork almost instantly) and Drawing the Human Head (Practical Art Books). Good luck! Rating: 3 (Making Faces: Drawing Expressions For Comics And Cartoons customer review by CB, 2010-02-14)

Terrific instruction on drawing expressions The book uses cartoon faces to show you how to express emotions. Because expressions are more extreme in cartoons, you learn what to do easily. I plan to use these skills in making drawings for carving caricature figures. Neat stuff. Rating: 5 (Making Faces: Drawing Expressions For Comics And Cartoons customer review by A. Juhasz, 2009-12-24)

Happy with the purchase I bought the book "Making Faces" and it was in excellent shape, and arrived relativly quick. I'm very happy with the purchase and would order from them again. Rating: 5 (Making Faces: Drawing Expressions For Comics And Cartoons customer review by M. May, 2009-10-20)