This is a list of books that I’ve read or keep around to learn art. This isn’t the end-all, be-all of art knowledge, so don’t be afraid to do your own research. Books are good, but they aren’t as good as actual applied practice.
A majority of the links I’ve posted are Amazon Affiliate Links to monetize my information. The only thing you pay for is the product you’re buying and Amazon drops me some money for recommending it.
Drawing from Scratch
These books are for those who have never drawn in their life before. The goal of these books is to explain the concept of putting line to paper! If you never knew how to draw a stick figure, here’s where you’ll learn.
Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain by Betty Edwards
If you have never, ever drawn before in your life, this book will help you learn how to not only start but enjoy putting marks on the page.
Keys To Drawing By Bert Dodson
A straightforward book going through the steps of putting pencil to paper. It goes through lines, shapes, and patterns to give you an understanding of the physical act of drawing instead of hitting you with all the technical stuff.
Fun With A Pencil by Andrew Loomis
This book is a great book for beginners as it can help you figure out what kind of things you like to draw. It’s also a genuinely funny book.
General Drawing
These books are now for giving you a nice broad pile of techniques that can be used for any type of art you want to do.
Picture This by Molly Bang
This book is the simplest book about arranging your pictures in your page with a purpose.
Perspective Made Easy by Ernest R. Norling
I might be throwing you in the deep end with this, but the biggest thing to learn if you want to be an artist whether professional or not, is how to draw in perspective. This book will help you learn how to draw with a sense of 3D depth and space.
The Figure by Walt Reed
This is a solid start in learning anatomy. You learn the general blocks and body areas that you need to make a human body! The more you learn, the easier it will be to know what body parts you need to emphasize and reemphasize to make interesting character designs.
Drawing Scenery: Landscapes and Seascapes by Jack Hamm
After learning perspective drawing, this book will give you tips on how to approach drawing natural scenery.
The Art of Animal Drawing by Ken Hultgren
If you’re into drawing animal characters, as I am, this is a good bedrock for learning the basics on drawing animals. I’d say if you master all of these animals, you’ll learn how to draw 80% of mammals in my opinion, you even get some small tips on making anthropomorphic characters. You won’t learn how to draw birds, reptiles, primates or fish, but this is a solid start for common animals.
Framed Ink by Marcos Mateu-Mestre
This book specializes on storyboarding and camera angles to plan out your compositions and make your stories more readable! Reiterating on the basic composition books, now your diving into applying that knowledge to more practical uses.
Color by Betty Edwards
Dynamic Light and Shade by Burne Hogarth
Lighting and Value are quite a big thing and the chief way to give your art depth and dimension. This is a good book next to How to Render, for learning about how to light your figures better.
How to Render by Scott Robertson
This book is a bit of a doorstoper, and it might require you to read Robertson’s previous book How to Draw, but this book will get yourself learning how to not only draw objects but think about how to draw objects reacting to light and shadow thus giving them form.
Color and Light by James Gurney
Just like How to Render, this book will show you things about light and color, unlike Robertson’s book in my opinion, this book is a bit harder to get into since this is more about theory than technique. You will absolutely learn more about colors, values, color palettes, and color relations though.
Illustration
Now to narrow down to more specialized techniques
Creative Illustration
Imaginative Realism
This book is the best book about showing you how to use references you gather. You aren’t copying them, but getting inspiration and utilizing the world around you to create new images will be easier than imagining from your head!
Creating Comics
Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud
If you want to make comics it will help to know what Comics are and what the language and syntax of comics and sequential art works. This is great for if you’ve never made a comic in your life and explains why comics are formatted like they are.
Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative by Will Eisner
How to Make Comics The Marvel Way
A great start to learning about comics. There are many techniques here that are made easier with the advent of digital software, but the core of making comics is still there to help you get started.
Save the Cat
This book is more specialized for movie screenwriting, but it can help teach you Storytelling and outlining in general.
The Art of Comic Book Inking
Learning to ink can be intimidating and there are billions of ways to do it as long as you are clear in your artwork. This book is a decent start in showing some ink techniques.
DC Comics Guide to Inking
DC has professional inkers who know their stuff about inking. This book is another of the This mostly focuses on showing you the many techniques to learn how to make pen and ink and line art legible for comics and print.
DC Comics Guide to Coloring and Lettering Comics
Colors might seem easy but this book also explains the technology of printing colors.
Comic Book Lettering the Comiccraft Way
Making Animation and Film
These books specialize in general animation. The skills from these books can be used wherever animation is needed regardless of medium or software.
The Animator’s Survival Guide
When you learn from this book, you will learn 80% of all animation techniques that can be used for 2D or 3D character animation.
Timing for Animation by John Halas and Harold Whitaker – Timing is possibly the hardest thing the learn in animation and it’s also the most abstract concept to wrap you head around until you actively practice animation. This book will help deal with the guess work and elaborate upon it a little more than Animators Survival Guide.
Drawn to Life Vol 1 and 2 by Walt Stanchfield – This book actually takes you back to life drawing techniques to give you a better understanding of strong gestural drawings and exaggerating poses. These techniques will be helpful for getting into the flow of drawing quickly, simply, and consistently. These techniques aren’t only good for 2D animation, they are also great for 3D animators who want to plan out their key poses before fiddling about with their rigs.
Financial Stuff
Graphic Artist Guild Pricing and Ethical Guidelines Handbook
If you want to do art professionally and get paid actual money for it, BUY, READ, AND MEMORIZE THIS BOOK! Acquire this book however you can, but READ this book as early in your career as possible, so you won’t be a starving artist at the beginning.
Other Reference Books
Dynamic Wrinkles and Drapery by Burne Hogarth
You can’t really go around with naked characters now, can you? Understanding drapery can give your character work another sense of believability to them and make movements look more dynamic with flowing drapery and clothing!
Drawing Dynamic Hands by Burne Hogarth – Hands are second most expressive part of a human and a lot of people claim that they have the hardest time drawing hands, but hands are quite an important aspect of figures, so it’s best that you master them. This book is the best start to betting better at drawing hands as it help break down how hands should flow and the major aspects of what people subconsciously look for when seeing hands.
The Urban Sketcher by Marc Taro Holmes– This is a book for learning how to get better at seeing your environment and drawing things that you see in that environment.
Fashion: The Definitive History of Costume and Style by DK– A nice, large, book of the history of fashion. Inside are a bunch of pictures of clothing and fashion group different eras. This is a great reference book for character costuming.