Draw Real People! (Discover Drawing)

Although I bought this for one of our daughters in conjunction with some other sketching supplies for her birthday, the rest of our daughters and I have enjoyed going through this book. Each of our 3 children are naturally artistic, but this book is filled with some very good instructions and suggestions on sketching portraits. The illustrations are very well-done, and the author, Lee Hammond, appears to not only be a natural artist, but also a natural teacher/instructor. I have been sketching as a hobby for many years, but I have gleaned some very good information from this book as well. Noses, in particular, have always been the bane of any portrait I've done, but I believe I will approach my next portrait with a bit less dread when it comes to the nose after the very helpful information provided in Draw Real People! In my opinion, this is an excellent reference book for anyone who is interested in portrait drawing, from those who have never sketched a portrait to those who have, but who are open to suggestions and further instruction. I would feel comfortable giving this book to ages as young as 6 or 7 years old, depending on the child's attention span and his/her interest level. In my experience as a mother, I have found one of the most important things to do with a young person interested in art techniques -(or any other particular skill)- is to provide them with as much information/materials as possible while they have that passion and let them absorb and practice as much of it as they wish. It can be suprising how much a child will actually learn if it is something they have a strong interest in. This is what I have done with our children, who each expressed an interest in art at very young ages, each of whom have won awards/honors in art competitions, (please forgive me for bragging a bit on them, I'm just so proud of their hard work, dedication and accomplishments ;-) I highly recommend this book and will be looking for other drawing/sketch books by Lee Hammond.

I’m an experienced artist but I decided to read this book for a refresher on fundamental portrait drawing skills. This book gives step by step examples on how to draw and shade the different features of the face, which I found very helpful!

This book is great, easy, and has a great basic knowledge of the drawing of people. My students were very successful! The improvement was remarkable.

If you are tired of drawing stick people or faces that look like aliens, this book is very helpful for taking your skills to a higher level. Most of my artist talents come from self education not classes, and I have to say an awful lot of the how to draw books on the market are... lacking. They assume a LOT. This book is the first one I have found in a long time that teaches the reader how to draw in a way that is clear, concise, easy to follow. I seriously doubt you can buy this book, really use it and not improve your drawing skills. The skills it covers do not apply just to drawing people even though that is the focus of this book. Perspective, shading, dimensions... these things apply to anything you might want to draw, and this book covers them well. A great reference book for anyone trying to improve their skills!

Nice book, I would recomend for beginners

I am going to buy as many Lee Hammond books as I can for my daughter. My daughter is 11 years old and has had her sketches displayed in a local art gallery, one is published in a book and one sold at an auction for a fundraiser. She is very serious about drawing. I have bought other instructional books but she LOVES this book. Lee Hammond is a wonderful artist and her instructional drawing books are head-and-shoulders above the rest.

I have struggled with drawing people for sometime. I found the methods in this book very helpful, especially when I am attempting to make my drawing look like a particular person. The grid really helps with proportions and proper placement of features and the directions are simple and easy to follow. My hope is that, with practice, and with this book as a reference, drawing people will become easier for me.

Based on the recommendations I decided to give this book a shot. I am a dabbler in most everything, and have recently picked up drawing again... this book, has nice pictures of faces and up-close and personal body parts (like ears, and noses) it's not for the raw artists. There's a surprising lack of step-by step on how-to-, where to draw each part of the body and so forth. They have only a few samples with the steps drawn in; I'd love to have more pointers!! And, it should be titled, "How to draw the head profile" instead of "How to draw real people", since the author did not include how to draw human figure, hands, arms, etc. however, it's still a helpful guide in giving the basic knowledge of how to draw the human face.

Great instructions

A gift for my teenage granddaughter, sent to south Africa. She find it invauable now she has started her art classes at school as a main subject. I too have one and the advice is clear, helpful and effective.

good book

Excellent

Good basic instruction from beginning to end. Was able to make sense of a pile of previous attempts that needed work. Ordering and delivery were right on as well.