Perspective in Action

Author David Chelsea has taken the complexity of perspective drawing and packaged it into an engaging, visual presentation in the form of a graphic novel.  Don't be fooled by the format, there is deep meat and amazing detail within the pages of this book.

Honestly, I felt as though I needed a math degree to comprehend some of the explanations on calculating and creating accurate perspective drawings. Just be aware that this would not be a book to hand to your elementary aged student to ingest on his own, but could be useful if first digested and subsequently shared on a simpler level with beginning artists.

It seems much more suited to a very serious hobbyist or even a college student of the arts. Chelsea offers some very fascinating discussions (and recreations) of how famous artists may have used various tricks to pull off their artistry.  So there is a fair amount of art history mixed in with some interesting descriptions of various techniques (with step by step instruction on how an avid student could replicate them).

Even for areas I felt were hard to understand, the author writes in a very engaging fashion and historians, artists, and graphic novel fans will find something to entertain and enlighten them within the pages of Perspectives in Action. This would make a fabulous gift for high school or college student of art.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of Perspective in Action from Blogging for Books for the purpose of review. No other compensation was received.