May 1, 2018 - News Post

I’ve been on an art book kick lately.

Due to a hectic schedule, I’ve been forced in recent months to read in five-minute chunks. The only way to successfully finish a book this way is to look at books with lots of pretty pictures. That is just fine with me. I thought I’d list my favorites.

(And since I keep mentioning books and linking to those books, I decided to join the Amazon Affiliates program. If you click the links below and make a purchase, a small commission will go towards supporting this comic and news posts like this. You’ve been warned.)

So, without further italicized interruptions, here are the prettiest pictures I’ve spent money on:

• Art of He Man and the Masters of the Universe by Tim Seeley and Steve Seeley
  This is a massive collection of He-man art throughout the decades. It has it all: classic toy prototypes, sketches, comic books, toy packaging, storybook, cartoons, the movie, and more. This book is loaded with content and gives perfect representative examples of each subject. The authors show everything from old meeting notes to cartoon film cells. The box art from the 80's toy line was of particular interest to me. There's just something about that dark, gritty, barbarian sci-fi world that felt so real. There have been a ton he-man books lately, but this is by far my favorite.
    
• The Art of Archer by Neal Holman
  This covers everything from the Archer TV show: scripts, storyboards, character art, background rendering, clothing, voice acting, vehicle choices, weapon design, etc. Of the several art books I've read, this one was the lightest on text. The behind the scenes images are beautiful, the summaries nice, but I found myself constantly wanting to learn more about each department and their process, particularly their animation style. The weird part is, I’ve seen online posts by Holman (the show’s art director) with a great deal more detail than what’s contained in the book. The book covers every aspect of the show, and I enjoyed it, I just wish it was a little thicker.
    
• Mythology: The DC Comics Art of Alex Ross by Alex Ross, Chip Kidd, and Geoff Spear
  This is the oldest book of the bunch. I've actually owned it for quite some time, and only skimmed through it again in recent months. If you're not familiar, Alex Ross is a painter of all things superhero. The book does a great job of walking through the Alex Ross's history, his techniques, his inspirations, and his works. I realize that not everyone likes these paintings, but I love the way he simultaneously humanizes superheroes and somehow makes them appear iconic and larger than life. That style is much more commonplace than when he first started out, but his earliest works were mind blowing at the time.
    
• Art of Atari by Tim Lapetino
  Of all the subjects listed above, Atari was probably the one that I knew the least about. Most of their games came before my time, but I always loved the vivid, detailed painted art that was used to sell such simple games. What's so great about this book is how it sets the scene. It describes not only the history of Atari's rise and fall, but how it compared to the competition and other industries at the time. It provides profiles for the individual artists who created the designs, along with the team's processes, techniques, and motivations. In addition to package art, it covers logos, advertisements, hardware design, and rejected art. From a business and artistic perspective, this book was fascinating. It also had my favorite balance of text to art.

So yeah. That's what I'm "reading". How about you?

-Jeff