How to Draw Lifelike Portraits from Photographs

by Lee Hammond

Book Overview

How To Draw Lifelike Portraits From Photographs, Revised Lee Hammond is back and better than ever, featuring all new step-by-step demonstrations that will have you drawing your best portraits yet. Her... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 089134635X
• ISBN13: 9780891346357
• Release Date: April 1995
• Publisher: North Light Books
• Length: 144 Pages
• Weight: 1.86 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 8.8" x 11.3"

Customer Reviews

Great for beginners!!

I have taken lots of art classes in person and online but this book is so much easier to learn from and you can go at your own pace! I recommend this book to anyone who loves to draw and wants to get better at it.

Great Book!

This is one of the best books on drawing portraits I have seen. There are several other fine books that go into more detail about the basics of drawing faces, proportion, etc., but most don't go into detail about shading and technique to make the portrait truly come alive. There are tons of illustrations. Ms. Hammond's own artwork is awesome! They are an inspiration in and of themselves even without the instructional steps. (I was surprised that a couple of other reviewers didn't find her artwork to be very good. We must be talking about two different books!). The illustrations and examples are very clearly presented, and the photos are of excellent quality. She goes into detail about making eyes, lips, noses, hair, and even eyeglasses and clothing! Ms Hammond's instructional style is warm and encouraging. I have several other books by Lee Hammond, and I've found all of them enjoyable and informative. Whether you are looking for a book just to do family and friends portraits or to do professional portraits, I would recommend this book. The hardbound cover and glossy-like feel to the pages are pleasing as well.

A beautiful, effective, and inspiring book

Lee Hammond instructs the reader to use a graphing approach to get a likeness, as it seems she does in all her books. She then describes in detail how to draw each feature of a face and gives many examples and exercises in using the blended pencil technique. Finally the reader is encouraged to put it all together and do a full portrait.The book is very well-organized and detail-oriented, not to mention visually appealing. At first I questioned the graphing technique--it seemed somehow "unnatural", plus you can't do it with a live model. However, after looking at my finished drawings, amazed, thinking to myself (as another reviewer said), "this is so good, I can't believe I did it", I can understand that however unnatural graphing may be, it certainly gives me faith in my abilities and inspires me to try more art. I think the visualization techniques I learned from this book will help me in whatever medium I choose, and I wouldn't be surprised if they helped me draw realistic portraits from life as well. A note about Lee Hammond's books: I looked at the Discover Drawing Series, and it seems that a lot of the material in those books is covered in this book. They do deal with some different types of models, but if you are going to get just one of her books, I recommend this one.I have just bought her "How to Draw Portraits in Colored Pencil from Photographs" and I am so excited to try it out!

This book is worth every penny!!!

This book does exactly what it says! You don't need any prior art lessons to understand and learn how to realistically reproduce portraits from photographs. Lee Hammond meticulously explains each step in the process of drawing. She takes the reader from the materials to get, to each feature of the face, to hair, clothing, hands, composition, backgrounds, and special effects. Her book has a generous supply of her own outstanding portraits and her students' drawings, and they are absolutely beautiful. She also shows you some before and after drawings that are so professional looking that I was really challenged to see if it could really be done. I know that they are real because guess what?? I went through the book, and it really works! I believed I had no drawing ability until I went through this book. Lee Hammond is a master artist and teacher. The best thing is that these techniques can be transferred to drawing anything...not just portraits. If you ever wanted to produce lifelike, realistic portraits, get this book. It's worth every penny!!!