Bold Visions: A Digital Painting Bible - Gary Tonge

Bold Visions: A Digital Painting Bible
Gary Tonge
Impact
Copyright: 2008
978-1600610202

The amazon.com product description:

This comprehensive and up-to-date guide to the rapidly expanding area of digital painting features beautifully displayed finished works of art alongside practical demonstrations. Artists will learn to create a wide range of subject matter from futuristic spacescapes and revolutionary vehicles to medieval landscapes and beautiful maidens. An in-depth materials section introduces all the equipment you are likely to need, from computer hardware and software to more traditional art media. A detailed basic techniques section caters to both newcomers to the digital medium and those who wish to brush up on their skills.

I bought this book at some point last year, after sneaking peeks at it in the store for a week or so. Back then, it was inspiring, and intimidating to read. Reading it again this past week changed it to just inspiring. The art in here is geared more towards fantasy and science fiction images than reality, but there's plenty of information that would be useful to any and all digital media artists.

I think what changed my feelings on the book is that I subscribed to the Digital Artist magazine in January, when it first came out. Now, I have a better idea of what the author of Bold Visions is going for in his tutorials. Gary Tonge uses the same style for the tutorials of step by step. Now, I'm just more used to it.

He goes over things like perspective, detailing, lighting and color, all in marvelously illustrated tutorials. I have to admit, it was the art that drew me to this book in the first place, and that was just as impressive on this read as well.

The software this book is geared towards is mostly Photoshop, but also Corel Painter can be used, not to mention some form of 3D software. The author mentions Maya, but I know there are others out there too.

I mentioned the Digital Artist magazine earlier, and that was because I think this book is almost made to go with that magazine, despite the fact that the one is about two years older than the other. The two just interlink so well.