Monthly Journal for April: Figure It Out!

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Normally, when doing a book review like this, I like to plan out my thoughts and words just like I was taught in school (outline, rough draft, edit, spelling and grammar check, page scans, etc.). Unfortunately, because of "reasons", I barely had time to go through Chris Hart's latest book "Figure It Out! Human Proportions", so this review is not only a long time coming, but I'm probably going to wind up giving a basic impression. I hope this is okay for my readers.

So what is this book about? At first I thought it would be similar to a previous publication called "Drawing the Head and Figure" by Jack Hamm. While that may be so, Chris' book focuses mainly on drawing the proportions of people while describing why certain parts of the body are measured in a particular way in his own language that we can all understand. The Jack Hamm book, in contrast, is too wordy and too detailed, which can be intimidating even for the most experienced artist. 

Going further, Chris' explanations are broken down into individual parts, such as the head, the torso, arms & legs, hands & feet, and the back, and each part is broken down further to illustrate how they measure up in reference to other parts, thus showing how the figure is perfectly proportioned. For example, when discussing how the face changes when the head moves (and believe me, the head moves quite a bit, only second to the torso), Chris explains and illustrates the perspective changes in the features as the head is tilted. This sort of thing is very important when drawing close-ups. 

Of course, most of the things we, as artists, already know are in here as well, like the average height of the figure being 7-7 1/2 heads tall, elbows falling by the rib cage, hands mid-thigh, head being five eyes wide with an eye length between each eye on the face (those who own How To Draw Comics The Marvel Way know what I'm talking about). What I would have like to have seen is how the proportions affect the figure when it's in action (extreme foreshortening of limbs in front view, movement of the torso, stuff you see in comic books), but I reckon that's in another established book by Chris Hart.

In conclusion, I like it when Chris Hart does books like these. We may view him as "just another cartoonist", but as you can see in his YouTube videos and books, he's quite capable of drawing realistically. Not only does he know his talent, but he enjoys interacting with his fans on Facebook, DeviantArt, YouTube, or wherever his social media outlets link him to his audience. I can't wait to check out his other books in the future.
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