gdbooks

Hi Fructose

From the publishers of Hi Fructose Mag. Some serious illustration talent (most fairly known already) packed into one great book. If you ever wondered who was doing what in kids toys this would be a good reference book. There are plenty of entertaining and interesting interviews as well, some from one artist to another, that give a quick look into the lives of emerging and already successful illustrators.

Mark Ryden

Brian Mccarty

Last Gasp of San Francisco, 2008

Juxtapoz Illustration

The intro in Juxtapoz Illustration says, "Juxtapoz Art & Culture Magazine was established to document the exploding lowbrow art movement." It represents that very well. The images are fairly raunchy at times (yes, raunchy) and its almost unfortunate because it can be a turn off to some amazing illustration but it is what they claim it to be.

Amy Sol

Mickey Duzyj

Ginko Press, 2008

One Show Design

One Show Design is a great collection of conservative but amazing design (especially if you like works produced by Ogilvy & Mather & Apple). They have a good broad spectrum of advertising, design, and packaging which make it worth the price.

Most notable is the brilliant campaign by Big Ant Int. for the Global Coalition for Peace, What Comes Around Goes Around.

Rockport Publishers, 2009

Dirty Fingernails

Straight up graphic design, for some reason coined under the sub title "uniquely designed by hand". Granted a lot of the designs are potentially designed by hand, most are finished digitally and the materials list ends in "software".

Aside from that its an amazing collection and well worth putting on the shelf. Works by:

Ron Liberti

El Jefe Design

Joanna Wecht

Rockport, 2009

Illusive - Contemporary Illustration Part 3

Beautiful book and worth the price. Illusive 3 has large pages, well displayed illustrations (that you haven't seen a thousand times in every design book already) and is thick (340 pages). This is one of those rare visual books you can leaf through 3 or 4 times and keep on the shelf.

Works by:

Franceso D'sla

Lesja Chernish

Kristiana Parn

Shohei

Gestaltan, 2009

IdN 15th Anniversary Edition

IdN is a great publication that exposes many artists, both online and in print. While I could never justify the cost of the magazine I thought the 15th Anniversary Edition would be a good compromise. It features a collection of artists "who have collaborated with us over the last decade and a half". It's a great collection of illustrations, some good, some bad.

I've noticed an upward trend in the cost of design books lately. I wonder how long the publishing world can sustain that. Whether or not this book is worth the $60 for inspiration, im still uncertain.

IdN, 2009

Hi-Fi Color for Comics

A great book with major problems. Hi-Fi Color for Comics has good step by step tutorials that are easy to follow and understand, great real world examples and its very inspiring.

Unfortunately, the major flaw is that the tutorials rely on scripts and actions (supplied on the CD ROM) that don't work in CS4 and there is no clear definition of them anywhere in the book. Given that they are the 3 most basic and major actions you need to do in order to flat art it can leave you frustrated.

Impact, 2008

Mail Me Art

Super fantastic book with amazing illustrations. Mail Me Art

How Books, 2009

An Illustrated Life

Danny Gregory is likely an inspiration to many artists, from graphic designers trapped in the ad world to illustrators looking for something new. His first book Everyday Matters definitely inspired and helped my own artwork. Reading the descriptions by some famous, some not so famous, artists from far and wide about their experiences and uses for sketchbooks you can tell he impacted others.

I avoided this book for months figuring it was another spin off of the previous Gregory books but I was wrong, this one contains great visual eye candy as well as interesting artists write ups.

Here are a few of the artists inside the book (with good sites).

Paul Soupiset, Illustrator

James Kochalka (his hilarious daily online comic strip)

Tommy Kane

Mark S Fisher (awesome site)

Everett Peck

How Books, 2008

What is Illustration?

What is it anyway?
It's a good question but maybe not the best book title (or cover for that matter). With that small rant aside, this is a rare book to find, one on illustration that does not simply cover the top 10 most commissioned illustrators in the world. That's whats nice about RotoVision, they manage to produce off key content for their design books while most other publishers continue to reshuffle the same award winning works over and over, year in and year out.

The gallery portion in the back includes a nice brief on: Serge Seidlitz, Christoph Niewmann, TADO, and of course Jeremyville.

What is Illustration, RotoVision 2009