Fun with a Pencil by Andrew Loomis

Fun with a Pencil Reviews

• 
  রিফাত সানজিদা

  It's a true helpful guide for the beginners, who have interest in illustration. The way of showing the basic techniques is so easy indeed.
  
  And yeah, making lines & images on paper with a pencil is always fun to me. :)
• 
  Kalin

  I love Andrew Loomis. All of his books are brilliant. Reading this book was an excellent first step into understanding how cartoons can be created by breaking them down into simple forms and exaggerating their various proportions. I loved the section on facial expressions and how he encourages drawing from the imagination through the use of the basic construction framework. He also shows how the framework of a cartoon relates back to a traditional figure which piqued my interest for further understanding.
  
  This book was also my first look at the Loomis method of constructing the head, which I will be learning more about as I read his other books. My main criticism is that this book is labelled as a book for beginners, however the content gets increasingly more difficult towards the end of the book when Loomis dives into complicated perspective and shadow construction drawings with little explanation to aid in understanding them. There are so many lines in these drawings that any beginner would have no idea what they are looking at. Aside from that, the content in this book is still 5 stars and the book's main focus is on having fun, which should be the reason you started drawing to begin with.
• 
  Ihor Kolesnyk

  Класична книжечка від Енрдю Луміса про рисунок "для чайників". Дуже класна структура, дещо старенька стилістика, але всі ідеї подаються тут максимально практично і з гумором.
• 
  Alien Citizen

  racist crap...well, racist anyway. This one includes lots of fun instructions on how to draw stereotyped forms of all sorts...from the librarian with glasses on the nose to the African-American man with lips the size of Australia. Yes, this book was written in the early 60s, I think. If that's enough excuse for you then enjoy the read...it's not for intermediate or advanced artists.
• 
  Anelis

  fun and very useful guide from a master
  you will cringe with the casual sexism and racism though
  proceed with caution
• 
  Camilasc

  Deceptive title.
  
  This book is a gross liar in that it presents itself as a drawing book for "rookies".
  
  Make no mistake, the drawing principles exposed here are extremely hard, and 70% of the illustrators of today do not draw this good...even those who went to art school.
  
  This book covers how to draw with volumes , keeping proportion, technical perspective and shadow and light. Heavy emphasis is on the human figure (the most rewarding and challenging of subjects). All the principles are very HARD things to do, and mastering these concepts will require much* further practice after copying everything from the book.
  
  All in all, a great tool for the artist that wants to move from the low intermediate to high intermediate.
  
  -1 star for pointless racism (if you wanna draw the receding hairlines of middle aged white men, oh boy, do you have diversity *there* :/...).
• 
  Lailatun Nadhirah

  Ini kali pertama saya dengar nama Andrew Loomis. Apabila cari nama beliau di Internet, ternyata beliau merupakan ilustrator Amerika pada era 50-an. Bukan setakat melukis karikatur sahaja, malah beliau juga melukis potret yang sangat cantik dan realistik.
  
  Saya agak suka melihat strok lakaran penselnya. Sangat kemas! Buku ini merupakan panduan langkah demi langkah beliau dalam melukis karikatur. Ia dimulakan dengan latihan membuat bulatan terlebih dahulu sebagai rangka. Sebagai ilustrator, saya akui bukan mudah hendak melukis karikatur. Buku ini sudah berjaya melatih tangan saya melukiskan karikatur dengan mudah.
  
  Ada juga disediakan panduan melukis bayang-bayang, perspektif dan latar belakang susunan rumah. Agak menarik pada panduan melukis bayang-bayang kerana tiada ilustrator yang menyediakan panduan ini. Sangat-sangat membantu saya.
  
  Saya perhati Andrew Loomis gemar memakai pensel yang mungkin 6B hingga ke 8B berdasarkan kehitaman lakarannya. Tidak pasti sama ada ia editing atau tidak, tetapi jika benar beliau memakai 6B hingga ke 8B, saya memang kagum. Tak ramai ilustrator berani hendak memakal 6B-8B dengan selamba sebegitu.
  
  Sangat galakkan mereka yang meminati lukisan itu membaca buku ini.
• 
  Aja

  While I mostly just scanned/gleaned through this, I do think this has a lot of decent material concerning some fundamentals of art while encouraging creativity, which is really good for beginners at any age from heads, posing, and perspective.
  
  However, the only main drawback is are the racist caricatures that may disturb some readers. I have noticed at least at a glance with some of Loomis' work outside of this book (and inside this book), that he doesn't necessarily make equally as nice drawings of non-white people as he does for white people as far as anatomically correct drawings and cartoon figures are concerned. Sure, the book is in black & white, yet that doesn't mean he can't present said non-white people with features that can be recognizable without shading in a presentable and decent way.
  
  While I wouldn't mind looking at his other books for technical drawings, even I wouldn't recommend this book to a beginner, for the above reason alone. If there was a reprint of this with annotations and a disclaimer of some sort, then it probably wouldn't have such a low rating from me. Two stars for the technical aspect, I guess, and nothing else.
• 
  Loran (Inked with Curiosity)

  Fun with a Pencil is a really awesome introductory drawing book for people who have little to no experience with figure drawing or basic techniques. Anybody could pick up this book and get a great grasp for how to start drawing and where to progress from there. Andrew Loomis's lessons are classic and simple to follow and provide enough structure to even encourage those people who don't think they can draw at all. The only downside to this book (and most of Loomis's books) is his personal style is extremely specific and a tad outdated and it can make modernizing some of his figure and facial drawings difficult. Also his technique is extremely realistic so if you are looking to do something more like animation then this might not be the best instructional book for you to start with. That being said anything Andrew Loomis does is classic and provides a pretty solid foundation for those who don't know where to start. I personally was way too advanced for this particular book and found it to be a little too silly and immature for the kind of art I create so I had to give it a lower rating. It's still a great beginner's book though and I don't regret my time with it.
• 
  Катерина И.

  Книгата е добра и дава най-обща представа за начинаещи. Това е първата книга на Лумис (до колкото знам) и тук той иска да покаже,че да рисува може всеки. Не започва от линии,форми и медиуми. Всяка глава е надграждаща: главата, тялото, мястото на тялото във "света" на произведението, композиция и правилно разположение на фигури и предмети. Но за жалост няма обяснения стъпка по стъпка,може да се дължи на малкият обем или авторът предполага,че читателят ще разбере сам по себе си. Книгата е скелет или схема, но само тя не е достатъчна за да се усвоят всички умения. Въпреки всичко 5 звезди защото когато човек не знае от къде да започне е добър ориентир.
• 
  Xavier

  Incredible instruction for beginners. The explanations are clear and easy to follow and can greatly improve someone's ability to draw people in a very short period of time. The section on how to draw cast shadows according to specific angles was difficult for me to understand. Here Loomis gets away from his casual way of communicating to the reader and into more technical jargon.
  
  Overall great stuff. I wish I had read this before finishing his book "Figure Drawing for All its Worth".
• 
  M0rningstar

  Too incomplete for intermediates, too complicated for beginners. Good grasp of basic perspective is prerequisite. Results of figure drawings require at least some knowledge of anatomy, not possible with information presented in book alone.
• 
  kel

  Great content as always. A must-read for beginner artists!
• 
  Ambition

  i can doodle now atleast lol
• 
  Χρηστος Παλαιολόγος

  Εξαιρετικές συμβουλές. Συστήνεται για όσους ξεκινάνε το σχέδιο.
• 
  Darjeeling

  I was pleasantly surprised by the racially diverse characters. Very inclusive:
  
  https://archive.org/details/andrew-lo...
• 
  Konstantine

  ill admit that i dont necessarily love loomis for figure drawing, but his studies on the human head are probably some of my favorites
• 
  Cecely

  Written with a lot of fun and a welcoming tone. I definitely enjoyed it.
• 
  Shaz

  Really good instructions for the absolute beginner artist on how to get started and have fun drawing. Minus one star for the racist caricatures included.
• 
  Rob Smith, Jr.

  Brilliant step-by-step guide to drawing and illustrating and cartooning and...oh, just to draw.
  Loomis has been top of the heap since his books appeared over 80 years ago. Today, those are the books I first recommend, though this and most others are long out of print.
  I see there are digital versions available. Those are fine to look at, but the physical book is far,far batter for reference and to compare and consider approaches to drawing.
  
  I highly recommend this book. 10 out of 10 points.
• 
  stefi ✨

  I didn't understand anything from that perspective part...
• 
  Michael Scott

  
  Andrew Loomis's
  Fun with a Pencil is a wonderful about drawing. Starting from the premise that anyone can draw, Loomis draws what becomes circles, circles in circles, and ultimately human shapes and figures. The twist? It's not only a masterful course on drawing (cartoons) but also a course on drawing philosophy. Read it and all the books signed Loomis.
• 
  Lachezar Petkov

  I read this one a long time ago. I recommend it to anyone who wants to learn to draw a little bit better just for the fun of it (even if you "can't draw at all"). Or to children and teenagers who want to improve and become pros. Its indeed very fun to read and very fun to do the exercises (lots of funny cartoons!)