Books on Drawing and Painting will clearly be good resources to anyone learning how to draw figures. I found a copy of this book while browsing my local library. Drawing and Painting the Figure – A practical and inspirational guide to professional drawing and painting techniques, Stan Smith & Linda Wheeler, Quantum Publishing, London, 2002
There were parts of this book I found interesting, and parts I didn’t like so much, but it was certainly worth a read. The introduction gave an historical view of figure drawing and figure painting, with a good view of the ranges and styles of drawing. The book contains lots of great illustrations for each section
The anatomy section was useful for me, providing a good analysis of the use of knowledge of human anatomy in drawing. There was a good summary, plus some practical rules of thumb – for example, using triangles to outline torsos – for women the hips provide the base of the triangle, and the neck the apex; for men the triangle is inverted, with shoulders wider than hips. Other interesting and practical sections included a view of the differences in aging human skull, and the geometry of human faces.
I learned some new words: buccinators, zygomaticus zygomaticus, platysma. Try running an image search on your favourite search engine to see what these facial muscles look like – and try drawing them while you’re at it to help consolidate what you see.
The book also contains some step by step guides to creating drawings, which I didn’t like so much, but they did provide useful commentary and tips. You might find it a worthwhile exercise to try a similar drawing yourself and compare results.
Try following the Dewey Decimal system in your own library to number 740 (Arts, Drawing) or 750 (Arts, Painting) to see what useful books you can find there that will help you learn how to draw figures.
