Drawing Trees (How to Draw and Paint series #259)

Rating:
Summary: Good value for Beginning Artist/ Amateur Naturalist
Review: Drawing Trees is a short, over-sized Art course in itself. It starts simply with pencils, erasers and drawing techniques and builds from there. It does not give step-by-step instruction how to draw individual trees, but instead covers different trees as it imparts various drawing techniques. (For example, various pines, a red maple and a white oak are shown in the section on Tree Shapes).

The "lessons" include: Shading; Surface & Textures; Light Values; Perspective; Pictorial Composition;Tree Shapes; Bough & Foliage Shapes; Trunks; Branches & Boughs; Root Patterns; Dead & Fallen Trees; Majestic Oak; and ends with two "scenes" - Sycamore Lane and Sierra Pines.

I am not an artist, so while this may be rather basic for the intermediate-advanced artiest, it gave me a perfect blend of how to draw trees (shapes, branches, roots) with basic art concepts (shading, perspective). The size of the book is awkward and I would have paid more for either a laminated or hardbound eidtion to bring out in the field, but for the price, its a great value. Highly recommended!