Midwest Book Review
Midwest Book Review - January 2024
Synopsis: Clothes and accessories are the perfect way to give your manga characters energy and develop their unique identities. From on-trend streetwear to traditional and formal clothing, the way that your character is dressed is an instant way to tell a story.
With the publication of "Manga Art Fashion Secrets: The Ultimate Guide to Making Stylish Artwork in the Manga Style" aspiring manga artists can join with manga art expert Dalia Sharawna and her thousands of fans and learn how to draw fashionable manga clothes that show personality, character, and mood. Packed with everything you need to know to draw a huge variety of cool clothes and accessories in the manga style, this detailed guide covers a range of styles and looks to take your manga characters to the next level.
"Manga Art Fashion Secrets" is packed from cover to cover with step-by-step drawings for formal and casual outfits, sportswear, and accessories. Learn how to give your work personality and style with Dalia Sharawna's tutorials for a huge variety of on-trend looks to dress your characters in. At the end of each chapter is a series of practice exercises where you're encouraged to trace or freehand draw subjects from earlier on. You'll end up with a portfolio of sketches charting your artistic development. Five contemporary artists take up residence on these pages, sharing their manga fashion secrets and showcasing their own art.
Critique: An extraordinary, comprehensive, and unique DIY course of Manga Art instruction, "Manga Art Fashion Secrets: The Ultimate Guide to Making Stylish Artwork in the Manga Style" is especially and unreservedly recommended for personal, professional, community, art school, and college/university library Manga Art instruction collections.
Library Journal
This small but mighty book should be named the definitive guide to drawing awesome manga artwork. Instagrammer and expert manga artist Sharawna explains how to draw manga fashion, from casual clothes and streetwear to traditional Japanese attire. The designs are simple enough for anyone to accomplish. The book includes sidebars about all types of clothing accessories, which make the drawings customizable and realistic. Sharawna also adds sidebars of Manga Art Secrets, which stretch the books main lessons by tasking readers to do more with the details that reflect their characters personalities. After each chapter, theres an Exercise Roundup that includes additional small activities that mesh with the chapters subject and are designed to hone ones drawing skills. Between chapters, there are pages that highlight manga artists who draw for a living or for fun.
VERDICT An unusual but highly insightful guide that also looks at artists who do this kind of drawing and their multiple career paths. An essential purchase where drawing books and manga are popular.
Customer Review
Overall this is a really nice book. There are a nice few pages at the beginning that act as refreshers for someone who's already got the basics down reminding you of face and body proportions and a few tips on how fabric moves and drapes. The rest of the book focusses on a wide range of clothing items, grouped into chapters by style (streetwear, casual, elegant, etc.), with a few tips in each case to help you get started. If you're just starting out you might be wanting it broken down more with more information, but you would learn a lot just by copying the images. Each item is shown both on a 'model' and broken down into simple line drawings so you can see how it's constructed.
Each chapter finishes with some suggested exercises and drawing prompts so you can practise the clothing styles, and with some gallery images from different artists. I really enjoyed having the gallery images included as I find it really helpful to see how different people interpret the same sort of items.
Overall a nice book if you're looking for clothing inspiration for your drawings and want to expand your range.
