Book Review: Art Fundamentals 2nd edition: Light, shape, color, perspective, depth, composition & anatomy

The first edition for Art Fundamentals was published in 2013 by 3dtotal Publishing and has since gone out of print. Rather than reprinting the first edition, which currently has 4.5 out of 5 star rating from more than a hundred reviews, 3dtotal Publishing went for an almost full rewrite of the book. The first book was really good. This book is even better.

The topics covered are still the same, namely light, shape, colour, composition, perspective, depth and anatomy.

Art Fundamentals 2nd edition with 288 pages is not an in-depth dive into each art fundamental which can easily be the subject of a thick book on its own. The book focuses on the fundamentals that make art work and have impact.

Each chapter will start with the basics of the art fundamental, sometimes going into the art history. Highlight of the book is easily the detailed analysis of the many gorgeous artworks featured. The commentary is insightful and answers why certain techniques work and what could be done better. All the examples are carefully chosen to teach the art fundamentals so that they can be easily understood.

Parts of the content are reused from the first book but there are also lots of new content. If you already have the first edition, you can probably skip this unless you want to see the artworks from new artists and the analysis.

This is a book worth reading again and again so that the knowledge can seep into your subconsciousness. The official retail price is US $49.99 and it's worth the money.

Contributors are

Names in bold are the artists who wrote the chapters.

Check out more books from 3dtotal Publishing at https://www.parkablogs.com/category/tags/3dtotal-publishing

Art Fundamentals 2nd edition: Light, shape, color, perspective, depth, composition & anatomy is available at Amazon (US | CA | UK | DE | FR | IT | ES | AU | JP | CN)

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