Book Review: The Art of Planes

The Art of Planes is a beautiful artbook companion to the two films Planes and Planes: Fire & Rescue.

It's a 176-page hardcover book that's quite similar in format to Pixar artbooks.

It has a balanced mixture of character designs, environment art and other graphics such as logos, colour scripts, storyboards, etc. I really like the huge concept paintings.

The design of the planes are similar in style to those from the world of Cars. They are in the same world, except that these two films are produced by Disney. There are some input from Pixar artists but it's predominately Disney made. But seriously, from the artworks you see in the book, it's hard to tell whether or not this is Disney or Pixar — you would have to watch the films themselves.

The character designs consist the final CG renders, sketches and coloured illustrations. I like the variety I'm looking at because there are not just planes, but also other vehicles like forklifts, trucks, pitties, helicopters and other cars. There's Dusty Crophopper with the other racers from Wings Around the Globe, his friends from hometown Propwash Junction, and the other vehicles that hang around Piston Peak National Park. Putting eyes and the appropriate postures to those vehicles really give them a sense of personality and a certain quirkiness.

There are a lot of environment art as well which I also love. They are really beautiful. They are places around the hometown, the different countries in the race, hangars, garages, interiors, open vistas of mountains, valleys and canyons. It's quite cool to see the transformation of certain iconic monuments and buildings to fit into the world of Planes. For example, Statue of Liberty is modified forklift holding the torch, the Blue Mosque in Istanbul has four giant propeller blades at each corner and Mexico has their Mayan inspired pyramid hangars. In the national park, there are mountains and canyons with shapes of vehicles and planes carved into them.

Most of the designs are accompanied by insightful commentary on the characters and story requirements.

It's a wonderful artbook packed with beautiful art.

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This book was borrowed from Basheer Graphic Books for review purposes. You can order the book from them. Check with Basheer on Facebook.

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This book was borrowed from Basheer Graphic Books for review purposes. You can order the book from them. Check with Basheer on Facebook.