The Guide To Fantasy Art Techniques
(1984 - Paper Tiger)

(by Martyn Dean & Chris Evans) I think the title is a bit of a misnomer. From it, one would expect more of an instructional theme than the book actual delivers. It is indeed more of an art book, containing eight chapters, each spotlighting a practitioner, while providing an excuse to display more than several of their works. Be aware that one chapter is given over to probing the work of Martin Bower, a film-industry model-maker. All the narratives are in-depth, providing a strong biography, as well as grilling them about broad strokes of their creative processes & techniques. But again, it is rare to find some kind of step-by-step examination of some facet of any particular one's work, if that is what someone is looking for. Indeed, I didn't count that many at all, when paging through the book. Of most interest to me were 51 pages with a large artwork reproduction and the four others with just multiple smaller images. That accounts for half of this 112-page book, with the rest being photographs and the text mentioned above. The captioning is held to just the title of the works. The seven fantasy artists featured, along with their art, are: Jim Burns (6), Philip Castle (4), Chris Foss (8), Syd Mead (8), Ian Miller (8), Boris Vallejo (8)* and Patrick Woodroffe (8).