Ten-Step Drawing: Animals - DNF Review

Ten-Step Drawing: Animals

By: Walter Foster Creative Team

Publication: August 7th 2018 by Walter Foster Publishing

128 pages

Genre: Non-fiction, Arts, Crafts

Source: Publisher via NetGalley (Thank you!!)

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Goodreads description--Featuring illustrated tutorials for drawing 75 different animals, Ten-Step Drawing: Animals breaks down each subject into 10 simple steps; moreover, all you need is a pen or pencil and a piece of paper!

Handy prompts help artists by encouraging artistic individuality, as well as helpful tips for drawing other subjects not featured in the book. Ten-Step Drawing: Animals is sure to encourage even the most reluctant amateur artist to break out a pen and paper and doodle to their heart’s content!

Ok so my first mistake was assuming that "ten steps" = ten lines. I kind of feel like this book is cheating a bit because each of these steps often includes a lot more than one line or shape. Each step might have multiple pieces to it, and for me that kind of defeated the purpose.

I don't know why I thought this would be easy...maybe because the description made it seem so. And even the steps themselves seem easy. But you can't just say "draw a flat ovalish shape" and have the results come out looking like the illustrations in this book. Well perhaps someone out there could, but me...not so much.

Another thing I've always struggled with in drawing is perfectionism. Art is much more subjective and unless I'm copying or tracing an image, it will never look like what I see in the illustration or picture. And what's in my head never translates to paper.

Aside from that, I knew from the very first animal that this book was going to be too advanced for my skill level. Let's take a look at the first animal in the book.

I'm not quite sure what I expected, but it wasn't this. Sadly, Ten-Step Drawing: Animals was quickly DNF'd. Have you tried Ten-Step Drawing: Animals? What did you think? Let me know!