Imaginative Realism: How to Paint What Doesn't Exist

An award-winning fantasy artist and the creator of Dinotopia, James Gurney instructs and inspires in Imaginative Realism: How to Paint What Doesn't Exist. Renowned for his uncanny ability to incorporate amazing detail and imagination into stunningly realistic fantasy settings, James Gurney teaches budding artists and fans of fantasy art step-by-step the techniques that won him worldwide critical acclaim. This groundbreaking work examines the practical methods for creating believable pictures of imaginary subjects, such as dinosaurs, ancient Romans, alien creatures, and distant worlds.

Beginning with a survey of imaginative paintings from the Renaissance to the golden Age of American illustration, the book then goes on to explain not just techniques like sketching and composition, but also the fundamentals of believable world building including archaeology, architecture, anatomy for creatures and aliens, and fantastic engineering. It concludes with details and valuable advice on careers in fantasy illustration, including video game and film concept art and toy design.

More than an instruction book, this is the ultimate reference for fans of science fiction and fantasy illustration.

"Gurney's Imaginative Realism is a gold mine for artists who want to create images that sing with authority and delight the viewer with rich otherworldly visuals." --Erik Tiemens, concept artist, Star Wars: Episodes II and III

"Imaginative Realism is an indispensable, flawless reference for vision makers in any discipline to create their own imaginative realms." --Frank M. Costantino, ASAI, SI, FSAI, JARA, cofounder, American Society of Architectural Illustrators

Customer Reviews:

Delivers!

By Reviewer - October 7, 2009

I have been a long time reader of James Gurney's blog. My interest was not in sci-fi/fantasy, but rather, his insights into painting 'what's not there'. I have studied representational painting - the training is indispensable, but (obviously) focuses on painting a model or still life. The academies do not teach the lost art of painting realistic but imagined scenes - of course you can find classes about painting 'abstractedly' or from 'imagination' but not painting, say, an historic scene or creature that no human has ever seen alive (like a dinosaur) - and that's the gap filled in by this book.

The book offers a wide range of topics - from pleasant surprises like created imaginary maps that look 'real' to extensive coverage of the forgotten use of maquettes and dioramas.

What this book is not: Though this book is fun and interesting to read for non-artists, this is not an in depth 'how to' book on technique (though he does go over some techniques) - so before... read more

An Instant Classic

By Illustrator and Concept Artist - September 29, 2009

An instant classic that really gets into the nuts and bolts of doing professional illustration work. It is a rarity among popular art instruction books that they have both basic information and very professional level information. But this book has both. Great explanations, clear prose, and lots and lots of great pictures demonstrating the principles under discussion. And of course there's lots of amazing fantasy artwork by the author which is all reproduced excellently. In that way its also a Monograph of Jim Gurney's work, as it also includes lots of his other illustration work, besides Dinotopia, including some fantasy paperback book covers and some incredible Historical Pieces done for National Geographic. All of which is deconstructed to show us his thought process while composing and designing his pictures, the building and setting up models, the use of silhouettes, chiaroscuro, and value control, using research to assist the imagination and increase creativity, and many other... read more