any recommended art books/graphic novels?

[Tad]

Hi,
i'm picking up the latest blade of the immortal book off amazon.com and I want to get the free shippin

so I figure i'll buy something else,
cant think what I want though.

any suggestions?
preferably something cheap.

anything nice and art related,
comic collections, graphic novels, howto books, that sort of stuff.

lemme hear some ideas!
thanks.

[DavidCousens]

If you're going for graphic novels and you don't already have it, you MUST buy the Watchmen. You can read that one again and again.

Trust me :)

[JackalAnubis]

the concept art books for the original star wars trigolies (sp?) are really awesome. I've been meaning to buy a waterhouse book for awhile but thats just me.

[Schlo-mo]

Violent cases!

[N D Hill]

Expedition -Incredable creature artwork by Wayne Barlowe.

The Art of the Matrix-The concept art and storyboards from the first matrix film.

Giger's Alien- Name says it all.

[JVC]

The complete Lone Wolf & Cub series, assuming you haven't already got them. There're 28 volumes though! ;)

[Tad]

thanks for the input guys!
that helps a bit,

not interested in lonewolf/cub though,
i never did feel the art style in it.

I'll check out that other stuff you guys mentioned,

any more ideas are still welcome! :)

[fukifino]

Check out Powers: Who Killed Retro Girl. I just discovered it recently and I'm hooked on the series. Art is so so (think Batman Animated Series style) but I dig the crime drama in a world where superheros are common idea behind it.

Might not be your cup of tea, but I thought I'd throw it out there. :)

[Alex Outbreak]

I always liked Vagabond, it reminds me a little of Blade of the Immortal.

[TheDirtSyndicate]

GOAD the many moods of Phil Hale

i highly recomend this. he is an amazing painter (the original with this style....actually, alot of people rip him off. even a few people on this site) and photographer.

[Wednesday]

Hey Schlo-mo, I started reading that recently, tis' a nice book.

Try I Paparazzi, I really liked that one.

I havent read it, but i want Foster's book. :D

[endregan]

yeah goad is awesome! a bit strange i may add, but great :)

only problem is the font is really tiny and designer like. will make u blind to read it all ahha

[Dahsramu]

"Xenozoic Tales" by Mark Schultz is by far my favorite comic book and Shultz's artwork just blows me away - definitely check it out ... (especially if you like dinosaurs). They recently collected and re-released most of the published stuff in two trade paperbacks - I HIGHLY recommend them...

Another book I recommended is "The Authority" by Warren Ellis and John Cassaday (you should start with the first trade paperback "All Over the World And Other Stories", though, because the story is kind of complicated)... same with "Y: The Last Man"

Also, any "Sin City" books... and finally, if ure a fan of the "Matrix" movies, check out the "Matrix" trade paperback - its got a lot stuff by a lot of different and talented artists and writers (Geoff Darrow, Neil Gaiman, etc)...

okay, I could go on, but I'll stop here... :D

[chuckacious]

Hey, anything from alexgrey or giger is a top choice, they arent just picture books they are a visual progression thru their life. really good stuff.

[jetpack42]

HEROBEAR AND THE KID

[Kanchi]

Since you seem to be into manga:
-Nausicaa of the valley of the wind by Hayao Miyazaki, the perfect collection is 4 books and is one of the best manga's I've read so far. (way deeper than the movie version)
-The Sandman: The Dream Hunter collaboration of Neil Gaiman & Yoshitaka Amano (FF concept art,Vampire hunter D etc) Basically a revamped Japanese fairytale with illustrations by Amano.
-Capcom Designworks (if you are a capcom fan)
-SNK Characters 1&2 All about illustrations (if you are a snk fan :) )
Ghibli seems to put a lot of work in their artbooks, I only have the Spirited Away book but I'm sure they are all ok. (not exactly blade of the immortal stuff, but if I like both maybe you do too ? :) )

The art of starwars books are cool like Jackal mentioned. Someone brought a big art of LOTR book to the workshop which seemed cool too. Not sure of the exact title though.

Just wondering btw: A lot artbooks are being released from Japanese games. Are there any artbooks out there from non-Japanese games? I know about a warcraftbook but other than that?

edit: this post actualy reminded me to order the warcraft book :)

[Tad]

thanks kanchi,
the capcom/snk books sound right up my alley.

Actually Nausicaa is my favorite movie of ALL time,
man I love it so much. So i'm kind stuck on the movie version.

I dont know of many artbooks about american games,

one I know I would really love to see is the Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver series,
if you havent checked these games out I HIGHLY HIGHLY recommend them.
the ps2 ones especially for us concept art freaks,
they're on dvd so they come with all sorts of "special features" like a movie dvd would, but its all beautiful production art, concept art, 3d work, behind the scenes type stuff.
Really nice.

[Tad]

darn, I couldnt find any capcom or snk books on amazon,
where do you get those at?

[Kanchi]

I got my capcom book from some stand in a mall when I was visiting Thousand Oaks but you can get it here too:
http://www.animebooks.com/capdeswor.html
I bought an snk book there, it was a pretty bad experience buying it there though. It took for ever, but he blamed it on the postal service and I already met someone who buys a lot of stuff there with no problems so maybe it was just bad luck on my part. They do have A LOT of artbooks.
Shop around, I don't know where you are from but there are a lot of online shops selling stuff like this in the US I think.
A good one in Europe (they do ship to other countries too): http://www.archonia.com/
They don't seem to keep stuff in stock for long but they do sell a lot of manga/anime stuff(dvd's,manga's,artbooks, models etc).

I saw the Nausicaa movie first and after I read the manga I realized that the movie could have been so much better. It's like the movie only kept the WWF part of the story and forgot about the rest. (well that's how I remember it anyway, been a while since I last saw the movie)

[Tad]

Originally posted by Kanchi
I got my capcom book from some stand in a mall when I was visiting Thousand Oaks but you can get it here too:
http://www.animebooks.com/capdeswor.html
I bought an snk book there, it was a pretty bad experience buying it there though. It took for ever, but he blamed it on the postal service and I already met someone who buys a lot of stuff there with no problems so maybe it was just bad luck on my part. They do have A LOT of artbooks.
Shop around, I don't know where you are from but there are a lot of online shops selling stuff like this in the US I think.
A good one in Europe (they do ship to other countries too): http://www.archonia.com/
They don't seem to keep stuff in stock for long but they do sell a lot of manga/anime stuff(dvd's,manga's,artbooks, models etc).

I saw the Nausicaa movie first and after I read the manga I realized that the movie could have been so much better. It's like the movie only kept the WWF part of the story and forgot about the rest. (well that's how I remember it anyway, been a while since I last saw the movie)

thanks, i'll check those sites out.

about nausicaa, you gotta remember.. it is a movie afterall, you can fit a heckof alot more story into a comic series that goes on as long as you want, heh, the movie is already like 2hrs long

both are definetely great works thougH! miyazaki definetely didnt mess around

[Kanchi]

I know, that's why I like the manga better. Maybe they should do an anime series on it :)