The Complete Urban Sketching Companion is chockful of detail and examples. It was a way over my skis on some of these lessons, but I enjoyed the artistry. Great find.

This is a very comprehensive book that starts off very simple and builds to a large amount of complexity. I enjoyed following along

It is a great companion
"The Complete Urban Sketching Companion. Essential Concepts and Techniques from The Urban Sketching Handbooks – Architecture and Cityscapes, Understanding Perspective, People and Motion, Working with Color" by Shari Blaukopf, Stephanie Bower, and Gabriel Campanario was published by Quarto Publishing Group - Quarry. It is thought as a companion to the various books from the "The Urban Sketching Handbook" series. After the introduction that covers supplies and etiquette, the book is divided into four main parts: 1) Architecture and Cityscapes, 2) Understanding Perspective, 3) People and Motion, and 4) Working with Color. An enormous range of topics, such as Composition, Basic Spacial Principles, Expressions, or Pigments & Color Mixing are covered in these four parts.
The book is presented with a great design, images, and drawings. It is inspirational and very informative. Helpful Tips, "Workshops", and comments are also included. The drawings might be challenging for beginners because of the complexity of the examples, but they can be a real help to those artists to learn about the various topics which are covered. I really appreciated that the authors are presenting artwork from different artists and if readers want to study more of the works of a particular artists they will have no problem since the necessary information is included in the list of contributions at the end of the book. Readers can also find 72 challenges there that can be a help to them to apply their own skills and a detailed index which is a great help if readers search for a particular topic. I highly recommend the book and, although the book is predominantly thought for watercolor artists, it can be also of help for artists who use other media.
The complimentary copy of this book was provided by the publisher through NetGalley free of charge. I was under no obligation to offer a positive review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.
#TheCompleteUrbanSketchingCompanion #NetGalley

I draw cartoons sometimes. What I find difficult is fitting characters in a matching background.
So I picked this one and I was not disappointed with its lessons.
Book teaches drawing urban backgrounds with perspective and angulations.
A very good book to know basics about how backgrounds work.
Approach is easy to follow and with gradual upgradation of difficulty level.
Backgrounds look beautiful in the book.
It is a collection book for artists.

I will give every book that tells me I can mix every color with Yellow, Red and Blue one star from here on, no matter how good it is. To MIX every color, you need yellow, magenta and cyan. Were talking about substractive Color Synthesis here, not additive.
In addition, the images in this book are so compressed you are unable to make out much details.

This took me a long time to read and review! Overall I thought the book was very informative as it gives a lot of very good advice for people wanting to sketch and paint buildings and urban landscapes. I liked the fact that the works included were from many different artists!

This book is apparently a compilation of 4 other urban sketching books. There are 4 sections, one for each book with about 50-60 pages each I have not read any of those other books, so it is not clear how much more information they have although it looks like they are about double page-wise what is available in this book. Overall it has a lot of great suggestions/ideas for sketching urban areas as well as tips and ideas to think about while sketching. I especially enjoyed looking at all the sketches included by various artists. My favorite section the one on people and motion.

Great little reference book for the budding artist. Easy to follow step-by-step instructions. Beautiful illustrations. A really well-rounded book on urban sketching.

The Complete Urban Sketching Companion is an excellent book for learning to draw cityscapes and built up environments. It is full of wonderful illustrations in a variety of styles, and concentrates on learning to use perspective in your drawings. The instructions are very good and perspective is explained really well. It is particularly good for budding artists and also architecture and technical design students. Drawings of so many great places are included and you will be itching to grab your drawing equipment and go travelling in search of some great subjects. Overall an excellent book that would be a brilliant addition to any artist's library.

This book is great, especially for either beginners in Urban Sketching, or for people who want a more compact version of the great collection of books that is The Urban Sketching Handbook series.

This book contains selected chapters from four previously published books in the series: Understanding Perspective, Working with Color, Architecture and Cityscapes, and People and Motion. I feel like the chapters have been well selected to offer a good basics on each of those topics and you can always get the other books in case you want to get more in depths on a specific one. Already accomplished urban sketchers will also probably be more interested in the latter.

I liked the layout of the book, it's clean and appealing, well illustrated and never too dense while still providing plenty of useful concepts and tips. I cannot recommend it enough if Urban Sketching is a thing you want to get into or you're beginning at.

I was gonna finish this review by saying that the copy I was provided was a digital one and I was planning to get a physical copy to browse it more comfortably. However, some amazon reviews are making me reconsider this as it seems the binding of the physical copies is not good, so maybe stick with the eBook.

This is a nice companion with lots of nice tips. It's a great gift for architecture and interior designer students. It's a helpful book but the organization is a bit messy and the drawings are a bit blurry. I received a free digital copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review

This book is an excellent guide to help create beautiful buildings, scenery and architecture. I love drawing but always shy away from drawing places and buildings. This is an easy to follow guide to help you plan your drawings and how to see buildings in a simpler way in order to envisage drawing them. I am a newbie at this kind of drawing, so perhaps I need more of a beginner's guide and then move onto this one. Although this one has helped break this down for me and realize I could be capable of drawing these kinds of urban settings. I am exciting to attempt to draw more.

I was taking an Urban ketching time while reading this book. The book had a very in-depth explanation of perspective and did a good job of focusing on urban sketching and the need for portability, quickness, and ability to choose what details to focus on while drawing. This a good beginner guide and also for more a more advanced artist.

I consider the Urban Sketching books to be the best combination of eye candy and fantastically valuable information and this very comprehensive guide is no exception. In fact, if you've never read any of them and aren't sure where to start, I'd say this is the best one to start with.

It's comprehensive and covers buildings, cityscapes and people. It has color concepts, perspective, motion, depth, and so many other fundamentals of sketching in urban settings. It breaks down the sketch step by step so you know where to start, how to build, and how to put the finishing touches.

It also has all the delicious eye-candy I've come to expect from these books. Fantastic sketches, wonderful variety, and it's sure to make you itch to go out and sketch. If only one could master sketching just by reading books!

with gratitude to netgalley and Quarto Publishing Group for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

I got this one hoping it was not above my art skills. It was. But I still found it useful.

I generally draw faces and cutesy animals.. City scenes are beyond me. But if you do urban sketching I think this will be very useful, not matter your skill level. More a reference book than a how to, so you do need some skills if you really want to benefit from this. There are some blank pages for sketching on. Probably the topic covered most extensively is color but there are also sections of things like composition, perspective, etc in this book.

At the very end of the book there is a page of challenges in four different categories:
Architecture and cityscapes has 26 challenges including “draw a skyscraper.”
Understanding perspective has 25 challenges including “draw rounded lampshades from below.”
People and motion has 19 challenges including “draw a friend.”
Working with color has 21 challenges including “take artistic license, painting the sky anything but blue or gray.”

This would be a great gift for any budding or experienced artist. Contains everything you need to to know about drawing buildings and people in city settings. Includes a host of ideas on perspective, composition, color, motion, and more. A treasure trove for the artist on the go!

Pub Date 18 Aug 2020

Grateful to the Quarto Publishing Group - Quarry and NetGalley for the early copy, in exchange for my honest review.

#TheCompleteUrbanSketchingCompanion #NetGalley

Master Urban Sketching Skills

If you already are a fairly decent artist comfortable with your mediums, this book could help you consider and drill down to some very specific considerations when working with buildings and cityscapes, perspective required for urban settings, people and motion, and color. This book is not for the beginner who is just learning to do urban sketches. It compiles some essential concepts from shorter books in The Urban Sketching Handbook series. This companion is divided into four sections, one for each of these books, giving tips and techniques on four or five topics from those books. The authors certainly have provided a lot of things to consider as you pull together a sketch and ultimately the finished piece from it. Highly recommended if you like drawing urban settings.

This is a very attractive and complete book for the urban sketcher. The authors offer their own examples with excellent instruction as well as the same from other artists. This is a very complete treatment of this specific form of art and the illustrations are enticing and inspiring. Helpful for novice and experienced artist.

This is an absolutely beautiful book, full to the brim with gorgeous sketches to illustrate the points each section makes. It is a very detailed and comprehensive guide to the different aspects to consider when sketching, from perspective to colour theory. It’s also fantastic that it provides spaces for the reader to practice what they learnt in each chapter. As with most art books, they can sometimes be a bit vague as to where to start or what constitutes a “bad” sketch. This is definitely not a beginners book, and it assumes that the reader is already familiar with the Urban Sketcher premise. The quality of the drawings within could also discourage some starting out, who might deem them as “unattainable” to beginners.
Overall, this is a stunning book, perfect for the casual artist who wants to build on their skills.

If you only get one urban sketching guide, this would be the one. It is the compilation of some of the smaller guides. I own the perspective one already because that is where I struggle the most, but including the motion and color segments into this book is a great idea. Very handy to have, not quite as light and easy travelling as the individuals but a great study guide.