The Art of How to Train Your Dragon

The media could not be loaded. I can't believe my eyes when I saw this books on the shelf at a local bookshop, two months earlier than its scheduled release date.Flipped a few pages, and saw the unique style of Nicolas Marlet, flipped back to the cover and found that Tracy Miller-Zarneke is the author and the movie's from Dreamworks. Those three names instantly reminded me of quality art book The Art of Kung Fu Panda. I'm glad to say that this book is as good and fun. By the way, Chris Sanders and Dean DeBlois are the famed directors here.Inside the book are more than 350 development artwork, including early character designs, story sketches, and concept paintings. The books is divided into three parts, the dragons, vikings and the environment with stuff like props and houses. Discarded art and characters are also included, like Hiccup's mother - who can cook a mean dish with dragon meat. Accompanying the art are plenty of interesting quotes and commentary from the production staff.Nicolas Marlet and Simon Otto seem to be the lead character designers responsible for the concept art of the dragons and vikings, although a good amount of designs are actually from Nicolas Marlet. There's a wide range of wackiness and creativity to the drawings. The character digital paintings are great and the colours are really beautiful, kudos to Zhaoping Wei.The environment paintings from Pierre-Olivier Vincent, art director, are beautiful. This guy really knows how to draw scenic yet precarious backgrounds like sloping hilltops, snow-capped sea arches and Dragon island which is like an ice-cream cone with molten lava as topping. Not only that, his tranquil pieces are also spectacular, National Geographic-spectacular. He has created places you want to visit but probably not because one wrong step and you'll roll down the hill.There are even a few illustrations from Dominique Louis, who did some pastel concept art for Pixar. His using digital pastels now and there's no difference from his traditional work, I'm glad to say. The fun and stylised houses, statues, weapons, boats and other props are from Kirsten Kawamura and Mel Zwyer.It's a fantastic book showing the creative prowess of amazing artists. Highly recommended.-By the way, if you missed the "About the Author" section above, I have to mention it here again because Tracey Miller-Zarneke has authored some really great art books that you should check out.- The Art of Kung Fu Panda- The Art of Meet the Robinsons- The Art and Making of Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs-(More pictures are available on my blog. Just visit my Amazon profile for the link.)

BOught a copy of this book for my friend who LOVES HTTYD and she was so excited by it! She keeps it in a special place in her home when it's not on display as her "coffee-table book." It is well put together with a variety of beautifully illustrated pictures and concept art. There are developed renderings of many dragons and characters. It makes the HTTYD series come to life even more with some behind the scenes art and extra dragon lore. The text is well-formulated and beautifully accompanies the illustrations. It paints a clear picture of what's what and how all the dragons and dragon lore pieces fit together into Hiccup and Toothless' world! I went back and bought another copy just for myself since my friend was so pleased with it. And I have to admit, I truly love flipping through the pages...

This is such a fascinating book. My 4yr old is obsessed with How to Train your Dragon. I bought it and he wanted me to read it to him every night, few pages a night until we finally got through it, he didn't really know what I was reading but he was so fascinated with the pictures. Throughout the day I would see him just staring at the pictures. Super cool.

I'm not a huge collector of art books like some are--not being an artist, I have to be stunned enough by the animation (and the film itself) to want the art book. So this is perhaps the third one I've ever purchased, but it certainly fit my amateur art critic qualifications.The book is stunning, from the incredible cover to all the little drawings once would expect from an art book. Cressdia Cowell's preface sets up the emotion of the collection, and everything flows right in that vein of explaining all the art that went into the movie.The book is well-organized, its chapters focusing on characters, background, dragons, etc., making a straight-through read logical and a delve for something specific easy. To my surprise and delight, even Cowell's book illustrations have been included to demonstrate the inspirations. Sketches as well as fantastical concept art that seems to exist simply for beauty's sake are all in here. And, as every art book should have, the Powers That Be have included plenty of great notes and thoughts about the work.This should please fans of art as well as those who simply loved the movie.

I am not ashamed to say this, but I am a 58 year old woman who loves dragons. I began my journey when I read the Ann McCaffrey books in the Dragon Riders of Pern series many years ago. Then "How to Train Your Dragon" came to the movies. The bond of man and dragon was rekindled in a new tale of wonder. The care and artistry of every animator who touched this film is evident. As the credits rolled by at the end of the movie, I saw more wonderous images of other dragons. I had to have a book, or poster, or some thing I could touch and feel that belonged to me. This book was the answer to my wish. Each character, every dragon, every bit of scenery, and imagination of every artist and actor who touched this film is illustrated in this book. It is just fabulous. The care, the detail, the dedication to bring the world of Berk to life shows in the illustrations of every artist. Thanks for giving wings to my world again. I love this book!!!

The is beautiful! The book came with some of the tops of pages cut off. It wouldn’t be problem if with was used but this was a brand new book. It didn’t cut off the art but it’s a shame that some of the pages in the middle of the book are missing the tops of them!