[.ca] The Book of a Hundred Hands (ISBN 048622709X)

A Very 'Handy' book!:
This is a superb little book to have around the studio at all times. Although there are one or two better books on the subject of drawing this most difficult of body parts (Burne Hogarth's 'Drawing Dynamic Hands' is the best), there is nothing to match this one for sheer value for money. While Bridgman's illustrations are a little sketchy for my taste, you can't beat the sheer convenience of having a book containing one hundred different hand positions around when you need a quick reference for a particular hand position...and all for under eight dollars. What more do you want? A chocolate cover? Great illustrations, good, informative text, a handy size, and great value for money. What are you waiting for? Buy this book now!

disorginized confusing sketches:
This book is not for beginners. To understand this book you'll need to have a good understanding of the hand's anatomy, but if you already understand the hand then this book will be useless. Some pages are organized so on the left will be a description like "the pinky sticks out at this angle", then on the right will be an ink blot test looking drawing where you can't even see the pinky. A good alternative to this is Burne Hogarth's "Drawing Dynamic Hands".

good anatomy, but falls short:
This is a very good book to teach you how the hand works. It demonstrates how the muscles pull and knuckles jut or decline depending on the position of the hand. It also demonstrates bones and ligaments well, how each finger has three hinge joints, except the thumb, which only has two, where the palm is fleshy and where it lies flat. Reading through the book can help you gain a better understanding of the anatomy of the hand. Unfortunatley this book does fall short in some aspects, some of the images are so sketchy and blurred, it is difficult to tell that they are hands, much less to practice from the drawings and achieve the desired results. Following the examples in the book will not improve the clarity of your drawings of one of the most difficult subjects: the human hand. But the anatomy lesson makes this book worth getting anyway.

disorginized confusing drawings:
This book is not for beginners. I checked it out at the library. On the left side of some pages their will be a discription like "the pinky points out at this angle", then on the right side of the page will be some mysterious sketchy drawing that doesn't show the pinky. To understand this book you'll have to have a good understanding of the anatomy of the hand, but if you already understand that then the book will be usless. A good alternative to this is Burne Hogarth's "Drawing Dynamic Hands".

Excellent beginning to intermediate book at a good price:
There are two excellent books that I know of that focus specifically on the anatomy of the hand for the artist. I was given this book early in my aspiring art career by my grandmother (an accomplished artist) but lost it some while later. I had forgotten the title and ended up buying Hogarth's "Drawing Dynamic Hands" as a guide after failed attempts to locate this book again. I would actually recommend getting them both, but start with this book first. In the end I got alot out of both, but there were many times using the Hogarth book that I missed "Hundred Hands". Hogarth's style of illustration in all of his books is much more imbellished by his use of soft shading to illustrate volume. His look is extremely useful but it can also be an obstacle to a beginning to intermediate student since end result is a more stylized appearance. With Hogarth's books, the student can find themselves inadvertently adopting the look of his images in their own style. Bridgeman's illustrations are much more loose and sketch-like. He uses little or no shading but his understanding of volume and structure rivals Hogarth's. The simplicity of his examples are much easier to get started with. He accomplishes just as much if not more with a few loose lines as Hogarth's vivid shading. More importantly the sketch-like quality can be much less intimidating early on. While it's true Hogarth's book is definitely nicer to look at, I believe Bridgeman's is a much better learning guide for starters. The price of this book also makes it affordable to use them as compliments to one another if you decide get both.