Drawing and painting is one of those things I'd like to get better at, if only I could find the time for it next to my other hobby projects.

Nevertheless, I enjoy good how-to books on art, and this is one of the most inspiring. It is written from the perspective of people who have to develop concept art for architecture, and in that field, it is not only important to draw well, but to draw fast. Hence, "Drawing Shortcuts" - and the book delivers.

The book describes all sorts of speedy ways of painting architecture and how to enliven them with scenery. While the focus is on real world architecture designs, many of these approaches should also work for fantastic and science fiction buildings. From using photos as reference images to draw over up to using simple 3D models, these suggestions make it fairly easy to get architecture and perspective right.

The technology discussed in this book is often rather outdated (which is not surprising, given that the last edition was published in 2010), but anyone with a basic understanding of modern graphics software should find the techniques easy to adapt.

Highly recommended!