Books for 3D Art

Since I started working with 3D art, I have been leery when it comes to purchasing books. There are quite a few that are great for learning, but a lot that can end up only skimming the surface of what you need to know. While this is how a prefer to learn in comparison to videos, there can be quite a few that can fall short. The reason I say this is because a lot of books might teach you that one thing you want to know about, but leave you hanging when trying to apply that practice. In this profession there are tons of books that are great for reference, and those are of course the ones I recommend.




Buying a book on how to learn different methods is another story. My rule of thumb is, "if you can use it over and over, at least for reference, or it dives into a subject in great detail, it's a great purchase". While I can understand buying some books for $10 or less, there are almost none like that when dealing with the software you use, and can be quite pricey. Too add to that thought, you can obtain a large wealth of information from video tutorials, and various community articles when dealing with the software. One book I did purchase when I was starting was Blender Master Class by Ben Simmonds , which I felt was a great investment, since it had lots of material node setups in it, and a few practices I'm still not use to. I still refer to them from time to time, but eventually I'm sure I won't have to.

Aside from the content mentioned previously from Blender Master Class, it wasn't as "in depth" as I would have hoped. The book went along the lines of a tutorial, teaching you how to make a particular object, without any rhyme or reason as to why the methods used were being applied in the models. It wasn't until I attended a workshop that I learned about "quad-only" models, and how n-gons, and other irregularities could wreak havoc on your models. Not only that, lots of information was given on sculpting that just wasn't even mentioned in the book. While it was a great book to learn how to use Blender, it didn't give information on the art or style or methods of modeling, similar to various video tutorials. Needless to say, it was a great book in the aspect that it took you through a project from the concept, all the way to adding hair, materials, and lighting; this is where video tutorials almost always fall short.

After reading that book, I did feel that I was left hanging, but something great happened in the process that I was not aware of. Previous to reading Blender Master Class, I stumbled when asking questions in the community, trying to learn more about a particular part of modeling.This awesome sub-conscious enlightenment allowed me to ask the correct questions when wanting to learn more. So after reading it, I was able to ask the correct questions, with the correct terminology, giving other artists an exact road map to the path I was looking towards for an answer. Not only that, the terminology allowed me to see how in depth the workshop I was looking at, actually was. Had I not known some of these key words, the workshop would not have been near as interesting, and I might have seen it as an over-glorified video tutorial. Looking back, I'm glad it didn't happen that way, as I would probably have learned everything after 3-4 months later.

Regardless, like I mentioned before, there are lots of other books that will always be useful, and even some cheap ones that will help with various art methods (lots of those on Kindle). My point is to make sure you are making a sound investment, as you will find yourself spending more and more as you progress into the 3D world. Almost any book dealing with an artistic mindset is a great buy, but keep in mind that books that cover topics that aren't covered in videos are usually the most valuable books in your artistic career.