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Dragonart: How to Draw Fantastic Dragons and Fantasy Creatures

From the artist behind the wildly popular NeonDragonArt.com, DragonArt will help you create mythical beasts that awe, delight, and disturb the sweet dreams of little ones.

$19.99 $16.26

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Ever wonder how to draw a dragon?

They are such beautiful and majestic creatures that it’s hard to resist!

And they are all over popular books and movies that we love so much! Can you name a few? 😉

That is why I decided to do my own research on the topic, and so I collected the most helpful “dragon books” that will be filled with inspirations, reference materials, techniques and so on.

AND I also asked a couple of artists that have done beautiful art with dragons to share their process. (You can learn from them here.)

Before we get to the list…

Dragon Fun Facts

Dragons are beautiful, majestic and complex creatures. And yet, so many of us are so deeply in love with them!

Did you know that the word “dragon” comes from ancient Greek and means “to see strong” and from Latin dracon – huge serpent?

Also, the most well-known dragons come from two distinctly different traditions: European Dragon and Chinese Dragon.

• The European Dragon is typically depicted as a large, fire-breathing, scaly, horned, lizard-like creature. Their blood is a symbol of a long life, and sometimes has poisonous properties;
• And the Chinese Dragons are most commonly depicted as snake-like and with four legs; They symbolize powers (mostly control over water), strength and are a good luck charm for the worthy ones.

Now, history aside – here is the list:

 Top 7 Books

That Will Teach You How To Draw A Dragon

1. The Art of How to Train Your Dragon

* It stands as the number 1 on my list because I remember myself referring back to it A LOT! The character design is stunning for the dragons, and the Vikings and all the characters overall 🙂 I Love it! It’s not necessarily a “how to” book, but it is filled with the character development sketches, inspirations and ideations – super inspiring and with a lot of variety.

“The Art of How to Train Your Dragon” by Tracey Miller-Zarneke and Cressida Cowell is the official illustrated tie-in that holds in itself more than 350 images from the DreamWorks Animation Feature Film, based on Cressida Cowell’s popular kids book.

How To Train Your Dragon is the story about a Viking Hiccup, member of a Viking tribe. Hiccup lives on the island of Berk in the North Sea at the time when Dragons and Vikings don’t get along. He has to enter a dragon training where he will be able to prove worthy to his dad. Everything seems fine until he meets and becomes friend with a cute injured dragon. And that’s when the true adventure begins…

The book offers you an inside look into the development of the animation film: with a lot of ideation sketches, character developments, concept paintings and discarded ideas. Also, while flipping the pages you will stumble upon commentary and interesting quotes from the production team.

It’s a powerful book full of great ideas and inspiration – a great place to start building an understanding of dragons and their design.

2. Dragonart: How to Draw Fantastic Dragons and Fantasy Creatures

This book is by the famous artist from NeonDragonArt.com.

It’s separated into three main topics and one quick guide:

• Part One: Fantastic Dragons
• Part Two: Unique Details
• Part Three: Other Fantasy Creatures
• And A Quick Guide To Fantastic Beasts.

The book goes through a step-by-step process you can implement in your design, as well as covers the various styles of heads, wings, horns, tails and other cool dragon parts.

I think it’s a great reference for someone looking for more than just one way of drawing a dragon, as well as learning to draw the creature from different angles, adding muscle tone and interesting details.

Feel free to judge for yourself while flipping through the book HERE.

3. Drawing Dragons: Learn How to Create Fantastic Fire-Breathing Dragons

Drawing Dragons: Learn How to Create Fantastic Fire-Breathing Dragons is a book by Sandra Staple. 

It’s a step-by-step guide full of thoughtful techniques and tips to take away. It has a variety of creatures from fierceful and angry-looking to loving and protective mother dragons. As well as different ages, genders and poses.

Most of the book is black and white, as it covers the DRAWING, not the painting, however, in the middle of the book you will find 16 beautifully colored pages.

Sandra makes it look so easy! And it’s a wonderful guide for those wanting to build a solid foundation for the creature drawing/design.

It’s one of the Amazon’s #1 Best Sellers! You can see for yourself some more details about it HERE.

• Note: The Kindle Preview and The “Look Inside” The Book on Amazon usually feature different pages you can flip through. So it’s a great idea to check out both! I included the Kindle preview for some of the books, and the other preview you can view by following the links 🙂 

4. Dragonology: The Complete Book of Dragons (Ologies)

It’s a book by Dr. Ernest Drake (Author),‎ Dugald A. Steer (Editor),‎ Various (Illustrator).

This is a total masterpiece in my opinion! It features a lot of amazing knowledge and explanations on topics such as: how come dragons are able to talk? Fly? And what’s up with all of their habits?

I think that in order to draw a creature masterfully and true to life(not sure how that applies to dragons if you believe they are unreal) – you must know more about them than just the basics! And this book is your go-to guide for that!

The book is filled with amazing things! Such as:

• Various samples of artifacts;
• Interactive envelopes you can open;
• Dragon skin you can feel (!!!);
• Maps, journals and charts that flip open;
• Guide on how to track, tam and fly a dragon;
• And much MUCH more!

5. Dracopedia: A Guide to Drawing the Dragons of the World

Dracopedia: A Guide to Drawing the Dragons of the World by William O’Connor (Author) is a beautiful piece of work dedicated to all things related to dragons. 

 

It has been compiled from years of sketches, finds and field notes by the artist William O’Connor, that has traveled all around the world studying dragons. This book is definitely a great resource for learning how to draw dragons step-by-step as well as to learn about their history which will help you keep them true to life.

It goes through drawing materials, digital painting tips, as well as the behavior, biology, specifications and history of 13 major dragon families!

Dracopedia also features:

• An enormous variety of sketches, anatomical studies and gesture drawings;
• A step-by-step process to creating 13 beautiful dragon paintings (concepts that will work for any medium).

Note: This book is for “Advanced Artists” in my opinion, as even though it goes through the process step-by-step, the final paintings are quite complicated to achieve. However, don’t get discouraged! As after a few tries you will be able to create these amazing paintings as long as you have the will, and are not afraid of a challenge! 🙂

6. Dragonart Evolution: How to Draw Everything Dragon

You can always read some more reviews about it HERE.

7. Dracopedia The Great Dragons: An Artist’s Field Guide and Drawing Journal

The last book on our list “How To Draw A Dragon 7 Awesome Books” is this beautiful piece by William O’Connor!

As you might have noticed already – it looks very similar to our #5. That is because these two beautiful books are by the same author! As a matter of fact, this one was published 3 years later from the previous one 🙂

The Great Dragons features a researched guide on dragons with a special focus on each one. It is a book filled with facts, stories and instructions on how to capture these marvelous creatures!

You get to learn about the habitat and history of 8 different dragons: Acadian Dragon, Icelandic Dragon, Scandinavian Dragon, Welsh Dragon, Ligurian Dragon, Crimean Dragon, Chinese Dragon and an Elwah Dragon. As well as enjoy a huge amount of sketches, drawings and start-to-finish artworks.

You can see a preview of what you get in this book HERE.

Begin Learning Now

I hope you enjoyed the list, and even if you don’t decide to get one of these beautiful creations, I recommend you still check out what’s inside them! You will get so much inspiration just by looking through the pages 🙂

I know book deliveries can take a couple of days to get to you, that’s why I think it’s worth checking out our “How To Draw A Dragon Tips From 5 Artists” blog post featuring a lot of amazing artists: Sanjay Charlton,  Dennis Sabino, Yuriy Skorohod, Hana Kuro, and Milena Młynarska. You can definitely learn a lot from them, and get inspired to start creating!

Remember the artwork on the top of this blog post? It is by Sanjay Charlton. I asked him a couple of questions about this piece that you can find following the link above, but also here are some of them:

Anna: What inspired you to draw this dragon?

Sanjay: I really like anything fantasy and anything powerful and dragons seem to be the weapon of mass destruction of the genre. So how could I not?

A: Did you collect any reference material or do some research before you started?

S: Yes, I looked at a lot of reptiles, especially for textures. I looked at various interpretations of dinosaurs and most importantly I looked at how other artists interpreted various types of dragons in different styles.

A: When you just begin the process – what do you think about? Are you trying to understand the skeleton/muscles or how do you work?

S: Primarily I think about the pose and how everything else supports that. Form, skeletal makeup, muscles, skin texture and then lighting.

A: How do you make sure that this fantastical creature looks believable and true to life?

S: Outside of the structure, texture and lighting, imperfections go along way. Teeth that jagged and misaligned, textures that are not uninformed and so on.

You can read the rest here.

Hope you are inspired! Good luck in your studies of these marvelous dragon creatures 🙂

And make sure to save one of our images to Pinterest for future reference :*

• Oh, and don’t forget to subscribe to our email list and follow us on social media if you would like to read our future posts!
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Good luck on Your Art Path,

– Anna, Your Art Bud ?

Blog Posts to check out next → ” 14 Best Figure Drawing Books For Beginners”

and → “Drawing Ink Supplies You Need To Try in 2018 (+Reviews)”