Cielo Martha

Drawing for Beginners by Cielo Martha is one of the best drawing books for beginners. It explains in detail a lot with many examples, exercises, and tutorials to follow. It is accompanied by pictures and corresponding titles. It explores three different but core techniques : drawing, shading, and blending. It gives you the ‘’how-to’’ of each step and more importantly the reason why – I’ve been looking for a book where they’d say why do this or that. Finally, I’ve found one! It also covers the grading and different types of lead, which is always interesting and useful to know. Moreover, it offers a shading guide (it even shows you how to create one for yourself!). It has all kinds of general tips and advice about drawing. It tackles the topic of 3D drawing, which I have rarely seen, at least explained in such details. Martha’s drawing guide has this enthusiastic and informative tone that fits perfectly and eases the process of doing the exercises. It explores how to convert a photo into a drawing through the use of a black and white photo and editing programs.


As for the bad sides of this book, I have spotted a few typos, and that’s pretty it. Besides I was left wanting more of it, that is. I would have liked to have examples of the required steps at the beginning of the book in order to obtain the desired results (such as the grading exercise, etc.). Moreover, there was only the title ‘’Table of Contents’’, but no real table; I think one is crucial in a book to know where one is or where to go for a precise information. Also, I’d have liked to see the required steps for drawing a photo, with examples and guidance through the process like it is in the rest of the guide. I’d say the last part had a big chunk of possible information missing.


This book gives you all the basics and is short, unlike most drawing guides. It really is for complete beginners, but advanced artists might enjoy this fresh take on the core techniques. Also, I was left amazed at the amount of information there was in this short book. Overall, I give it a rating of 4 out of 5 and recommend it mostly to beginners, but seasoned artists as well as I’m pretty sure everyone can find this read worthy of their time.

I was provided with a complimentary copy of this book, through Reading Deals, so I could give an honest review.
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