Ronald B. Tobias This book shows the reader how to take timeless storytelling structures and make them immediate, now, for fiction that's universal in how it speaks to the reader's heart and contemporary in detail and impact.

Each chapter includes brief excerpts and descriptions of fiction from many times, many genres - myth and fairy tale, genre and mainstream fiction, film plots of all types, short story and novel.

Find 20 fundamental plots that recur through all fiction - with analysis and examples - that outline benefits and warnings, for writers to adapt and elaborate in their own fiction. Ronald B. Tobias has spent his career as a writer moving from genre to genre, first as a short story writer, then as an author of fiction and nonfiction books and finally as a writer and producer of documentaries for public television. He is currently a professor in the Department of Media and Theatre Arts at Montana State University and the author of The Insider's Guide to Writing for Screen and Television. He lives in Bozeman, Montana.

Victoria Lynn Schmidt Every novelist, screenwriter and oral storyteller faces the challenge of creating original and exciting characters. Archetypes—mythic, cross-cultural models from which all characters originate—provide a solid foundation upon which to fashion new and vastly different story people. 45 Master Characters explores the most common male and female archetypes, provides instructions for using them to create your own original characters, and gives examples of how other authors have brought such archetypes to life in novels, film and television. Worksheets are then included for writers to develop and map the lives of their own characters. * Excellent companion to the works of Joseph Campbell * The first and only book focusing heavily on the heroine's journey * Includes 45 black & white movie stills and line art depicting classic examples of each archetype

Yishan Li 500 Manga Characters is the biggest collection of manga clip art ever collected on one disc. Now stunning artwork can be created quickly and easily using this vast collection of hi-res (300dpi) JPEG images that are ready to use in any project. The book accompanying the disc teaches how to use professional coloring techniques, add figures to backgrounds, combine them into a text document and even create original manga stories!

An enormous range of characters are included, from the heroic, dramatic, and historical to the comedic. There are also aliens, villains, monsters, and giant mecha robots. 500 Manga Characters is perfect for any designer or manga fan looking to create amazing artwork without learning to draw. All illustrations are royalty-free and are also supplied as black outlines, offering endless coloring possibilities. The book includes a complete illustrated listing of all the images on the CD. These criteria include: pose, setting, mood, aspect, appearance, expression, characteristics, and physical appearance.

Colin Moock Updated to cover Flash MX, the newest version of Macromedia Flash, ActionScript for Flash MX: The Definitive Guide, Second Edition is the one book no serious Flash developer should be without. Author Colin Moock, one of the most universally respected developers in the Flash community, has added hundreds of new code examples to show new Flash MX techniques in the real world: how to draw circles, save data to disk, convert arrays to onscreen tables, create reusable components, and preload variables, XML, and sounds. The book's language reference alone has nearly doubled from the first edition, with more than 250 new classes, objects, methods, and properties. You'll find exhaustive coverage of dozens of undocumented, under-documented, and mis-documented features. Along with the new material, Colin Moock has meticulously revised the entire text to conform to Flash MX best-coding practices. From sending data between two movies to creating getter/setter properties, the new edition of this book demystifies the often-confusing new features of Flash MX, giving developers easy access to its powerful new capabilities.

Sharon Steuer Designed to dazzle and inspire but not leave you in the dust, this beautifully designed volume lets you follow along as it dissects real-world projects from some of today’s top Illustrator artists. In the process it teaches you how to use Adobe Illustrator CS2 in ever more creative ways for your own projects. Best-selling author and award-winning artist Sharon Steuer uses lavish, four-color images of real-world Illustrator CS2 projects to show what’s possible and then employs simple, step-by-step instructions to explain the techniques that will produce those effects. You’ll find comprehensive coverage of all of Illustrator CS2’s most important capabilities. Veteran users will be grateful to explore Illustrator CS' new features, including the new drawing tool, Live trace, Live paint, SVG-T and much more. On the CD, you'll find many examples of artwork from the book, third-party software, demos, samples, and more.

Nolan Hester This book uses simple step-by-step instructions, loads of screen shots, and an array of time-saving tips and tricks, serving both as the quickest route to Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 mastery for new users, and a handy reference for more experienced digital photographers.
 
Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2 features numerous new features and enhancements including the ability to enhance specific areas of a photo, edit JPG, TIFF, and more than 190 camera raw file formats non-destructively, print more efficiently, and sharpen smartly.
 
Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2: Visual QuickStart Guide is the definitive task-based tutorial for digital photographers needing a jump-start on the complete range of features available in Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2. Master this workflow application quickly and completely by working from beginning to end or just skip to the task you need right now. It’s all covered, everything from importing, organizing and processing images, to managing and showcasing your images—whether it’s one shot or an entire shoot.

Alan Moore, Jacen Burrows The master of comic book writing shares his thoughts on how to deliver a top-notch script! The main essay was originally written in 1985 and appeared in an obscure British fanzine, right as Moore was reshaping the landscape of modern comics, and has been tragically lost ever since. Now Avatar brings it back in print, collected for the first time as one graphic novel, and heavily illustrated by Jacen Burrows. Moore also provides a brand new essay on how his thoughts on writing have changed in the two decades since he first wrote it.

Maddox Lumberjacks, pirates, and Chuck Norris all agree that there is but one arbiter of manliness, and he has but one name: Maddox. The longtime proprietor of the absurdly popular website, The Best Page in the Universe, Maddox has thoughtfully collected his vast masculine wisdom for the first time in a useful reference work, The Alphabet of Manliness. Since men of course communicate with others only under duress, this book may be the sole resource for those starved for answers about basic manly subjects such as urinal etiquette, road rage, and beef jerky.

We thought that Neil Strauss, who chronicled his own transformation from "half a man" to a "Master Pickup Artist" in the one-of-a-kind bestseller, The Game, might be the perfect expert to assess Maddox's guide, and indeed, he came through with the sharpest take we've yet seen on the book, which you can read below.

Guest Reviewer: Neil Strauss

Over the past decade, Neil Strauss, former pop music critic for The New York Times, has established himself as the go-to guy for diarists of decadence, collaborating with rockers Marilyn Manson, Mötley Crüe (on the instant trash classic, The Dirt), and Dave Navarro, as well as porn star Jenna Jameson, on a series of witty and frank tales of celebrity excess. And then he stepped out on his own with one of our top-selling books of 2005, The Game, his bizarre, hilarious, and surprisingly uplifting memoir of joining a secret society of "Master Pickup Artists." Keep your eye out: he has many more smart and shocking projects on the way.

I am fully convinced after reading the entire A-Z of The Alphabet of Manliness that the author of its 26 essays, Maddox, is a nerd. And not just because he correctly alphabetizes the entries, but because he can recite the names of every Castlevania game, talks about hacking and IP addresses and various mathematical theorems, and has just spent way too much time analyzing in minute detail every aspect of the penis, its functions, and its influence on the male brain. However, Maddox's lack of bulging biceps may actually be a positive thing. Because having him become the symbol and policy-maker of all things alpha male just may be one of the most subversive byproducts of the Internet since file-sharing.

If you are new to the world of Maddox and unfamiliar with his website www.thebestpageintheuniverse.com, here's how you will react to the book: When you read the dedication——"to the love of my life, my soul mate, and the greatest person in the world: me"—you will think for a moment that you have encountered one of the most unlikable narcissists in the world. When he calls a woman a "bitch" on page 2, you may actually begin to hate him. But if you stick with it, by the time you get to the middle of the book and are fully immersed in his over-active, over-systematic, testosterone-addled imagination, you will begin to realize that Maddox just may be the Andy Kaufman of his time, in possession of the driest wit you've ever encountered. The middle of the book also happens to be the home of Maddox's finest essays. In his contribution to the geek canon of Chuck Norris worship, he spuriously notes that Norris uses hippies as firewood, intercepts letters to Santa Claus to use as toilet paper, and eats "bread, cheese, some tomato paste and a handful of basil, which sounds like pizza, but it's not because Chuck Norris doesn't want to give the Italians the credit."

In general, there are two types of humor in this book: things that are funny because they're wrong ("a pirate's semen is indestructible") and things that are funny because they're right (his entire essay on urinal etiquette).

By the time you get to his views on the quickie, in which he describes a sexual encounter with his girlfriend that involves her never showing up and him passing out drunk and getting robbed, you may be bookmarking his website. And by the time you turn to the last page, you'll be flipping back to the first, reading it again and looking for the jokes you missed because you were too busy being shocked, offended, and slightly titillated. In short, The Alphabet of Manliness just may be one of the smartest paeans to stupidity ever written. —Neil Strauss

What's more manly than crushing a can against your eye, Maddox-style? Mastered that advanced skill? Move on to Maddox's short quiz below, prepared exclusively for Amazon.com, and find out whether you might be one of the new breed of men, the "hetrosexual."

Straight Is the New Gay

by Maddox

In a world where metrosexuals—stylish, well-groomed, and sharply dressed men—have taken the center stage in defining the new masculinity, small pockets of men are starting to emerge, rebelling against the status quo. This new breed of man has rejected a lifestyle of wine tasting, pedicures, and excessive cultural awareness (i.e., any cultural awareness). This newly born response to metrosexuality is gaining momentum like never before, calling back to a day when men proudly wore plaid, ate liver and onions, and smelled like motor oil by choice. This modern man has come to be known simply as: the hetrosexual.

Hetrosexual men aren't afraid embrace their masculinity. They eat, drink, and sleep like real men: fully engorged. There's no such thing as a "fashion faux-pas" in the world of hetrosexuality. In fact, even the use of the phrase "faux-pas" draws the ire of the hetrosexual man in the form of beatings and social isolation (preferably both). These are men who refuse to be pigeonholed into the constraints of sexual ambiguity, and gladly welcome every opportunity to crotch-wrestle a hot babe. Hetrosexuals are making it cool to be straight again; straight is the new gay.

Think you might be a hetrosexual? Take the following quiz to find out:

1. How much should you tip a hairstylist?

A) 10%

B) 15%

C) 20%

If you answered, you're wrong. Hetrosexuals don't go to hair stylists.

2. Cologne?

A) Yes

B) No

The correct answer is B) No. Acceptable fragrances for men are: sweat, grease, rum, or some combination thereof.

3. Which language do you speak?

A) French

B) English

C) Both

D) Neither

The answer is B) English. French is the language of love, and men don't love anything. At best, there are varying degrees of "like," and even then, men don't like anything that much.

4. When dining at restaurant, you should

A) Push aside your friends and wrestle over the best seat

B) Wait until the maitre d' seats you

C) What's a maitre d'?

The correct answer is A and C. A, because if you don't secure the best spot at the table, you may find yourself in the position of having to engage in small talk with your guest. And C, because of the answer to question 3 above.

If you answered all of the questions correctly, congratulations: you are the winner. The important thing to keep in mind is that you are a man (unless you are not), and nobody can take that away from you.

Glenn Fabry Here in a single volume is a practical, comprehensive training course for budding illustrators working to master comic book art, graphic novels, fantasy posters, sci-fi book covers and illustrations, and computer games. The author, a highly successful fantasy artist, teaches the basics of human anatomical drawing and musculature, as well as perspective and composition. He then instructs on ways to distort, develop, and transform the human figure, giving it features that range from monstrous or magical to super-agile or larger than life. Detailed artist’s references and step-by-step instructions show how to build bodies that truly stretch the imagination—mighty alien warriors, kick-boxing cyber-punks, and mega-muscled superheroes, to name just a few. Art students also learn how to show their characters in many different dynamic action poses, such as flying, spinning, punching, and jumping, as well as how to express each character’s emotions through facial expressions. More than 300 color illustrations.

Alan J. Porter, Chris Roberson, Jake Black, Dennis O'Neil Compiled by a veteran writer of the comic series, this collection of essays explores Batman’s motivations and actions, as well as those of his foes. Batman is a creature of the night, more about vengeance than justice, more plagued by doubts than full of self-assurance, and more darkness than light. He has no superpowers, just skill, drive, and a really well-made suit. One of the most recognized superheroes ever created, Batman has survived through campy TV shows and films, through actors like Adam West, Michael Keaton, and Christian Bale. It covers both the silly and the solemn, asking questions like Why is the Joker so good at pushing Batman’s buttons? What does Batman’s technology say about the times? Why are Batman’s villains crazier than average? and Why is Batman the perfect, iconic American hero?

Will Brooker

Simson Garfinkel, Michael K. Mahoney Cocoa is an object-oriented development environment available in Apple's Mac OS X environment. Mac OS X, a unified operating system and graphical operating environment, is the fastest growing Unix variant on the market today. Hard-core Unix programmers, developers who cut their teeth on classic Mac operating systems, and developers who cherished NeXTSTEP, the decade-old system on which today's Cocoa is based — all are flocking to Cocoa, and they need a lot more practical information than is currently available from Apple. There is a lot to learn. Building Cocoa Applications is an ideal book for serious developers who want to write programs for the Mac OS X using Cocoa. It's a no-nonsense, hands-on text that's filled with examples — not only simple and self-contained examples of individual Cocoa features, but extended examples of complete applications with enough sophistication and complexity that readers can put them to immediate use in their own environments. Building Cocoa Applications takes a step-by-step approach to teaching developers how to build real graphics applications using Cocoa. By showing the basics of an application in one chapter and then layering additional functionality onto that application in subsequent chapters, the book keeps readers interested and motivated. Readers will see immediate results, and then go on to build onto what they've already achieved. The book is divided into four major parts: Part I introduces the Mac OS X graphical user interface (Aqua) from a developer's point of view, Cocoa developer tools (such as the Interface Builder, Project Builder, and gdb debugger), object-oriented concepts, the Objective-C language in which Cocoa is written, and the basics of Cocoa programming itself. Part II focuses on building the first complete application, Calculator, a simple four-function calculator. The chapters in this part of the book extend the application, piece by piece, by introducing such features as nibs, icons, delegation, resizing, events, and responders. Part III focuses on building an application called MathPaper, which is similar to a word processor but which instead solves mathematical expressions the user supplies. The chapters in this part of the book extend MathPaper by developing both the front and back ends using a variety of Cocoa classes and methods. They introduce Cocoa'sdocument-based architecture, tasks, pipes, Rich Text format, handling document files, and using Quartz to draw in windows. Part IV focuses on building the GraphPaper application, a more complex multithreading application that graphs mathematical functions in multiple dimensions and that uses mouse-over capabilities to identify graph points. The chapters in this part of the book add more advanced Mac OS X features such as multithreading, color, mouse events, zoom buttons, pasteboards, services, preferences, and the defaults database. By the end of the book, readers who have built the applications as they have read will have a solid understanding of what it really means to develop complete and incrementally more complex Cocoa applications. The book comes with extensive source code available for download from the O'Reilly web site, along with an appendix listing additional resources for further study.

Jeffrey Kahan, Stanley Stewart The comic-spawned Spider-Man franchise, despite its “pop” status, demonstrates important trends in literature. It raises numerous key questions for developing a better understanding of literary elements and devices. How, for example, do writers involved with the franchise reconcile divergent plotlines and characterizations that appear in multiple serials, and in a number of concurrent depictions of the hero in comic series, television series and films? Readers may be surprised to realize that Shakespeare grappled with similar topics in his Henry VI series, and, for instance, in the character Falstaff’s reemergence from death in The Merry Wives of Windsor. This textbook inspires a greater appreciation for literature by studying important literary themes found in comics. By deconstructing comics, it raises critical thinking about literature, a crucial skill for understanding language and composition. Chapters discuss DC, Marvel and other comics’ varied attempts at portraying race, politics, economics, business ethics and democracy; responses to the Cold War and the events of September 11; and portrayals of prisons and capital punishment. Each chapter offers a series of questions that stimulate further reading, writing and discussion. Photographs are included as well.

Raymond Obstfeld, Franz Neumann Creating realistic, well-developed characters that readers can believe in is one of the biggest challenges authors face. Careers for Your Characters makes it easier than ever by providing detailed descriptions for the ninety-nine most written-about professions—everything from ad executives to waiters. Each entry consists of a written description and a breakdown of the fine details, including education, salary, jargon, hazards, rewards and a typical daily schedule.

Packed with informative sidebars and call-outs, this reader-friendly, interactive reference enables writers of any skill level to create characters whose professional lives resonate with realistic details and insider insights.

Nancy Kress The indispensable Write Great Fiction series continues with an in-depth look at three of the most important tools in the writer's craft: character, emotion and viewpoint. With the tips and techniques in this book, readers will learn how to:

-Create compelling characters that readers believe in -Write scenes that deliver an unforgettable emotional impact -Distinguish among the many different kinds of viewpoint, and choose the one which is right for their story

Each chapter is filled with examples drawn from the work of successful writers and action-and- results exercises that help readers take their lessons to the keyboard.

Aaron Hillegass Suitable for anyone with a little C/C++ programming experience who wants to create software for the newest Mac platform, Cocoa Programming for Max OS X provides a slickly packaged and approachable tutorial that will get you started creating state-of-the-art Mac programs.

The smart presentation style and easy-to-understood code examples help make this text an excellent resource. (It also helps that Aaron Hillegass is a truly engaging writer.) He first explains how the legacy NeXTSTEP platform has evolved into Cocoa on the Mac OS X. Beginning with short examples illustrating the actual Cocoa tools in action, the author gets you started with simple programs for a random-number generator, a raise calculator, and other comprehensible examples. Rather than just listing APIs and classes, the emphasis is on hands-on Cocoa development. An early standout section provides a nice tour of essential Objective-C features you'll need to know to use Cocoa effectively.

This book covers the several dozen built-in Cocoa controls, from basic text and buttons to more advanced widgets (including lists and tables). Subsequent sections look at user interface design (using the Interface Builder to create nib files) and how to add programmatic processing behind the visual layout. Along the way, the author introduces coverage of essential Cocoa APIs for strings, arrays, and dictionaries. Later chapters look at saving and loading documents (and user defaults) and how to tap the powerful graphics abilities available in Cocoa. (Besides image and basic drawing, there are short sections on PDF support and printing.)

More advanced user interface features get their due by the end of the book, including cutting and pasting data through the Cocoa pasteboard and also adding drag-and-drop support. Final sections look at creating new controls for use with the Interface Builder palette, and, briefly, how to use Java with Cocoa (an option that the author doesn't necessarily recommend). Throughout this text, the author provides more advanced, challenging problems at the end of each chapter for the "more curious" reader. This approach keeps beginners from getting lost in the details of Cocoa development, but gives the more advanced reader something more to do.

While there are comparably fewer books on Mac OS X compared to other platforms, readers are lucky to have this one available. Anyone who wants to get onboard with Cocoa development will be well served by this title. It's a fine tutorial that earns high marks for its approachable, clear examples and an excellent presentation by an author who knows his stuff and, better yet, knows how to teach it to others. —Richard Dragan

Topics covered: Brief history of the Mac platform (from NeXTSTEP to Mac OS X), basic Cocoa development in Objective-C, using Project Builder and Interface Builder tools, tutorial to Objective-C (instances, variables, using classes, arrays and other containers, custom classes), the Objective-C debugger, basic Cocoa controls (building user interfaces), tables and data sources, event handling and delegates, archiving documents (encoding and decoding, saving and loading documents), Nib files, window panels, saving and retrieving user defaults (including using dictionary classes), notifications (observers and more on delegates), alert panels, localization (including string tables, a English and French example, the nibtool utility), custom views and drawing, drawing images and mouse events (plus coordinates systems and autoscrolling views), responders and keyboard events, fonts and strings (including attributed strings and PDF support), pasteboards and nil-targeted actions, using Objective-C categories (a code reuse feature), drag-and-drop support, timers, sheets and drawers, formatting strings, printing support, on-the-fly menu updating, text editing with text views, basic tutorial for using Java with Cocoa, and custom Interface Builder palettes (and inspectors).

Gary Spencer Millidge With film adaptations of legendary comic books and graphic novels hitting the bestseller lists, the medium of comics has never been more popular. To create your own comic book or graphic novel, you need to know the techniques, rules, and tips exclusive to the comic trade.

In Comic Book Design, Gary Spencer Millidge, the award-winning creator of the Strangehaven comics, guides you through. . .
•Creating story line concepts and original designs
•Designing characters and creating background locations
•Drawing in pencil and ink or digitally
•Page layout and grid structure
•Lettering, word balloons, and Color
•Covers and publication design

With profiles of leading comic artists such as Rian Hughes, Chris Ware, and Chip Kidd, and examples right from the most successful comics on the market, Comic Book Design is the must-have for every beginning comic book artist.

Will Eisner Based on the popular course Eisner taught for several years at New York's School of Visual Arts, this lovingly written book on visual storytelling contains an accumulation of his ideas, theories and advice on the practice of graphic story-telling and the uses to which the comic book art form can be applied. Whether you're a film student, literature student, artist or simply a fan of good storytelling, you'll love this book filled with Eisner's cartoons.

Allan Menezes Created by Joseph Pilates almost 80 years ago, this popular exercise regimen combines elements of yoga and bodywork to strengthen the core muscles of the abdomen while increasing flexibility in the legs, arms, and smaller muscle groups. Long embraced by dancers, Pilates has been adopted by professional athletes. This book covers Joseph Pilates's complete floor program. Introductory chapters outline the history and philosophy of Pilates, including the eight principles of the method. The book guides readers through basic, intermediate, and advanced routines, with detailed descriptions of each exercise and nearly 200 step-by-step photographs. A special chapter lists exercises for alleviating specific conditions such as back, ankle, and shoulder pain. Worksheets allow readers to monitor their progress.

Tami D. Cowden, Caro LaFever, Sue Viders Writing great fiction heroes and heroines.

Julie Oswin, Steve Walton "Essential Know-How for a New Era in Wedding Photography

*Wedding photography is one of the most lucrative areas for professional and aspiring photographers *Working photographers must master the less formal contemporary style of wedding photography to win clients *The highly acclaimed authors are featured regularly in the bridal and photography press

Today's wedding photography has to tell a story and capture the emotions and atmosphere of the day in a natural, photojournalistic style. This user-friendly manual reveals the techniques necessary to shoot in this contemporary style, whether for professional photographers looking to update their methods or aspiring photographers wanting to break into this high-end market.This comprehensive guide: *Guarantees successful shooting by using comprehensive checklists, professional tips, proven templates and step-by-step photographs *Includes advice on pre-wedding planning, presentation of images to the couple and everything in between *Inspires achievement in photographers of all levels through the authors' inimitable shooting style An A to Z directory of professional tips makes vital knowledge easy to find."

Coolio THERE'S ONLY ONE THING THAT COOLIO'S BEEN DOING LONGER THAN RAPPING: COOKING

Coolio started making thirty-minute meals when he was ten years old and has since developed a whole new cuisine: Ghetto Gourmet. His recipes are built around solid comfort foods with a healthy twist that don't break the bank. Start your Ghetto Gourmet adventure with some "Soul Rolls," follow-up with "Finger-Lickin', Rib-Stickin', Fall-Off-the-Bone-and-into-Your-Mouth Chicken," and fi nish off with "Banana Ba-ba-ba-bread" sweetened with golden honey. Chapters such as "How to Become a Kitchen Pimp," "Chillin' and Grillin'," and "Pasta Like a Rasta" will guide you through creating 5 star meals at a 1 star price. You can't fi nd fusions like Blasian (black Asian) or Ghettalian (ghetto Italian) in restaurants, but you can have them cooking away in your kitchen faster and easier than ordering takeout. As Coolio says, "All you need is a little bit of food, and a little bit of know-how."

Martin Sitter If you are new to both DVD authoring in general and DVD Studio Pro in particular, the 17 chapters in this book are the road map you need. Every page is loaded with information, tips, screen shots, and tutorials designed to walk you through the process of creating a DVD step by step. Starting with basic discussions of different digital formats and the audio and video encoding processes; to the rundown of the DVD Studio Pro interface and the best methods for setting up a project; to building menus, scripts, and importing graphics; Peachpit Press's DVD Studio Pro Visual QuickPro Guide thoroughly covers the process of DVD authoring.

Most important, this book doesn't end with the basics. The final section, consisting of four chapters, details how to create a 16:9 formatted disc, multiple language tracks, adding subtitles, scripting, and creating hybrid DVDs. The clear and concise text and graphics make this book a pleasure to work through, and the supple paper and binding help it stay flat on your desk while working with it. Although no CD-ROM (or DVD) is included, there is an accompanying Web site for downloading examples cited in the book, and even a bonus project not listed in the book.

Peachpit's DVD Studio Pro Visual QuickPro Guide is the perfect companion to Apple's professional-grade DVD authoring package. Authoring a professional and polished DVD can be an elusive goal, especially for the beginning DVD creator. Learning to use a tool like Apple's DVD Studio Pro with this QuickPro Guide, however, is possibly the fastest and easiest way to climb the hardest part of the learning curve. —Mike Caputo

The Writers of The Daily Show, Jon Stewart Amazon.com Exclusive Content
Jon Stewart on America (The Book)

Sure, we could write a pithy blurb telling you all about America (The Book), by Jon Stewart and the writers of The Daily Show, but it's much easier—and funnier—to let Jon Stewart tell you all about this irreverent new book himself.

Watch Jon Stewart talk to Amazon.com customers about America (The Book) from the set of The Daily Show. 

Read or listen to our exclusive interview with Jon Stewart. 

Read our exclusive Election 2004 interview with Jon Stewart.

R. D. Reynolds, Bryan Alvarez This detailed tell-all of the demise of the former top pro wrestling company World Championship Wrestling explores the colorful personalities and flawed business decisions behind how WCW went from being the highest-rated show on cable television in 1997 to a laughable series that lost 95 percent of its paying audience by 2001. Behind-the-scenes exclusive interviews, rare photographs, and probing questions illustrate with humor and candor how greed, egotism, and bad business shattered the thriving enterprise. Wrestling fans will devour the true story of this fallen empire, which in its heyday spawned superstars such as Sting, Bill Goldberg, and the New World Order.

John G. Blair Boudoir photography does not require its subject to be a beautiful, physically flawless woman. It does not require the use of extravagantly expensive equipments, props, and studio space. In fact, the very essence of boudoir photography is the idea that its subject is not a professional model and is not even necessarily in the boudoir. No longer confined to the idea of heavy makeup, lingerie, and the bedroom, the new age of boudoir photography is casual, sensual, and sexy. That is the premise behind Digital Boudoir Photography. Firmly grasping the freedom that digital photography affords, this book offers tips and techniques that allow anyone with a digital camera the ability to take attractive photographs of any woman.

Michael Burns There's a powerful fascination in creating fantasy characters and their bewitching environs on the computer screen. Written for anyone who works- or plays-in 3D graphics, Digital Fantasy Painting supplies a treasury of tested techniques that can be applied to any illustration software package. This extraordinary resource is packed with dozens of step-by-step exercises for designing photo-realistic 3D creatures and their strange worlds. Readers will see how to produce simple human skin and bone textures, as well as an entire host of ethereal creatures such as ghosts, spirits, robots, and cyborgs. They'll discover how to design realistic atmospheric effects as well as capture the surreal world of nightmares, futurescapes, and planetscapes. Computer artists will also find tested techniques for modeling, surfacing, staging, and lighting as well as creating water, glass, and other true-to-life motion effects. Digital Fantasy Painting features a dazzling showcase of the very best fantasy artwork, complete with dozens of tips, examples, and shortcuts that help put the creative process on the fast track. Plus, a special section outlines the myriad software illustration packages available on the market today. For graphic designers, fans of fantasy and science fiction art, and anyone else who wants to try their hand at creating incredible creatures on their computer screen, here is a definitive one-stop resource.

Roderick Macdonald This book considers the advantages that digital photography and image-editing software have brought to photographing the nude. Filled with stunning images of nudes photographed by a pro, this true art book reveals detailed explanation on how to take and improve photos. Focusing on the subject from image capture to image output, this guide provides step-by-step instructions for reproducing the beauty of the human form. Using full-color in an effective portrait layout, this book is aimed at those new to photography who have been enticed by the falling prices of basic, but efficient, digital cameras.

John Beardsworth Digital technology has transformed the entire photographic workflow—and Adobe™ Lightroom, the latest application from the creators of Photoshop®, is at the forefront of the revolution. With this in-depth guide, photographers can make the most of the cutting-edge software and understand the entire image-making process. It’s filled with expert tips and techniques, and comprehensively covers both professional essentials (setting up photo libraries, white balance) and advanced topics like studio branding. You’ll learn how to have a photo shoot, whittle it down to the best shots, and fine-tune their tone, balance, and exposure. Zoom in, zoom out, crop, and undo, all without altering the original. Put the file on CD or the web for clients or friends, then make picture-perfect prints, in color, mono, or sepia. The possibilities are amazing!

Scott Adams You loved the comic strip; now read the business advice.

Or should that be anti-business advice? Scott Adams provides the hapless victim of re-engineering, rightsizing and Total Quality Management some strategies for fighting back, er, coping. Forced to work long hours, with no hope of a raise? Adams offers tips on maintaining parity in compensation. Along the way, Adams explains what ISO 9000 really is and assesses the irresistibility of female engineers.

The breath-taking cynicism of the strip should prepare readers for the author's no-holds-barred attack on management fads, large organizations, pointless bureaucracy and sadistic rule-makers who glory in control of office supplies. Readers of the on-line Dilbert Newsletter are familiar with the kind of e-mail Adams receives from his readers — and may even have sent a few of those missives themselves. Along with illustrative strips, e-mail messages provide excruciating examples of corporate behavior which compel the reader to agree with Adams when he insists that "People are idiots".

The final chapter offers a model for would-be successful businesses to follow: the OA5 model. It's introduced with little fanfare, no outrageous promises and just the right amount of self-deprecation.

Douglas Allen Box Often overshadowed by complicated lighting techniques or advanced postproduction tips, this resource seeks to remind the professional photographer of the fundamental importance of a subject's pose. Conveniently designed in two-page spreads—a striking portrait on one side, a comprehensive how-to of the strategies used on the other—this reference includes countless techniques for studio sessions as well as outdoor and location shoots, with individuals or groups, male or female clients, and in sitting, standing, or lying poses. With advice from a well-known and respected professional, it covers all the basics, showing how to emphasize a client's assets and downplay perceived flaws, how to create a cohesive, engaging group photo, how to use natural elements on location to enhance an image, and how to ensure that the result flatters the subject and adds the essential professional polish to an image.

Adam Warren Not only is costumed crimefighter "Empowered" saddled with a less-than-ideal superhero name, but she wears a skintight and cruelly revealing "supersuit" that only magnifies her body-image insecurities. Worse yet, the suit's unreliable powers are prone to failure, repeatedly leaving her in appallingly distressing situations... and giving her a shameful reputation as the lamest "cape" in the masks-and-tights business. Nonetheless, she pluckily braves the ordeals of her bottom-rung superheroic life with the help of her "thugalicious" boyfriend (and former Witless Minion) and her hard-drinking ninja girlfriend, not to mention the supervillainous advice from the caged alien demonlord watching DVDs from atop her coffee table... From Adam Warren - writer/artist of the English-language Dirty Pair comics (the original "Original English-Language Manga" before OEL was cool), and writer of Livewires, Gen13 and Iron Man: Hypervelocity - comes Empowered, a butt-kicking, bootylicious superhero lampoon that raises the bar for long-john lust and low-brow laughs. Remove all previous notions of superhero entertainment from your puny mind... and prepare to be Empowered!

Adam Warren Costumed crimefighter Empowered is briefly overjoyed to find herself in the running for one of the superhero community's annual Caped Justice Awards (or "Capeys") - only to discover that her nomination was merely a cruel joke by her obnoxious superpeers. But when the masked masses face a cataclysmic reckoning for such previous heartless hoaxes, can our perpetually struggling heroine overcome her resentment and save the day? And can she cope with the further problems posed by crossdressing vigilantes, dying wishes from preteen wannabe supervillains, telepathic "booty calls," a deeply depressed ninja, bedroom "cosplay" conflicts with her boyfriend, and even . . . Hummer® fu? Each volume comes shrinkwrapped with an 18+ advisory sticker.

Adam Warren

Adam Warren Empowered returns for further misadventures, as a distress-prone girl wonder struggling with life on the superheroic C-list! Clad - or unclad, as fate would too often have it - in her embarrassingly revealing and maddeningly unreliable supersuit, she fights a neverending battle against overly sensitive supervillains, irrationally envious superheroines, and her own body-image issues! Meanwhile, her boyfriend, Thugboy, plays with fire when he foolhardily attempts to compliment his profoundly insecure sweetheart on the awe-inspiring power of her... well, booty. And her often-inebriated gal-pal, Ninjette, pursues a drunken and ultimately disastrous mission to acquire Empowered some respect - by force if necessary! All this, plus crossword-obsessed goons, speech-impaired superbeasts, "Ninjas Gone Wild," and even a few self-help hints from nigh-omnipotent cosmic overlords! You know, the usual.

Adam Warren As if life as an often-struggling superheroine weren't already hard enough, now costumed crimefighter "Empowered" discovers that another female superhero is ripping off her distress-prone persona - and cashing in, big-time! Even worse, her relationship with live-in boyfriend (and semi-reformed Witless Minion) Thugboy has run afoul of an extremely literal set of "power issues"! Worse yet, a singularly bloodthirsty and ruthless ninja clan is gunning - no, make that shurikening - for Emp's best friend and karaoke partner, Ninjette! Can our unlucky but still plucky heroine prevail over all these obstacles as well as further threats posed by foreign fanfiction outrages, her own supersuit's attempts to manipulate her self-esteem, and the revelation of (gasp!) her real name?

Ikari Studio With its adult-oriented themes, Erotic Manga is perfect for grown-up fans of Japanese comics, as well as aficionados of adult art.

This book is a comprehensive guide that will teach artists of all levels, from beginner to advanced, the basics of creating characters from shonen and soft-core, hentai comics. This book includes an easy step-by-step tutorial for progressing from initial black-and-white sketch to final color piece, accompanied by practical suggestions, hints, and tips.

Dossie Easton, Catherine A. Liszt

James V. Smith

Joe McNally When it comes to photography, it’s all about the light.

After spending more than thirty years behind the lens—working for National Geographic, Time, Life, and Sports Illustrated—Joe McNally knows about light. He knows how to talk about it, shape it, color it, control it, and direct it. Most importantly, he knows how to create it...using small hot shoe flashes.

In The Hot Shoe Diaries, Joe brings you behind the scenes to candidly share his lighting solutions for a ton of great images. Using Nikon Speedlights, Joe lets you in on his uncensored thought process—often funny, sometimes serious, always fascinating—to demonstrate how he makes his pictures with these small flashes. Whether he’s photographing a gymnast on the Great Wall, an alligator in a swamp, or a fire truck careening through Times Square, Joe uses these flashes to create great light that makes his pictures sing.

Donald Deschner Have you ever wished you could start over with a "clean slate"? The author, an anonymous private investigator, specializes in helping clients "get lost" permanently. Now his expertise can help you create a totally new person, with bona fide birth certificate, Social Security number, passport, driver's license, credit cards—all you need to break with your past and start anew.

Robert Acosta, Ben Dunn, Fred Perry, David Hutchison How to Draw Manga: Next Generation features exclusively created art, step-by-step guides, designs, and comments from the hottest rising stars of manga. Don't miss out on this chance to learn invaluable lessons that will catapult you to stardom.

Jack Davis, Ben Willmore Wouldn't it be great if you could have two of the world’s most sought-after Photoshop teachers sitting next to you at your computer as you navigate through the infinite possibilities of your digital photographic darkroom? How to Wow: Photoshop for Photography, second edition, is the next best thing. It’s the brainchild of two Photoshop powerhouses—-Jack Davis and Ben Willmore, both world-renowned authors and educators, who have developed an effective way to help you reach your full creative potential.

Jack and Ben guide you step-by-step through real-world projects, with an emphasis on uncompromising quality, last-minute flexibility, and go-home-at-night speed! You'll receive tips and techniques on everything from streamlining your workflow to solarizing without chemicals to balancing out skin tones. Whether it’s optimizing the color and tone of your image, retouching cosmetic undesirables, reconstructing priceless heirlooms, or creating sepia color treatments, you'll be given the tools at every stage of the creative process in order to learn How to Wow!

The book begins with the essentials of workflow (including color management, the new Adobe Bridge, and Camera Raw 3), and then moves on to adjusting and optimizing and retouching and repairing. Next comes the fun stuff, with projects focusing on enhancing and exaggerating aspects of your photos for maximum impact, followed by projects on color and black-and-white treatments and artistic effects and overlays. Finally, there is a chapter devoted to combining your images and creating custom photo collages using instant Wow Tools Presets, available on the CD-ROM accompanying the book.

James N. Frey Written in a clear, crisp, accessible style, this book is perfect for beginners as well as professional writers who need a crash course in the down-to-earth basics of storytelling. Talent and inspiration can't be taught, but Frey does provide scores of helpful suggestions and sensible rules and principles.

An international bestseller, How to Write a Damn Good Novel will enable all writers to face that intimidating first page, keep them on track when they falter, and help them recognize, analyze, and correct the problems in their own work.

James N. Frey "Damn good" fiction is dramatic fiction, Frey insists, whether it is by Hemingway or Grisham, Le Carre or Ludlum, Austen or Dickens. Despite their differences, these authors' works share common elements: strong narrative lines, fascinating characters, steadily building conflicts, and satisfying conclusions. Frey's How to Write a Damn Good Novel is one of the most widely used guides ever published for aspiring authors. Here, in How to Write a Damn Good Novel, II, Frey offers powerful advanced techniques to build suspense, create fresher, more interesting characters, and achieve greater reader sympathy, empathy, and identification.

How to Write a Damn Good Novel, II also warns against the pseudo-rules often inflicted upon writers, rules such as "The author must always be invisible" and "You must stick to a single viewpoint in a scene," which cramp the imagination and deaden the narrative. Frey focuses instead on promises that the author makes to the reader—promises about character, narrative voice, story type, and so on, which must be kept if the reader is to be satisfied. This book is rich, instructive, honest, and often tellingly funny about the way writers sometimes fail their readers and themselves.

Stephen Colbert Congratulations—just by looking at this webpage, you became 25% more patriotic.

From Stephen Colbert, the host of television's highest-rated punditry show The Colbert Report, comes the book to fill the other 23¿ hours of your day. I Am America (And So Can You!) contains all of the opinions that Stephen doesn't have time to shoehorn into his nightly broadcast.

Dictated directly into a microcassette recorder over a three-day weekend, this book contains Stephen's most deeply held knee-jerk beliefs on The American Family, Race, Religion, Sex, Sports, and many more topics, conveniently arranged in chapter form.

Always controversial and outspoken, Stephen addresses why Hollywood is destroying America by inches, why evolution is a fraud, and why the elderly should be harnessed to millstones.

You may not agree with everything Stephen says, but at the very least, you'll understand that your differing opinion is wrong.

I Am America (And So Can You!) showcases Stephen Colbert at his most eloquent and impassioned. He is an unrelenting fighter for the soul of America, and in this book he fights the good fight for the traditional values that have served this country so well for so long.

Please buy this book before you leave the store

Elizabeth Benedict Even though writing about sex probably ranks on the joy scale somewhere between reading about it and having it, Elizabeth Benedict feels that many writers don't do justice to the act. So she has developed a novel idea: a guide book for fiction writers seeking to create better sex scenes. Benedict, a teacher in Princeton University's Creative Writing Program, doesn't concern herself with pornography but rather with a contention that sex scenes are pivotal in carrying the plot, story and character of some novels. Her point is emphasized through many interviews she conducted with authors on their experience with and views on writing about sex. Now, if she would only visit the film industry . . .

Glenn O'Brien There is something powerfully erotic about Catholic schoolgirl uniforms. The blazer and sweater, the immaculate white shirt, the pleated skirt, the knee socks and athletic shoes are the stuff of legend. It's a charming fetish, as psycho-sexually resonant as the black motorcycle jacket or the nurse's uniform. Intended to bring equal status to the student body, and to induce its wearers to behave, the uniform embodies a nascent rebellion against sexual repression. With Katlick School, Sante D'Orazio has produced a witty visual narrative of flirtation, starring a beautiful Latina schoolgirl named Kat. She holds her notebook like a shield to ward off advances. But with her skirt hiked up and snaps-not buttons-on her shirt, there's a hint of come-hither. We soon discover that the pleated skirt conceals "Snoopy" bikini underwear and a tattoo. Kat is willing to trade her trainers for thigh-high spike heeled boots-and as the fantasy unfolds-we get to see her entirely out of uniform. Obviously she is committed to rounding out her education...As the Red Hot Chili Peppers sang, "Catholic school girls rule!"

Inc., Apple Computer For Mac developers of all levels, Learning Cocoa provides an approachable guide to creating applications using Objective-C and the programming tools built into the new Mac OS X operating system. This efficiently packaged text will help virtually anyone master basic Mac application development.

Written by the experts at Apple Computer, Inc., this book sets an admirable standard of clarity for a basic programming tutorial. It begins with the fundamentals of object-oriented programming and Objective-C, the default language used for the Mac platform. Much of the book consists of hands-on exercises for creating a variety of simple Mac applications built on the Cocoa application framework (a rich set of classes that make it simple to create software). Learning Cocoa is not just a source of raw source code; rather, its salient feature is a series of step-by-step guides to working with Mac OS X tools like the Interface Builder and the built-in Apple IDE. From a simple "Hello, World" program and a currency converter to a "Travel Advisor" application (with information on three countries) and a "To Do" application, the book provides exercises that show you all the steps for creating software using a variety of tools.

The discussion of the user interface widgets that are available in the Mac OS X is excellent. You will learn how to design interfaces (which are saved to .nib files), and about the Model-View-Controller architecture recommended by Apple for designing reusable and flexible classes. Later in the book, the same classes are reused in a multiple-document version of the Travel Advisor program. Sample code for a custom widget that displays a calendar will show you how to build custom components.

Throughout this book, there's plenty of information on the nuts and bolts of building successful applications for the Mac OS X, especially memory and resource management. There're also plenty of diagrams and background on the architecture of using Cocoa application framework classes together to create software.

Even Mac beginners should benefit from this concise and well-presented text. It will have you writing simple applications fast, while giving you the latest on the classes and tools available on the newest Mac OS X. —Richard Dragan

Topics covered:Overview of the Cocoa framework for Mac OS XObject-oriented programming tutorialObjective-C language quick startMac application development tools (including Project Builder, Interface Builder, and command-line tools)A "Hello, World" application in CocoaFundamental Cocoa classes (including collections and controls)Memory and resource management in CocoaA "Currency Converter" application (including basic GUI programming with Cocoa components)Event-handling basicsUsing table views and data sourcesPersistence and "flattening" Cocoa objectsA "Travel Advisor" sample application (including the Model-View-Controller architecture)The Cocoa Multiple-Document ArchitectureA "To Do" scheduling application (including a custom calendar component and timers)Deployment in Cocoa (application settings, icons, and document types)Compiler optimization in CocoaReference for basic graphics in Cocoa

Watson-Guptill

Rod Ashford Lighting a nude can be challenging. How does a photographer turn a naked body into a work of art? Learn the top tips and techniques from Lighting for Nude Photography, now in a fully revised and updated edition of the acclaimed original. The photographs, including full nude art photos, semi-nude erotica, and much more, are beautiful and inspiring, and the lighting on each is fully explained and diagrammed. New, updated text, diagrams, equipment, and techniques reveal how to use every type of lighting from natural light, to simple lighting setups, to complex multi-light arrangements.

* Completely up to date, designed for today’s photographers

* Useful information on every aspect of lighting the nude

* Beautiful full nudes and semi-nudes to inspire and illuminate

Steve Bavister Lighting for portraits requires a broad range of skills and a way with people. This title examines the work of top photographers to uncover precisely how their highly successful portraits are achieved. A broad range of styles and skills are covered, ranging from simple set-ups using one light, to more advanced approaches using multiple lighting techniques. The examples shown are of known and unknown faces, and the functions range from commercial, to editorial and personal work.

Roger Hicks, Frances Schultz 400 nudes—and the lighting setups that make them look so good

* A best-seller, available for the first time in paperback!
* Side- and plan-view diagrams of the lighting setup for each shot
* Includes a directory of photographers, valuable for art directors and designers

Available for the first time in paperback, the top-selling Lighting the Nude reveals the lighting secrets of the top photographers working today. It showcases more than 400 images of the nude, in a wide variety of styles. Each photograph is accompanied by detailed lighting diagrams and an explanation of what makes the shot work. Both beginners in this branch of photography and seasoned pros will find plenty of inspiring lighting ideas and practical guidance. Lighting the Nude is an essential reference for every studio photographer’s bookshelf.

Scott McCloud Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics was published in 1993, just as "Comics Aren't Just for Kids Anymore!" articles were starting to appear and graphic novels were making their way into the mainstream, and it quickly gave the newly respectable medium the theoretical and practical manifesto it needed. With his clear-eyed and approachable analysis—done using the same comics tools he was describing—McCloud quickly gave "sequential art" a language to understand itself. McCloud made the simplest of drawing decisions seem deep with artistic potential.

Thirteen years later, following the Internet evangelizing of Reinventing Comics, McCloud has returned with Making Comics.

Designed as a craftsperson's overview of the drawing and storytelling decisions and possibilities available to comics artists, covering everything from facial expressions and page layout to the choice of tools and story construction, Making Comics, like its predecessors, is also an eye-opening trip behind the scenes of art-making, fascinating for anyone reading comics as well as those making them. Get a sense of the range of his lessons by clicking through to the opening pages of his book, including his (illustrated, of course) table of contents:

Maxim Jakubowski This follow-up volume to the black-and-white Mammoth Book of Erotic Photography celebrates the female form through these studies by top photographers around the world, as well as some impressive new talents. It features the work of 78 photographers (many of whom specialize in nudes), with approximately 8 images each, as well as a short biography and picture of each contributor. Included is a larger than ever number of female photographers, many of whom intriguingly practice the art of self portraiture-a chance to see how gender can sometimes influence the subtle way of looking at the body. There's also a father and daughter team; a photographer who also appears as a model in two other portfolios; the grandson of the famed American photographer Edward Weston; a mix of professional and amateur photographers; and contributions from the UK, USA, Spain, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Austria, Russia, Argentina, France, Israel, Italy, Poland, Norway, Switzerland, Japan, Australia, Canada, Czechoslovakia, and Holland

Chris George Electronic flash not only brings light to a photograph, it can be an important artistic tool—if you’ve acquired the knowledge to use it creatively. To master those skills, digital photographers need only turn to this complete reference. Packed with inspirational photos, it takes the mystery out of flash, covering every type of equipment and explaining such essentials as guide numbers, sync speeds, white balance, and more. Photographers will see how fill flash can decrease contrast and shadows in outdoor portrait photography, understand how to control the light using bounce and multiple flash techniques, and expertly employ high-speed and rear curtain synchronization to create impressive motion-blur images. Everything you need to know is here—including a section on studio flash and computer processing.

Art Spiegelman Volumes I & II in paperback of this 1992 Pulitzer Prize-winning illustrated narrative of Holocaust survival.

The immensely popular Grand Theft Auto game series has inspired a range of reactions among players and commentators, and a hot debate in the popular media. These essays from diverse theoretical perspectives expand the discussion by focusing scholarly analysis on the games, particularly Grand Theft Auto III (GTA3), Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (GTA:VC), and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (GTA:SA). Part One of the book discusses the fears, lawsuits, legislative proposals, and other public reactions to Grand Theft Auto, detailing the conflict between the developers of adult oriented games and various new forms of censorship. Depictions of race and violence, the pleasure of the carnivalistic gameplay, and the significance of sociopolitical satire in the series are all important elements in this controversy. It is argued that the general perception of digital changed fundamentally following the release of Grand Theft Auto III. The second section of the book approaches the games as they might be studied absent of the controversy. These essays study why and how players meaningfully play Grand Theft Auto games, reflecting on the elements of daily life that are represented in the games. They discuss the connection between game space and real space and the many ways that players mediate the symbols in a game with their minds, computers, and controllers.

Few figures have captured Hollywood's and the public's imagination as completely as have medieval heroes. Cast as chivalric knight, warrior princess, "alpha male in tights," or an amalgamation; and as likely to appear in Hong Kong action flicks and spaghetti westerns as films set in the Middle Ages; the medieval hero on film serves many purposes.

This collection of essays about the medieval hero on film, contributed by scholars from a variety of disciplines, draws upon a wide range of films and medieval texts. The essays are grouped into five sections, each with an introduction by the editors: an exploration of historic authenticity; heroic children and the lessons they convey to young viewers; medieval female heroes; the place of the hero's weapon in pop culture; and teaching the medieval movie in the classroom. Thirty-two film stills illustrate the work, and each essay includes notes, a filmography, and a bibliography. There is a foreword by Jonathan Rosenbaum, and an index is included.

Keith Sparrow Synopsis All the techniques you need to create great manga characters, with step-by-step drawings in pencil, ink, and color. Learn how to draw bodies and faces, eyes and hair, hands and feet, expressions, and gestures, across a range of human and fantasy creatures. Includes galleries of finished art to show you the full range of what you can achieve, including scores of hairstyles, facial expressions, hand gestures, and body poses for you to practice, and add variety to your work. Pages of clothing, accessories and gadgets, weapons and vehicles for you to draw and color and incorporate into your manga illustrations and stories, together with ideas for animals, including monsters and cute fantasy creatures, to help you build skill and confidence.

Estudio Joso, Fernando Casaus The popularity of manga continues to row, inspiring interest in learning how to draw in this exciting style of comics. Estudio Joso creates the ultimate guide to illustration—384 pages of manga instruction. The Monster Book of Manga is divided into sections focusing on the most figures and themes—Girls, Boys, Samurais, Monsters, and more. Each illustration is broken down into six stages accompanied by step-by-step instructions, taking the artist from initial back-and-white sketches to the final color piece. They are all accompanied by practical suggestions, hints, and tips.

Ikari Studio The popularity of manga—Japanese cartooning—continues to grow, inspiring interest in learning how to draw this exciting style of comics.

From comic illustration Ikari Studio comes the ultimate guide on how to draw manga. The Monster Book of Manga: Fairies and Magical Creatures focuses on these figures of wonder. Each illustration is broken down into six stages of creation and is accompanied by step-by-step instructions, taking the artist from an initial black-and-white sketch to final color piece. Each drawing is also accompanied by practical suggestions, hints, and tips.

This monster-size manual is the must-have book for anyone interested in learning how to draw manga, appealing to beginning and advanced artists alike.

Ikari Studio This exciting new volume in the Monster Book of Manga series features stunning art and detailed instructions on how to illustrate adventurous, bold, sexy, and self-possessed female manga characters.

The Monster Book of Manga: Girls includes more than fifty exercises that cover every female archetype in modern manga: the student, the Gothic Lolita, the athlete, the music idol, the warrior, the science-fiction heroine, and many more. It pairs advanced illustration techniques with step-by-step instructions, and features an original cast of girls, fierce and timeless enough to take the spotlight of any manga cartoon. This lush, full-color manual is perfect for beginning and advanced manga artists alike.

Ikari Studio The popularity of manga—Japanese cartooning—continues to grow, inspiring interest in learning how to draw this exciting style of comics.

From comic illustration Ikari Studio comes the ultimate guide on how to draw manga. The Monster Book of More Manga is divided into sections focusing on the most popular manga figures and themes—Girls, Boys, Samurai, Monsters, and Computer. This new volume contains brand new sections on Mecha, Villains, and Animals, and a special section on Fairies. Each illustration is broken down into six stages accompanied by step-by-step instructions, taking the artist from an initial black-and-white sketch to the final color piece. They're also accompanied by practical suggestions, hints, and tips.

From beginner to advanced, this monster-size manual is the must-have book for anyone interested in learning how to draw manga.

Desmond Morris

Desmond Morris Internationally bestselling author and world-famous human behaviorist Desmond Morris turns his attention to the female form, taking the reader on a guided tour of the female body from head to toe. Highlighting the evolutionary functions of various physiological traits, Morris's study explores the various forms of enhancement and constraint that human societies have developed in the quest for the perfect female form. This is very much vintage Desmond Morris, delivered in his trademark voice: direct, clear, focused, and communicating what is often complex detail in simple language. In THE NAKED WOMAN, Desmond builds on his unrivalled experience as an observer of the human animal while tackling one of his most fascinating and challenging subjects to date.

Peter Burian, Bob Caputo An updated, accessible guide to photography from two leading experts in the field, the National Geographic Photography Field Guide 2nd Edition appeals to both aficionados and amateurs with its encyclopedia coverage of everything from choosing film to virtual photography. Featuring up-to-the-minute information on new film, filters, cameras, lenses, and advances in digital photography as well as step-by-step instruction, this revised guide is an indispensable tool for creating superb pictures.

Professional photographers Peter K. Burian and Robert Caputo reveal every secret and component involved in creating photos, including the basics of composition, color, and light; manipulating film, exposure, and shutter speeds; coping with situations from weather to fast-moving subjects; techniques for shooting architecture, close-ups, portraits, and underwater adventures; plus a new section explaining black and white photography—all in a user-friendly and easy-to-reference format. With exquisite images and useful tips from award-winning professionals, this inspiring and informative volume illustrates the keys to turning everyday situations into vibrant visual moments to cherish forever.

Pascal Baetens Follow practical advice from nude photography experts and learn to create picture-perfect results every time with this master class in photographing the human form. Everything's covered, from working successfully with amateur and professional models to getting great results in your own home or outdoors. Find tips on setting up a shoot, lighting effects, and post-production techniques, so you can turn a good picture into a really great one. Get inspired by a stunning Photographer's Gallery featuring the work of an international panel of photographers, from Andreas Bitesnich and Sylvie Blum, to Allan Jenkins and Almond Chu.

Bill Lemon In Outdoor Glamour Photography Bill Lemon explains, image by image, how each was created and the equipment used, as well as the time of day that produces the best image and how to use the light to your advantage. Also included is a discussion of scouting for locations that fit one model better than another, backgrounds, depth of field issues, and much more. Reading light and not being afraid of it is the secret to wonderful pictures. In this new book, Lemon teaches you everything you need to know about light as it pertains to outdoor photography. In addition, he introduces the use of fill flash in certain situations and the use of what nature has provided for bounced light. The step-by-step, image-by-image information contained in this book is highly enjoyable, whether you are interested in learning the process or simply want to gaze at breathtaking, tasteful artwork.

Stephen King Short and snappy as it is, Stephen King's On Writing really contains two books: a fondly sardonic autobiography and a tough-love lesson for aspiring novelists. The memoir is terrific stuff, a vivid description of how a writer grew out of a misbehaving kid. You're right there with the young author as he's tormented by poison ivy, gas-passing babysitters, uptight schoolmarms, and a laundry job nastier than Jack London's. It's a ripping yarn that casts a sharp light on his fiction. This was a child who dug Yvette Vickers from Attack of the Giant Leeches, not Sandra Dee. "I wanted monsters that ate whole cities, radioactive corpses that came out of the ocean and ate surfers, and girls in black bras who looked like trailer trash." But massive reading on all literary levels was a craving just as crucial, and soon King was the published author of "I Was a Teen-Age Graverobber." As a young adult raising a family in a trailer, King started a story inspired by his stint as a janitor cleaning a high-school girls locker room. He crumpled it up, but his writer wife retrieved it from the trash, and using her advice about the girl milieu and his own memories of two reviled teenage classmates who died young, he came up with Carrie. King gives us lots of revelations about his life and work. The kidnapper character in Misery, the mind-possessing monsters in The Tommyknockers, and the haunting of the blocked writer in The Shining symbolized his cocaine and booze addiction (overcome thanks to his wife's intervention, which he describes). "There's one novel, Cujo, that I barely remember writing."

King also evokes his college days and his recovery from the van crash that nearly killed him, but the focus is always on what it all means to the craft. He gives you a whole writer's "tool kit": a reading list, writing assignments, a corrected story, and nuts-and-bolts advice on dollars and cents, plot and character, the basic building block of the paragraph, and literary models. He shows what you can learn from H.P. Lovecraft's arcane vocabulary, Hemingway's leanness, Grisham's authenticity, Richard Dooling's artful obscenity, Jonathan Kellerman's sentence fragments. He explains why Hart's War is a great story marred by a tin ear for dialogue, and how Elmore Leonard's Be Cool could be the antidote.

King isn't just a writer, he's a true teacher. —Tim Appelo

Roger Hicks, Frances Schultz, Alex Larg, Jane Wood The best-selling lighting guide—now updated with even more photos and diagrams

* 100 great photographs and the setups behind them
* Side- and plan-view diagrams for each photo
* Revised and expanded to include more pictures and the latest technology

Now available revised and updated in paperback, the best-selling Photographing People is an inspiring and comprehensive showcase of exciting work from photographers around the world—and full explanations and diagrams of the lighting setups behind each picture. Portraits, fashion, and glamour photography are included here, all accompanied by detailed 3D diagrams plus expert explanations and advice on solving problems that might arise in similar situations. Helpful to beginners and professionals alike, this book is packed with inspiring photographs—and all the details needed to re-create the lighting and obtain remarkable results.

Russell Hart Say "cheese"! Taking great pictures is a snap when you follow the tips, tricks, and techniques packed inside Photography For Dummies, which takes you all the way from choosing the right film to using your computer to turn your photos into greeting cards or Web-ready online images. Whether you're taking photos for fun or profit, you'll find expert advice on all the angles — from taking family pictures to action, sports, and travel shots — alongside hundreds of color and black-and-white examples that show you how to make your good pictures great, and your great pictures even better. Geared for novice photographers armed with automated point-and-shoot cameras, Photography For Dummies takes you step-by-step through the entire photographic process, from choosing the right film and photo processing to using your camera's special features. And when you're ready to take the next step in photography with digital cameras, you'll find all sorts of helpful information right here, all explained in clear, easy-to-understand language.

Linnea Dayton, Jack Davis Walk into a design studio and you just might see the popular The Photoshop 5.0/5.5 Wow! Book on the shelf. If there's a technique or effect that would work perfectly for the job at hand, whether it's adding a chrome or chiseled-in-stone look, or simply better understanding the usage of the lasso tool, designers, photographers and illustrators know to reach for this book.

The recent edition incorporates the updated features of Photoshop versions 5 and 5.5, including layer effects, "magnetic" options for many of the selection tools, actions that "record" a sequence of commands, and the art history brush that applies textured strokes to an image.

Even with all this great new content, the original organization mirrors from previous editions. The first two chapters cover fundamentals. Subsequent chapters begin with basics pertinent to the techniques covered, but each entry can be read independently. The techniques are shown in step-by-step instructions accompanied by full-color illustrations and, for many, digital files on the CD-ROM accompanying the book.

It's possible to dive right into the middle and tackle whatever problem is currently facing you. Silhouetting out a person's portrait is always tricky, particularly getting a good selection around hair. With potential time-wasters like this, Photoshop 5.0/5.5 Wow! is a lifesaver. And readers who have put off learning how to make full use of layers will find a whole chapter and a fun set of "dress up" files on the CD-ROM (digital equivalents of paper dolls) that will have you shamelessly proficient in no time.

With hundreds of illustrations, tips for making work quicker and easier, a gallery of work and advice from experienced Photoshop users, illustrated demos for each filter, and so much more, it's quite a hefty book. The CD-ROM has stock images, plug-ins, actions, and tutorial files. From "Making a Mezzotint" to "Making Buttons from Photos," The Photoshop 5.0/5.5 Wow! book is The Joy of Cooking for digital image-making. It'll have you cooking with Photoshop in no time. —Angelynn Grant

Topics covered: Step-by-step instructions on tools, techniques, and effects in Adobe Photoshop 5.0/5.5, including using layers, masks, and channels; enhancing photographic images by solarizing, applying a mezzotint, and other effects; making well-executed collages; using filters; painting effects; going from Illustrator to Photoshop and vice versa; adding special effects such as multicolor glow and others; using the new Web tools in version 5.5. CD-ROM contains tutorial files with before-and-after images; try-out applications and plug-ins; actions, gradients, brushes, stock photos, and a teacher's guide that outlines course projects using The Photoshop Wow! Book.

Linnea Dayton, Cristen Gillespie Ever since Photoshop version 2.5, The Photoshop Wow! Book has enlightened and inspired graphic designers, illustrators, and photographers around the globe. This newest edition delivers the familiar award-winning mix of explanations and step-by-step tutorials for creating both commercial and fine-art images, with tips and beautiful galleries that distinguish this book as the most inspiring Photoshop resource around. Redesigned for easy reference, Photoshop CS/CS2 Wow! also includes new short features in which professional photographers and designers let you in on their creative secrets for quick solutions. The DVD-ROM includes hundreds of before-and-after tutorial files, Layer Styles and Patterns, as well as Actions, gradients, custom tools, and other goodies. You’ll learn the most innovative techniques for creating and enhancing images, graphics, and type, including: 

• How and when to use the new features in Photoshop CS and CS2, including the Spot Healing Brush, Lens Correction, Lens Blur, Vanishing Point, and Variables

• How to build your skill with familiar Photoshop features such as blend modes, adjustment layers, channels, and filters

• How to focus attention on the subject of a photo, retouch a portrait, tint an image, or convert a color image to black-and-white

• How to bring out your inner artist with Photoshop’s sophisticated brushes and vector-drawing tools

• How to create dazzling special effects for type and graphics—from custom textures and realistic materials to animation and rollover for the web

• How to build a striking layout or a seamless composite, including the little details that make a big difference in the art of creating illusions

• How to keep your creations organized with layers, layer set or groups, layer comps, and Smart Objects

Scott Kelby Scott Kelby, the best-selling Photoshop author in the world today, once again takes this book to a whole new level as he uncovers the latest, most important and most exciting new Adobe Photoshop CS2 techniques for digital photographers.

 

This major update to this award-winning, record-breaking book does something for digital photographers that's never been done before—it  cuts through the bull and shows you exactly "how to do it." It's not a bunch of theory; it doesn't challenge you to come up with your own  settings or figure it out on your own. Instead, Scott shows you step-by-step the exact techniques used by today's cutting-edge digital  photographers and, best of all, he shows you, flat-out, exactly which settings to use, when to use them, and why. That's why the previous  version of this book took the digital photography world by storm.

 

But now, his new CS2, version is even bigger, even better, and exposes even more of the pros most closely guarded secrets, including a special chapter which shows, for the first time ever, step-by-step how to how to set-up Photoshop's color management. He does it by throwing out all the theory, all the techno-babble, and all the confusing charts and graphs and instead just shows you exactly what you need to do (and 

nothing more).

 

LEARN HOW THE PROS DO IT

Each year Scott trains thousands of professional photographers how to use Photoshop, and almost without exception they have the same questions, the same problems, and the same challenges—and that's exactly what he covers in this book. You'll learn:

  The sharpening techniques the pros really use (there's an entire chapter on, just this!)The pros tricks for fixing the most common digital photo problems fast!The step-by-step set-up for getting what comes out of your printer to match exactly what you saw on screenThe retouching secrets of how the pros retouch portraitsHow to process raw digital camera images (plus how to take advantage of all the new Camera Raw features of CS2!)How to color correct any photo without breaking a sweat (you'll be amazed at how easy it is–once you know the secret)A whole chapter on the latest, most requested Photoshop special effects
How to reduce noise, deal with lens problems, avoid halos, and moreHow to show your work like a pro!Plus a host of shortcuts, workarounds, and slick "insider" tricks to send your productivity through the roof!

 

If you're a digital photographer and you're ready to learn the "tricks of the trade"—the same ones that today's leading pros use to correct,  edit, sharpen, retouch, and present their work; then this is the book for you.

"The Professional Photographer magazine Hot1 Awards represent a must-have list of this year's hottest, most sought-after new products. Selected by a panel of working professional photographers, the awards are chosen based on innovation, overall quality and value for price. In its seventh year, the Professional Photographer Hot1 Awards are one of the biggest product competitions in the industry, representing 60 categories of gear from a couple hundred different companies."
—Jeff Kent, Special Hot1 Awards Editor / Editor at Large Professional Photographer magazine

Barry Jackson

Tim Shelbourne Adobe Photoshop CS2 offers professional and amateur photographers, artists, and designers unprecedented opportunities to manipulate images on their personal computers, but it's a complex application that can take years to master. With Photoshop Photo Effects Cookbook, you don't have to be a Photoshop expert to create sophisticated effects. The 61 easy-to-follow, fully illustrated recipes in the book show you how to use Photoshop CS2 to simulate classic camera and darkroom techniques and special effects-without making you first learn Photoshop inside and out.

Author and digital artist Tim Shelbourne has assembled a collection of real-world techniques that you'll be able to apply immediately to your own images, whether you're working on photographs or digital illustrations. Digital files of the examples in the book are available for download, so you can easily follow along as Tim takes you through each recipe.

The book covers: Creating graphic art effects: posterization, watercolor, pen and ink, woodcutWorking with lighting effects: neon glows, lens flares, fire and flame effectsSimulating natural phenomena: rain, clouds, rainbows, lightning, snowAdapting traditional techniques: film grain, contrast masks, hand-tintingAdding motion blurs and other special effectsSimulating textures: stone, metal, glass, plasticMaking mattes, vignettes, frames, borders, signaturesAssembling multi-layered images and photomontages

Packed with hundreds of full-color photographs, step-by-step instructions, and at-a-glance panels with many practical tips, Photoshop Photo Effects Cookbook is all you need to quickly and easily create professional graphic art effects from almost any image source.

James Scott Bell The second book in the Write Great Fiction series, Plot & Structure offers clear and concise information on creating a believable and engaging plot that readers can't resist. Written by award-winning thriller and suspense author James Scott Bell, this handy instruction guide provides:

* Easy-to-understand techniques on every aspect of plotting and structure, from brainstorming story ideas to building scenes, and from using subplots to crafting knock-out endings

* Engaging exercises, perfect for writers at any level and at any stage in their novel

* Practical and encouraging guidance from one of the most respected writers publishing today

Full of diagrams, plot brainstormers, and examples from popular novels, mastering plot and structure has never been so simple.

Billy Pegram With detailed discussions and eye-catching, dynamic images, this guidebook shows professional photographers how to masterfully create beautiful images of a model to achieve any creative objective. Instructions illustrate basic poses as well as a host of subtle variations to provide photographers with an endless array of looks for editorial fashion shots, athletics, glamour or nude photography, and shots designed to show curves, reveal personality, or showcase the hands, hair, or legs. This comprehensive resource also provides expert advice on conducting a successful session, how to work with the model, how to work with a support staff of image stylists, and tips for designing a high-quality portfolio. Additional lessons provide a start-to-finish analysis of four different shooting sessions, each with a different model and a different objective.

J.J. Allen This well-illustrated book offers guidance on lighting the subject and background, and covers exposure and lighting ratio. A thorough discussion on posing shows both traditional poses and twists on the tried-and-true standards. 128 pages, 8 1/2 x 11 , Softbound.

Jeff Smith Photographers learn how to gauge the needs of their clients before placing them into a stale, preconceived "women's," "men's," or "children's" pose that hardly fits the client's personality or preferences. Provided with a two-pronged approach to fail-safe posing, photographers learn first to determine what the mood of the portrait should be and how to use an appropriate posing genre-traditional, casual, glamour, or journalistic. Photographers are then shown how that genre can be used as a basis to produce a pose that best suits the client, allowing them to create dynamic yet natural-looking pose that the subject-and the intended recipient-will love.

Bill Lemon Every nude and lingerie photography shoot will benefit from the camera techniques, posing strategies, and prop selections discussed in this handbook from a seasoned model photographer. Sections on evaluating and modifying light, changing the setup, and ensuring the correct white balance combined with a gallery of set, prop, and posing possibilities provide photographers with the technical and artistic inspiration they need to visually enhance a model's assets and create the perfect mood. A variety of situations are covered, including photographs in water, of couples, and of tattoos. Based on the author's 20 years of experience, this handbook emphasizes the photographer's need to cultivate trustworthy relationships with their models in order to ensure the ease and trust that makes for stunning results.

Rasmus Lerdorf, Kevin Tatroe PHP is far more than a cult language or open-source icon. It's a remarkably capable language that's well integrated with lots of technologies—notably mSQL and MySQL database servers—and quite easy to learn. Programming PHP helps you up the PHP learning curve, very nearly guaranteeing that you'll find in its pages an example that illustrates every fundamental aspect of the language and its most important extension modules. Plus, there's some cool advanced stuff, like recipes for manipulating images, working with Extensible Markup Language (XML) content, and generating Adobe Acrobat (PDF) files. Rasmus Lerdorf invented PHP and quarterbacks its ongoing evolution, so there's little question of the content's authority.

The authors use a Talmudic style to explore PHP's capabilities and explain them to their readers, meaning that they like to present code and commentary in close formation, with each enhancing the other. Typically, they'll present a capability generically and show the relevant code. Then they'll dig into variations on the theme, calling attention to required code alterations as they go. This is a book about PHP itself, so practically no attention is paid to PHP Builder or other development tools. Regardless, this book will help you solve programming challenges with PHP, and enable you to write efficient, attractive code. —David Wall

Topics covered: The PHP programming language, for people who are coming to PHP with a bit of programming experience in other languages or who want to expand their existing PHP knowledge beyond the basics. Sections deal with the core language, as well as HTTP session management, database connectivity (to MySQL and Oracle, as well as with PHP Extension and Application Repository—PEAR), graphics file manipulation, XML parsing, and PDF creation. There are instructions for building a PHP extension library in C, as well as a function reference and guide to existing extensions.

Larry Wall, Tom Christiansen, Jon Orwant Larry Wall wrote Perl and he wrote Programming Perl. Better yet, he writes amusingly and well—all of which comes across in this latest edition of the definitive guide to the language.

Like Topsy, Perl just grew, and as a result the need for a third edition came about. It's now over 1,000 pages, which it needs to be, as it performs several different duties. First, it's an introduction to the Perl language for those who are new to programming; also, it's a guide for those who are coming from other languages; and, finally, it's a Perl language reference.

Among Larry Wall's other pursuits is being a linguist, and it's perhaps for this reason that Perl is a peculiarly flexible language with many routes to achieving the same ends, as the authors ably demonstrate. It's also extensible in several ways, designed to work with many other languages. Also, as it's largely interpreted, programs written in Perl tend to run unmodified on a variety of platforms—although platform-specific Perl modules and programming practices are also discussed.

A major strength of Programming Perl is the way subject areas are approached from several directions. This constant shift of viewpoint eliminates blind spots in the reader's understanding and provides a pleasing echo of the way Perl itself can take many routes from here to there.

Because the Perl community is both knowledgeable and active, the language covers much more ground here than in the previous edition. Even if you have both previous editions, you'll want this latest version—if only for the new jokes. —Steve Patient, amazon.co.uk

Larry Wall, Randal L. Schwartz The second edition of the Camel Book is more than 600 pages long and full of excellent instruction and sound advice. Topics include all the good stuff from the first edition plus Perl 5 features such as nested data structures (ever made a hash of arrays of hashes?), modules, and objects. From "Howdy World" to making your own modules, this book has it all.

Elaine Weinmann, Peter Lourekas If you're like most designers and publishers who work with QuarkXPress, you've been waiting a long time for this release. In fact, you're probably one of the last people on your block to start using Mac OS X or Windows XP because you've been waiting for your most important application—QuarkXPress—to offer native support for either. Well, the wait is finally over, and here to get you up to speed on it quickly and easily is QuarkXPress 6 for Windows and Macintosh: Visual QuickStart Guide. In these pages, best-selling authors and veteran educators Elaine Weinmann and Peter Lourekas use task-based, step-by-step instruction and loads of visual aids to provide a soup-to-nuts grounding in QuarkXPress 6, including all that's new in this ground-breaking release: project files containing multiple layouts, Synchronized Text, improved table creation, and more. Progressing from the basics of planning and designing layouts, working with text, and creating and importing graphics to more advanced topics like exporting documents as Web pages and adding hyperlinks, this indispensable reference covers it all.

Dennis O'Neil One of the most intriguing comic book heroes of the 1980s was DCs The Question, the faceless, morally conflicted avenger based in corrupt Hub City, whose adventures were written by longtime Batman writer Dennis ONeil.An expert in martial arts, The Question also delved into Eastern philosophy while taking on crime and crooked politicians. In this second volume, The Question tracks a killer to a distant island prison and becomes involved with a gambling crimelord.

Dennis O'Neil One of the most intriguing comic book heroes of the 1980s was DC's The Question, the faceless, morally conflicted avenger based in corrupt Hub City, whose adventures were written by longtime Batman writer Dennis O'Neil. An expert in martial arts, The Question also delved into Eastern philosophy while taking on crime and crooked politicians.

Secrets of the Question's past are revealed in this new, fifth volume, as The Question runs afoul of The Riddler and faces martial arts expert Lady Shiva.

Dennis O'Neil

Dennis O'Neil One of the most intriguing comic book heroes of the 1980s was DC’s The Question, a faceless, morally conflicted avenger based in corrupt Hub City. An expert in martial arts, The Question also delved into Eastern philosophy while taking on crime and crooked politicians.

In this new, fourth volume, The Question tries to find a manufacturer of deadly plastic guns and attends his high school reunion. Then, as the election of a new mayor is being held, a tornado tears through Hub City, killing the new mayor-elect and leaving an unlikely bureaucrat to fill his shoes.

Dennis Miller Dennis Miller is the bebop king of comedy, the pope of the pissed-off. Ranting Again is his latest collection of rapid-fire riffs on everything from animal rights to the Internet, harvested from his hugely successful TV show. Miller's wit is razor-sharp, and his rants have the controlled spontaneity of good jazz—giving them the energy of a live performance even in book form. Like Lenny Bruce and George Carlin, Miller uses his quick, no-holds-barred delivery to chip away at some of our most ridiculous cultural obsessions. He may occasionally pick easy targets, but he hits them hard and funny. Here he is discussing the perennially touchy topic of violence in the media:

"We're all looking for someone to blame if our kid goes bad, and the media is a defenseless target for the clusterfuck of self-righteous rhetoric that passes for intelligent debate these days.... The truth is, TV isn't the biggest influence on your kids. You are. There's probably more real emotional violence and bad vibes at the average American family dinner table than in an entire season of Highlander, not to mention better acting."

Now, Dennis is not for the faint of heart, and you won't agree with everything he says, but something in here will make you laugh out loud. Of course, that's just my opinion, I could be wrong. —Simon Leake

Dennis Miller The Emmy Award-winning host of the HBO cable-TV network's Dennis Miller Live presents a best-selling collection of hilarious tirades on such themes as drug-addled sports figures, do-nothing politicians, and other outrages. Reprint.

Scott McCloud Scott McCloud's Reinventing Comics, the sequel to his groundbreaking work Understanding Comics, is a study of two revolutions: a failed one and a potential one. His 1993 book was not only a chronicle of the potential breakthrough of comics (which he redefined as "sequential art") into a legitimate art form but a sterling example itself of the medium's astonishing untapped potential. Now, seven years later, he chronicles the failure of the comic book industry to fulfill that promise, but also explores how the movement can be restarted, particularly by utilizing the resources of another spectacularly successful revolution, the Internet. In the first half of Reinventing Comics, an elegantly clean example of comic art in McCloud's trademark bold black-and-white style, the author outlines how hype, speculation, and artistic burnout led to the genre's decline. He then lays out 12 paths toward a new revolution of comics, including creators' rights, industry innovation, public perception, gender balance, and diversity of genre, which are then explored with such innovative intelligence that, as with his earlier work, the conclusions he comes to are fascinating for both artists and nonartists alike.

Three of his paths, however, are of particular interest to anyone who wants to know how the Internet will affect both our lives and the livelihoods of future artists. Understanding Comics, with its brilliant how-to guide on marrying image and language, has become an indispensable reference for many Web designers. Now McCloud returns the favor by focusing on how the digital revolution will influence production, delivery, and the art form of comics itself. Informative without being pedantic, controversial without being argumentative, and always entertaining, this is both a worthy sequel to the author's brilliant original and a work that opens up the potential for an entirely different direction for sequential art in the realm of cyberspace. —John Longenbaugh

Jim Shooter

Kris A Heinlein, Rozz M Heinlein Make way for the next sexual revolution! Plenty of books describe the mechanics of sex but barely scratch the surface. The Sex and Love Handbook explores the most sensual sexual organ: the human brain. Explore the emotions, philosophies, risks and rewards of reaching toward your next sexual level. Nothing is out of bounds except dishonesty and hypocrisy. Learn how to be more fulfilled and to better fulfill your lover(s). Discover the ultimate sexual YOU, and make it a reality. ¿The book is fantastic.¿ —Tony Lanzaratta, NASCA International ¿Your book was fun to read! I felt like I was having a conversation.¿ —Melissa Me of PolyChi

Christopher Hart Maybe you’ve noticed. Today’s superheroes and action heroes aren’t as brawny and muscular as they used to be. In fact, almost all the characters in comic books and on TV have a fresh, new look—simplified, streamlined, edgier, with a hint of anime/cartoon design, and appealing to kids and adults alike. Now Christopher Hart, the superhero of how-to-draw books, has come to the rescue of artists everywhere with Simplified Anatomy for the Comic Book Artist. Anatomy has always been a difficult subject, but for this book Hart uses his straightforward approach to show a simpler way. In clear step-by-step illustrations and text, he shows: how to draw streamlined figures in poses; body types and muscles; the mechanics of facial expression; how to know which muscles to eliminate in a simplified drawing; grouping muscles; muscle contours versus bone contours; muscles in classic comic-book poses like flying and punching; and more. Now artist can stop struggling with the fine points of anatomy and start creating modern looking heroes and heroines with help from Simplified Anatomy for the Comic Book Artist.

Frank Miller Because of a shocking ending to the first Sin City book, many people wondered how successful Frank Miller could be with future tales of his no-holds-barred city noir. Enter Dwight McCarthy, a clean-living photographer who tries to avoid trouble because he knows what he's capable of. His tactics don't do him much good when a girl from his past (who he can't say no to) shows up and professes her love for him. When he finds out she's in way over her head, it looks as though trouble has found him. What's going to happen? You guessed it: people get hurt.

Frank Miller Dark Horse proudly releases the latest Sin City collection from comics master Frank Miller. This new book features never-before-collected stories in Miller`s harsh, dramatic black-and-white style, with some highlighted in a special color. This volume also features new art by Miller created especially for this collection. Collects The Babe Wore Red; Silent Night; Lost, Lonely, & Lethal; Sex & Violence; Just Another Saturday Night; and more.

Frank Miller This 126-page epic spilled out of Frank all at once. He doesn't want to serialize it — he wants you to read it in one sitting. So we're bringing it to you in a single package! It features Miho on roller-blades, Dwight on adrenaline, and the Sin City mob on clean-up detail! If you've never visited the town without pity, it's time to book your travel plans.

Frank Miller Can anything be darker than noir? Try Frank Miller's Sin City series. The tasty Hell and Back features Wallace, a brooding artist with a decided talent for hurting people, and Esther, a stunningly beautiful actress accidentally mixed up in a slavery ring that extends far and deep enough to transcend the word conspiracy. The tale twists, turns, and backtracks, teasing the reader with hints of terror to come—until the explosive climax. Miller's art is exactly right for his words; he uses more black than white, and color only when appropriate. The chapter dealing with Wallace's drug hallucinations is beautiful, heartbreaking, and terrifying in turn. Readers interested in the human dark side should find out what fans of Sin City already know: Frank Miller has seen it and wants to share. —Rob Lightner

Frank Miller In a Sin City short story, "The Babe Wore Red," Frank Miller deviated from his stark black-and-white artwork by adding tiny bits of color throughout the story. The girl's dress was red, her lips were red—you get the picture. In That Yellow Bastard, the fourth Sin City graphic novel, Miller's experiment with yellow ink is also a tremendous success. The setup is simple. On the last day before he retires, Hartigan, an old cop, gets a call about an 11-year-old girl who has been kidnapped by a lunatic. Hartigan has got just one more thing to do before he retires: save the girl. Saving her is the easy part, because Hartigan has uncovered something really bad that is not going to stop until it catches up with him. That Yellow Bastard is nerve-racking to the very end.

Frank Miller With The Big Fat Kill Frank Miller is at it again with another comics packed with guns, lovers, losers, and surprises. In Sin City's Old Town, the prostitutes run the show. "The cops stay out. That leaves the girls free to keep the pimps and the mob out." Sounds like an OK place, right? It is until a pushy, loud-mouthed guy who has had one too many drinks comes into Old Town and gets himself killed by the ladies. When they find out who he is, they realize that "it'll be war. The streets will run red with blood. Women's blood."

Frank Miller Sin City launched the long-running, critically acclaimed series of comics novels by Frank Miller. Having worked on some of the most important comic books in the 1980s, including Marvel Comics's Daredevil and the influential Batman graphic novel The Dark Knight Returns, Miller was already a heavy-weight cartoonist, but he hit his stride with Sin City. It gave him the freedom that doesn't come when working on someone else's characters. While the art isn't as polished as in later books, it is in many ways the quintessential Sin City story: tough-guy Marv finds the girl of his dreams, an incredible beauty named Goldie. But when Goldie is murdered on their first night together, Marv scours the bars and back alleys of Sin City to find her killer in hopes of avenging her death.

Lee Varis Achieving accurate skin tones is one of the most challenging tasks in digital photography. Master this challenge with professional photographer Lee Varis as he covers a range of skin: women and men, young and old, various tones, in-studio and outdoors, tattoos, and more. His step-by-step tutorials and before-and-after illustrations demonstrate various techniques for topics such as digital-specific lighting challenges and what can and cannot be done in post-process.

A free CD-ROM accompanies the book and contains sample image files to use while following the tutorials, plus equipment recommendations and technical reference materials that enhance and reinforce the instruction.

Order your copy of this practical guide today and get a complete start-to-finish approach to integrating everything from posing models to shooting and retouching candid scenes.

John K. Ousterhout Ousterhout's Tcl and the Tk Toolkit was one of the first books on Tcl (tool command language) and Tk (toolkit) and has become one of the classics in the field. Written by the developer of Tcl and Tk, the text takes a no-nonsense approach to the language, describing the elements of Tcl and Tk in programming-reference-style detail. If you are already familiar with a C-like language and want a just-the-facts introduction to Tcl and Tk, this is the book for you. The manual is divided into four sections: a description of the Tcl language, an introduction to Tk, a discussion of the Tcl/C interface, and information about the Tk/C interface. Although there are no fully worked out programs, code snippets illustrate how to use control structures and data types. Written in 1994, the book is based on Tcl 7.3 and Tk 3.6 and does not cover the most recent versions of Tcl and Tk.

Artie Lange, Anthony Bozza Outrageous, raw, and painfully funny true stories straight from the life of the actor, comedian, and much-loved cast member of The Howard Stern Show—with a foreword by Howard Stern.

When Artie Lange joined the permanent cast of The Howard Stern Show in 2001, it was possibly the greatest thing ever to happen in the Stern universe, second only to the show’s move to the wild, uncensored frontier of satellite radio. Lange provided what Stern had yet to find all in the same place: a wit quick enough to keep pace with his own, a pathetic self-image to dwarf his own, a personal history both heartbreaking and hilarious, and an ingrained sense of self-sabotage that continually keeps things interesting.

A natural storyteller with a bottomless pit of material, Lange grew up in a close-knit, working-class Italian family in Union, New Jersey, a maniacal Yankees fan who pursued the two things his father said he was cut out for—sports and comedy. Tragically, Artie Lange Sr. never saw the truth in that prediction: He became a quadriplegic in an accident when Artie was eighteen and died soon after. But as with every trial in his life, from his drug addiction to his obesity to his fights with his mother, Artie mines the humor, pathos, and humanity in these events and turns them into comedy classics.

True fans of the Stern Show will find Artie gold in these pages: hilarious tales that couldn’t have happened to anyone else. There are stories from his days driving a Jersey cab, working as a longshoreman in Port Newark, and navigating the dark circuit of stand-up comedy. There are outrageous episodes from the frenzied heights of his coked-up days at MADtv, surprisingly moving stories from his childhood, and an account of his recent U.S.O. tour that is equally stirring and irreverent. But also in this volume are stories Artie’s never told before, including some that he deemed too revealing for radio.

Wild, shocking, and drop-dead hilarious, TOO FAT TO FISH is Artie Lange giving everything he’s got to give. And like a true pro, the man never disappoints.

Mark Millar, Brian K Vaughan, Brian Michael Bendis, Jae Lee, Tom Raney, Mark Brooks, Steve Dillon The Ultimate Inhumans debut, two lives are forever changed, you'll never guess who's back and everyone guest-stars in the first-ever Ultimate Annuals! In Ultimate Fantastic Four Annual #1, it's the first appearance of the Ultimate Inhumans! From a hidden race, she came to steal the heart of the FF's youngest member: the beautiful elemental called Crystal! In Ultimate X-Men Annual #1, it's the return of Ultimate Juggernaut! Juggie makes a play for the Gem of Cyttorak, the jewel that will make him truly unstoppable. Only two small things stand in his way: Rogue and Gambit, the new prince and princess of thieves! In Ultimate Spider-Man Annual #1, Spidey goes toe-to-toe with some old foes - and winds up with a new girlfriend! Who is she? Let's just say she has a familiar face. And in The Ultimates Annual #1, if you thought The Ultimates were the only team S.H.I.E.L.D. was creating - you were wrong! Get ready for the next wave of super-soldiers designed to protect America's vital interests. But is this all that Director Nick Fury is up to, or is there much more to this ultra-clandestine program? And can even S.H.I.E.L.D. keep all these super-people under control? Collects Ultimates Annual #1; Ultimate Fantastic Four Annual #1; Ultimate X-Men Annual #1; Ultimate Spider-Man Annual #1.

Bill Jemas, Mark Bagley, Brian Michael Bendis The comic book publishing event of 2000 is coming to your bookstore.

Ultimate Spider-Man received extensive press coverage and was the highest selling comics launch of the year. It is the reinterpretation of Spider-Man's origin, updated for today's tweens and teens. Starting over at the beginning, the story of how a tortured teen is imbued with startling powers, has been completely re-imagined to appeal to the hi-tech, media savvy youth of today.

In the process, great steps were taken to make the unfolding saga reader-friendly to the non-comics reader. "Our characters have been around for almost 40 years," explained Bill Jemas, Marvel`s President of Publishing and New Media, explaining the reasoning behind Ultimate Spider-Man. "It's great that our comics are so rich that storylines run forever, but we want the Ultimate books to be accessible to the first-time reader. Someone will be able to pick up an issue of Ultimate Spider-Man and have enough information to understand and appreciate it."

An outsider even amongst his own peers, high school student Peter Parker is a young man at the crossroads of destiny. Orphaned as a youth and raised by his Uncle Ben and Aunt May, Peter finds himself the target of a constant barrage of pranks perpetrated by school jock Flash Thompson and his burly bud, nicknamed Kong. After Peter is bitten by an experimental spider from the laboratory of Osborn Industries, industrialist Norman Osborn takes a deadly interest in this development. Will Peter be able to avoid a violent case of corporate downsizing? When backed into a corner, will our hero learn that with great power there must come great responsibility?

Brian Michael Bendis

Brian Michael Bendis

Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Bagley

Brian Michael Bendis

Brian Michael Bendis After reuniting with his childhood friend Eddie Brock, Peter Parker discovers a terrible secret about their fathers' past a secret which quickly results in a confrontation with Venom, Spider-Man's evil, dark twin.

Brian Michael Bendis An all-new villain explodes on the scene, literally! But how can Spider-Man fight a new mysterious foe named Geldhoff if he can't even find a costume? And will Peter and Mary Jane finally just say what they feel?! Guest-starring the Ultimate X-Men.

Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Bagley, Marvel Comics Sam Bullit is running for Mayor of New York City on an anti-Spider-Man campaign, and Daily Bugle Editor-in-Chief J. Jonah Jameson is backing him 100%. But who is pulling Bullit's strings? None other than the Kingpin of Crime!

Brian Michael Bendis, Trevor Hairsine, Mark Bagley, Joe Quesada

Brian Michael Bendis

Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Bagley The ULTIMATE titles are well-known for adding a unique twist to classic Marvel characters...and you better believe they're about to get a whole lot more twisted! One of the most ruthless villains in the history of the Marvel Universe, the fan-favorite Carnage, gets the Ultimate treatment! And though young Peter Parker has proven himself time and time again on the field of battle, can even he hope to defeat this heartless killing machine? Collecting ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN #60-65.

Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Bagley A bizarre occurrence brings Spider-Man and Wolverine together for the weirdest team-up in super-hero history! As the two struggle to get to the bottom of this mystery, their lives literally unravel. Why are both heroes too concerned with their own lives to work together? Strap yourself in, True Believer; it's all part of the ride you get when you buy a ticket for the team-up for people who hate team-ups! Plus: Johnny Storm realizes that despite his new flame powers and fame on the horizon, he still doesn't have a high-school diploma. And where does the young New Yorker enroll? Why, none other than a certain Queens high school that also counts one Peter Parker - Spider-Man - as a student. And what's up between Johnny and sweet Liz Allen? Watch the sparks fly!

Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Bagley It's the terrifying debut of the Ultimate Hobgoblin as Harry Osborn returns to Midtown High harboring a dark secret that will affect the lives of all those around him - especially his best friend, Peter Parker. And where does Harry's father - Norman Osborn, a.k.a. the Green Goblin - fit into all this? Collects Ultimate Spider-Man #72-78.

Brian Michael Bendis, Andy Kubert, Danny Miki, Stuart Immonen The Gang War to end all Gang Wars begins! The Kingpin is in retreat - and that kind of a power vacuum won't last long. It's about to be filled by a figure of unabashed dread in the underworld: Hammerhead! Plus: the Ultimate debut of several Marvel characters, including Moon Knight! And Spidey thinks he's had trouble before... but nothing has ever made him declare "Peter Parker" no more! Collecting Ultimate Spider-Man #79-85.

Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Bagley The head of Roxxon Oil sics the world's greatest mercenary, Silver Sable, on Spider-Man to learn why the web-spinner has targeted Roxxon on his nightly patrols. How violently Ms. Sable wants to handle the situation is strictly up to her. Spinning out of the Ultimate Spider-Man video game (written and designed by our longstanding team of Bendis and Bagley), Ultimate Silver Sable might be the most dangerous foe Spidey has ever faced! Plus: the mystery of Ultimate Omega Red! Collects Ultimate Spider-Man #86-90; Annual #1.

Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Bagley Spider-Man teams up with his new girlfriend - the X-Men's Kitty Pryde, who gets a new super-hero identity for when she's not hanging with her mutant mates! Plus: Meet the dangerous Ultimate Deadpool - and the Ultimate Reavers! It's mutant action, with Spidey caught in the middle! Collects Ultimate Spider-Man #91-97, and Annual #2.

Mark Millar

Mark Millar Collects Ultimate X-Men #21-25.

Mark Millar The Ultimates vs. the Ultimate X-Men: the battle begins. When the X-Men do the worst thing they could to humanity, the government orders Captain America, Iron Man, Thor and the rest of the Ultimates to bring them down. A small but lethal army, the Ultimates were created to face these and other newly rising threats to mankind. But the X-Men's founder, Professor X, hasn't been training his students for nothing — and the youngs mutants just might take out the Ultimates first.

Mark Millar, David Finch, Adam Kubert Magneto, the X-Men's deadliest villain, returns. They've faced the Weapon X program, Proteus and even the superhuman strikeforce known as The Ultimates. Now, still licking their wounds from their prior battles, can Xavier's mutant team possibly survive the return of their most powerful foe?

Brian Michael Bendis, David Finch Collecting Ultimate X-Men #34-39.

Brian Michael Bendis, David Finch Collecting Ultimate X-Men #40-45.

Brian K. Vaughan, Brandon Peterson

Brian K. Vaughan, Andy Kubert It is the moment you've all been waiting for! Gambit returns to Ultimate X-Men! Because the fans demanded it, the Cajun thief is back! But what is he going to steal? And can the X-Men stop him? It's all about the Ragin' Cajun as the mysterious Gambit gives hints of where he's been, what he wants and why the X-Men will not be happy about it.

Brian K Vaughan, Stuart Immonen It's the ultimate reality show as mutants convicted of capital crimes are released on an island where contestants hunt them down. Longshot has survived longest, and the X-Men are sent to rescue him - until they become part of the game themselves! With one of their teammates a captive on the island of Krakoa, the malevolent media mogul called Mojo demands the X-Men return Longshot to his headquarters or Angel will soon have a harp to go with his wings! Meanwhile, does Longshot have a "Dazzling" not-so-secret admirer? Collects Ultimate X-Men #54-57.

Brian K Vaughan, Geoff Johns, Steve Dillon, Stuart Immonen, Tom Raney, Aaron Lopresti Ultimate Wolverine makes his explosive return! Storm travels to the Great White North to find her missing friend, but there's no time for celebration for the impetuous and troubled duo! They're about to take on an all-new threat to the Ultimate Universe... Lady Deathstrike! Plus: When a dangerous young mutant immune to psychic control takes Charles Xavier and the rest of a Manhattan bank hostage, the Professor must lead a diverse group of humans in a risky bid to end the siege! And finally, witness the return of Ultimate Juggernaut! Juggie makes a play for the Gem of Cyttorak, the jewel that will make him truly unstoppable. Only two small things stand in his way: Rogue of the X-Men and Ultimate Gambit, the new prince of thieves! This story will change the X-Men's status quo forever! Collects Ultimate X-Men #58-60; Annual #1.

Brian K. Vaughan, Stuart Immonen Emma Frost, Alex Summers and the X-Men's greatest enemy star in an epic new storyline! When teenage mutant Lorna Dane accidentally commits a horrific crime, will the X-Men protect her, or leave her to the fury of S.H.I.E.L.D.? Collects Ultimate X-Men #61-65.

Robert Kirkman, Tom Raney, Ben Oliver After the events of Magnetic North and their recent encounter with the Master of Magnetism, our heroes kick back for a night on the town with their significant others. But who or what is the Magician and how is he going to wreck their plans? Meanwhile, Wolverine runs into an old teammate who's out for revenge. Join new Ultimate X-Men writer Robert Kirkman and Ultimate Secret's Tom Raney as they take the Ultimate Universe's favorite mutants to dazzling new heights! Collects Ultimate X-Men #66-71.

Mark Millar, Geoff Johns The economical paperback Ultimate X-Men Ultimate Collection Vol. 1 represents the first year of the mutant team, issues 1-12 plus issue 1/2 that took place between issues 6 and 7. Ultimate X-Men was created as part of Marvel's Ultimate line, which starting with Ultimate Spider-Man "rebooted" popular series from the beginning so newer readers could dive into them without having to learn 40 years of character backstories. (They also use a more dynamic, cinematic style.) In the case of the X-Men, that meant reconfiguring Professor Xavier's opening roster to include Cyclops, a punk Jean Grey, Beast, Ice Man, Colossus, Storm, and a psychopathic secret weapon named Wolverine. In the first of the two six-issue story arcs, The Tomorrow People, we meet the team and their mission to protect the human race against Magneto and his Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, whose desire to establish homo superior's proper place above normal humanity leads the U.S. President to deploy the mutant killing machines, the Sentinels. The second arc, Return to Weapon X sags a little by deemphasizing the team in favor of the government agents behind the Weapon X project. Written by Mark Millar, with pencils mostly by Adam Kubert and Andy Kubert, with assists from Tom Raney and Thomas Derenick. —David Horiuchi

Scott McCloud A comic book about comic books. McCloud, in an incredibly accessible style, explains the details of how comics work: how they're composed, read and understood. More than just a book about comics, this gets to the heart of how we deal with visual languages in general. "The potential of comics is limitless and exciting!" writes McCloud. This should be required reading for every school teacher. Pulitzer Prize-winner Art Spiegelman says, "The most intelligent comics I've seen in a long time."

David duChemin For those who want to make the transition into the world of vocational photography—staying true to your craft and vision, while fusing that craft with commerce VisionMongers is a great place to begin your journey. With a voice equally realistic and encouraging, photographer David duChemin discusses the experiences he’s had, the lessons he’s learned, and the practices he’s adopted in his own winding journey to becoming a successful working photographer.

When it comes to this personal, honest combination of craft and commerce, there is no single path to success. Everyone’s goals are different, as is everyone’s definition of success. As such, VisionMongers does not prescribe a one size-fits-all program. Instead, duChemin candidly shares ideas, wisdom, and inspiration to introduce you to, and help you navigate, the many aspects of transforming your passion into your vocation. He addresses everything from the anxiety-riddled question “Am I good enough?” to the basics—and beyond—of marketing, business, and finance, as well as the core assumption that your product is great and your craft is always improving.

Along the way, duChemin features the stories of nine other photographers—including Chase Jarvis, Gavin Gough, and Zack Arias—whose paths, while unique, have all shared a commitment and passion for bringing their own vision to market. With VisionMongers, you’ll learn what paths have been taken—what has worked for these photographers—and you’ll be equipped to begin the process of forging your own.

Alan Moore, Dave Gibbons Has any comic been as acclaimed as Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons'Watchmen? Possibly only Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns, but Watchmen remains the critics' favorite. Why? Because Moore is a better writer, and Watchmen a more complex and dark and literate creation than Miller's fantastic, subversive take on the Batman myth. Moore, renowned for many other of the genre's finest creations (Saga of the Swamp Thing, V for Vendetta, and From Hell, with Eddie Campbell) first put out Watchmen in 12 issues for DC in 1986-87. It won a comic award at the time (the 1987 Jack Kirby Comics Industry Awards for Best Writer/Artist combination) and has continued to gather praise since.

The story concerns a group called the Crimebusters and a plot to kill and discredit them. Moore's characterization is as sophisticated as any novel's. Importantly the costumes do not get in the way of the storytelling; rather they allow Moore to investigate issues of power and control—indeed it was Watchmen, and to a lesser extent Dark Knight, that propelled the comic genre forward, making "adult" comics a reality. The artwork of Gibbons (best known for 2000AD's Rogue Trooper and DC's Green Lantern) is very fine too, echoing Moore's paranoid mood perfectly throughout. Packed with symbolism, some of the overlying themes (arms control, nuclear threat, vigilantes) have dated but the intelligent social and political commentary, the structure of the story itself, its intertextuality (chapters appended with excerpts from other "works" and "studies" on Moore's characters, or with excerpts from another comic book being read by a child within the story), the finepace of the writing and its humanity mean that Watchmen more than stands up—it keeps its crown as the best the genre has yet produced. —Mark Thwaite

Don't Miss Our Newest Collection!

· By tremendous popular demand, Wizard Entertainment proudly presents the second-ever BEST OF BASIC TRAINING trade paperback! This special 112-page book is the second in this series and focuses more on the basics of drawing, along with more specific lessons on anatomy, expressions and more. Read more of the best and most instructional "HOW TO DRAW" lessons from Wizard: The Comics Magazine's 14-year history, along with a brand new set of unpublished lessons from some of the biggest names in comic art.

Learn From The Greatest Artists In Comics!

· Michael Turner, Adam Hughes, Brian Bolland, Joe Linsner, Darick Robertson, Gary Frank, Dale Keown, Bart Sears, Brent Anderson, Terry Moore, Jim Calafiore, Tom Grummet, Jim Balent, Kevin Maguire and many, many more!

Over 30 Art Lessons On Basics & Anatomy!

· Superheroic Males & Females, Anatomy, Facial Expressions. Body Language, Perspective, Block & Cube Construction, Proportions, Shading, Sex appeal, Teens/Children and sooo much more! · Behold breathtaking design sketches from Terry Dodson, Joe linsner and more!

Designed For Both The Aspiring Artist And The Interested Fan!

· This book will work with the greatest artists, who have been creating your favorite comic books for Marvel, DC, and Image Comics. See how they illustrate the techniques used in comic artwork and be enlightened by hundreds of years of artistic expertise as we represent specific lessons from Volume 1 with all-new material created especially for this new volume.

· Artist Terry Dodson (Spider-Man) created an all-new exclusive cover to this brilliant new collection.

Editors of Wizard: The Comics Magazine This giant 256-page book collects the best and most instructional "HOW TO DRAW" lessons from Wizard: The Comics Magazine's 14-year history.

LEARN SECRETS FROM THE GREATEST ARTISTS IN COMICS!
Jim Lee, Michael Turner, George Pérez, Joe Kubert, Adam Hughes, Greg Land, Frank Cho, Joe Linsner, Greg Horn, Walt Simonson, Doug Mahnke, Darick Robertson, Gary Frank, Sean Chen, Dale Keown, Bart Sears, Pat Lee, Art Adams, Jim Califiore, Phil Jimenez, Matt Haley, Tom Raney, Kevin Maguire and many, many more!

OVER 50 ART LESSONS ON ALL ASPECTS OF COMIC ARTWORK!
Anatomy, Facial Expressions, Body Language, Layout, Perspective, Movement & Motion, Proportions, Shadows, Backgrounds, Storytelling, Coloring, Dynamic Foreshortening, Photo Reference, Sex Appeal, Inking, Sound Effects, Metallic Surfaces, Textures, Energy Effects, Negative Space, Teens/Children, Action Scenes and sooo much more! Plus, get additional resources on the Tools of the Trade, Professional Tips and Mistakes to Avoid, How to Break into the Business and a sample script to practice on by Brian Michael Bendis.

THIS BOOK IS DESIGNED FOR BOTH THE ASPIRING ARTIST AND THE INTERESTED FAN!
The greatest artists, who have been creating your favorite comic books for Marvel, DC and Image Comics, wrote this book. See how they illustrate the techniques used in comic storytelling and be enlightened by hundreds of years of artistic expertise.

Mark Millar Mark Millar and Steve McNiven - who last teamed for the monumental Civil War - bring us the most important Wolverine story of the 21st Century. Nobody knows what happened on the night the heroes fell. All we know is that they disappeared and evil triumphed and the bad guys have been calling the shots ever since. What happened to Wolverine is the biggest mystery of all. For 50 years, no one has heard hide nor hair from him... and in his place stands an old man called Logan. A man concerned only about his family. A man pushed to the brink by the Hulk Gang. A man forced to help an old friend - the blind archer, Hawkeye - to drive three thousand miles to secure his family's safety. Get ready for the ride of your life, Logan! Collects Wolverine #66-72, and Wolverine Giant-Size Old Man Logan.

Linda N., Ph.D. Edelstein Stereotypes exist for a reason; usually, because there's an element of truth to them. With The Writer's Guide to Character Traits, psychologist-professor Linda Edelstein has created a kind of Psych 101 for Writers. Her goal is a "friendly reference" for writers who want "to create believable characters and need accurate information about personality and behavior." Sure, disparage it if you like. But wouldn't you like to know which of your protagonist's offspring is most predisposed to warming up to their new stepfather? What kind of criminal is likely to have a religious mother? The traits of people who commit suicide? Edelstein has included more than 400 lists: of traits associated with child development, psychological disorders, criminal styles, sexual styles, love and marriage, life-changing events, physical problems, career, and so on. "Even when a writer's imagination soars to places more fascinating than reality," says Edelstein, "characters must possess an internal cohesiveness; they must make sense." And let's face it: "People," she adds, "are more consistent than not." (With real-life character anecdotes from Edelstein's own work and a huge character-trait cross-referencing index at book's end.) —Jane Steinberg

Linda N., Ph.D. Edelstein Stereotypes exist for a reason; usually, because there's an element of truth to them. With The Writer's Guide to Character Traits, psychologist-professor Linda Edelstein has created a kind of Psych 101 for Writers. Her goal is a "friendly reference" for writers who want "to create believable characters and need accurate information about personality and behavior." Sure, disparage it if you like. But wouldn't you like to know which of your protagonist's offspring is most predisposed to warming up to their new stepfather? What kind of criminal is likely to have a religious mother? The traits of people who commit suicide? Edelstein has included more than 400 lists: of traits associated with child development, psychological disorders, criminal styles, sexual styles, love and marriage, life-changing events, physical problems, career, and so on. "Even when a writer's imagination soars to places more fascinating than reality," says Edelstein, "characters must possess an internal cohesiveness; they must make sense." And let's face it: "People," she adds, "are more consistent than not." (With real-life character anecdotes from Edelstein's own work and a huge character-trait cross-referencing index at book's end.) —Jane Steinberg

Jack Heffron

Peter David The ultimate guide for anyone who wants to write dynamic comics, Writing for Comics With Peter David teaches readers how to create comics from start to finish. This essential guide:

-Provides easy-to-understand guidance for beginners, as well as seasoned advice for intermediate comics writers

-Features the expert instruction of highly successful Marvel and DC writer Peter David, whose credits include Spider-Man, Wolverine and the Hulk

-Includes illustrations throughout from major comic publishers, showing readers the creation process from start to finish

With an eye-catching package and superior advice, this book is a must have for anyone who wants to write comics or graphic novels.