Basic Human Anatomy: An Essential Visual Guide for Artists

Roberto Osti's Basic Human Anatomy has been an invaluable addition to my library of texts devoted to the study of the human form. As an artist and student, I have poured over countless texts throughout the years with the goal of better understanding the human form. As an educator (I teach figure painting, drawing, and anatomy at Laguna College of Art and Design) I have sought out the most useful methods for teaching artistic anatomy. In my search, I have found few books that exhibit the level of quality exhibited in Osti's Basic Human Anatomy. I believe that Osti has a place among the great names in anatomy education: Robert Beverly Hale, Gottfried Bammes, George Bridgman, Dr. Paul Richer, Elliot Goldfinger, to name a few. As a student at the New York Academy of Art I had the good fortune to attend Osti's anatomy lectures and drawing class. To watch Osti make life-size drawings of the human anatomy while simultaneously delivering his lecture was an incredible experience. All artists should have the opportunity to witness this master in action. Thankfully, he has given us this wonderful text. It has already proved an invaluable addition to my classes. The book is full of Osti's beautiful depictions of the human form. These masterful drawings alone are worth the price of the book. However, what I find even more valuable is the way that the book is organized. It takes a dense, often daunting subject and leads you through it in a series of easily understood steps. Beginning with the stereometric conception of the body and the structural conception of the skeleton, to the origins and insertions of the muscles, all the way to a discussion of the drawing techniques necessary to implement this knowledge, Osti's book is truly comprehensive. Two of my favorite aspects of this book are 1. his diagrams on transforming the schematic volumes of the figure into organic forms and 2. his anatomical drawings indicating the muscles on one side and their specific points of origin and insertion on the other. This book will not only be useful to the novice looking to begin their journey toward understanding the human form, but also to the advanced draftsman looking to augment his or her skill set.

I'm a studio art major and this is the first anatomy book I've ever bought. I'm in my third year and the closest we got to learning anatomy in classes was a few days of drawing a skeleton. This book is AMAZING and I really feel like my figure drawings and paintings will benefit from understanding the underlying structures better. I looked at many different book options and this seemed to have the best reviews for being overall comprehensive. There are so many beautiful and informative drawings and examples of different mediums. It says that some of them were amassed from Osti's own sketchbooks over the years and I thoroughly believe it. It seems like it must have taken years to generate them all at such a high level of quality. There are full people, skeletons, and muscles posed in many interesting ways that you can copy or take inspiration from. I think the exercises would be particularly great for digital art-- which I recently did for the first time-- given that you can practice layering with ease. The sections on the head/ skull seem very helpful for portraiture, but I don't think I'll much use the hands/ feet section, since I feel confident in my education in that realm. Also, I appreciate the exercises a lot as I've been taught the basics of the stereometric method (boxy people, identifying simple plane changes). After the stereometric method, it covers all the bones in the body from many different angles for XX and XY skeletons, the muscles shown in different layers and together, and also has a separate section of color-coded muscles to help differentiate. It individually shows angles of the pelvis, the spine, etc. There are incredibly detailed labeled diagrams giving the names of all the bones and muscles, and explanations of their "origins and insertion." A few pages seem like a little much for my purposes, since I'm not sure that I want to learn the names and functions of every single bone and muscle in the human body, as I'm not an anatomy student, but I'm glad I have the option! The book has some helpful tips for quickly working out proportions and drawing in general, and I'm sure much more than I've mentioned since I haven't read it all, just skimmed its 300 pages! I really recommend this book. It also isn't too pricy compared to others. I wasn't asked to review or anything, I'm just IN LOVE with the book lol. It's also really great during social distancing since the only models I have access to are my immediate family. There's a section on lighting that's useful for details if you don't have a real person or a photograph in the right pose. I hope I helped you decide if this is what you're looking for!

Starting by stating the obvious, you can't have only a single anatomy for artists book. However, this one is great for beginners and intermediate levels. With all the great anatomy books out there, either classical or contemporary, if I were to be asked to choose only a single anatomy book to keep, this would be it. Hands down! This is one of the most valuable drawing books among my collection. Roberto Osti takes on a very complicated topic in figure drawing, which is anatomy, a topic that is so important, yet dreaded by novice and experienced artists alike, and explains it in a very clear and artistic way, which makes it an enjoyable read. The size of the book (8.5x10.5 inches), the clarity and quality of the diagrams, the logical progression of adding in complexity and details, makes this a great study companion and reference. You are really in good hands with an elegant artist who started by being a professional medical illustrator. He clearly understands what is sufficient for artists to know for a successful figurative drawing. Finally, the last chapter of this book, Osti dedicates it to sharing important drawing techniques on light and form, tonal drawing and foreshortening, among other important aspects of figure drawing. This is one among the most valuable drawing books in my library, period. Finally, if there's one important improvement for this book it would be to enhance the Index. It is quite laking, you can't even search for a term such as "Deltoid" using the index!

I purchased this book after buying another anatomy book rather recently. The previous one, though detailed, was confusing to use - not great for a beginner due to the lack of labelling and constant flicking to the appendices to check what's what. It also wouldn't stay open without holding it with one hand which I found a little frustrating. But this one - I absolutely love it! Overall, I prefer my books to have substance over style, but this really has both. It's printed onto beautiful paper which almost looks like ribbed Kraft, is hardback (and you can have kept open as reference without holding it), and not only does it have all the usual anatomy that you'd expect, but it has a huge section at the beginning in terms of understanding proportions, basic shapes, and so on. All the main views are presented, along with beautiful illustrations to show you the build up of muscle on bone. While it doesn't contain loads of action poses (for which one of the Morphos books would perhaps be a good accompaniment), that isn't a complaint by any stretch. The book is simple to follow and comprehensive. Another thing I especially like, which I've not seen elsewhere, is the exercises! Anatomy can be tough to learn, so the fact that the author recommends keeping an anatomy sketchbook to complete a number of exercises to commit the information to memory, really helps with a self-guided structured learning plan. I never thought I'd be that excited about anatomy since I'm predominantly a nature artist, but this has completely inspired me to start my own figure and anatomy sketchbook. Highly recommended!

Amazing book with detailing of anatomical sketches .. all should have thia book to gain basic and advance knowledge of anatomy of human body . Really helpful for making human figure

An excellent book for learning to draw people in proportion, with lots of exercises and a thorough exploration of human anatomy. Highly recommend!

Dno. Włożona w kopertę, która już była przedarta. Pakują żenująco. Pewnie i tak była obita przed wyjazdem z magazynu. Jeszcze więcej przerzucania towaru w reaktywie. Brawo!!!!

Acho que é o melhor livro de anatomia para artistas que eu já tive. As explicações são detalhadas e fáceis de entender, e os exemplos ilustrados são feitos de diversas maneiras de forma que nos ajuda a entender não só a anatomia em seus aspectos mais técnicos, mas também as formas de estilização possíveis. Virou meu companheiro número um, fica do meu lado sempre que trabalho.