Ron Smith's book

Would someone be so kind as to tell me the correct title and the name of the publisher of Ron's latest book. Reason I ask is that my daughter gave me a gift certificate to Barnes and Noble but they don't seem to list either of his books. I'm in hopes that with the correct information maybe they would order it for me. Thanks, Mike.

Hi Mike

It's called "Advanced Drawing of Scrolls - 2nd Ed." by Ron Smith and as far as I'm aware only available from GRS http://www.grstools.com/b-ldd.html

Or from FEGA http://www.fega.com/prodserv/booksSC.asp?categoryparam=book

There maybe other suppliers but I'm unaware of them

Cheers
Andrew

Is it really necessary to get a book about engraving or can it be learned via doing?

Books help tremendously in learning to design and for inspiration- the wheel has already been invented!

Edgar said:

Is it really necessary to get a book about engraving or can it be learned via doing?

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Everybody has a different learning style. But, unless you have someone to show you, what are you going to practice? Books give access to sound theories and ideas. I have Meeks' book and both of Ron Smith's. I also have books on ornamentation, architecture and floral design elements. I also have reprints of classic engraving instructional texts.The actual mechanics of engraving are a whole lot easier to me than than producing clean and pleasing layout and design. In the sign and print business, layout and design will make you or break you. Proportion and scale, white space(positive and negative space), shading and depth, light reflection, symmetry, flow, natural-ness, fluidity etc are all artistic elements that must be correctly done. As so many here have pointed out, you should spend a whole lot mor time drawing and designing than actual cutting. Books and websites like this give us the techniques of the masters without the luxury of sitting at their sides.

So far it seems pretty easy to learn Engraving. Heck, I was making some pretty fair lines in a couple of days.

Sharpening - that's one of the keys to Engraving and that you can pick up yourself with what's available in the forums. Getting someone to show you is much better, of course, but yeah, you can learn by doing.

Tricky thing is, what do you do with those lines? That's where you need the books.

Plus they're quite handy for finding out about some of the many less-obvious things.

According to Ron Smith you can learn it all just by being stubborn enough, but I'm very glad that I have his books to make my journey so much easier than his was.

Is it really necessary to get a book about engraving or can it be learned via doing?

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Hi Edgar

To answer your question............No, it's not necassary to get a book about engraving and yes, you can learn engraving by doing. In fact there are many members on the forums that have done exactley that.

However, the big question is how long do you want to take to learn engraving? The books are there to show you the techniques and understanding involved from basic right through to advanced. All of which you could eventually figure out on your own.............maybe.

As Cloudy says .........the wheel has already been invented so why put yourself through all that grief trying to reinvent it.

Cheers
Andrew

Thank you very much for your quick responses. Seems like I'll get the books right away and start reading & learning.