In this digital age, one may wonder about the merit of a book on old fashioned freehand architectural drawing and rendering. After all, most presentation graphics are made with a variety of software - SketchUp, Adobe Suite, etc.; it’s rare for finished, elaborate presentation renderings to be done by hand. However, hand drawing skills are still in demand for sketching and designing. And for that, Mike Lin’s 1993 book Drawing and Designing with Confidence provides a thorough primer.
Lin’s approach in the book is to cover a wide range of topics, from drawing and rendering techniques to design details, and boil each topic down to its essence. Much of the book consists of elaborate lists, where, for example, he will go over a topic like drawing techniques by listing the fundamental principles and techniques and briefly explaining each one. The expectation is that the reader/student will learn and apply all of the techniques to their own drawings.
The book is also heavily illustrated, which is good since it’s all about visuals. Some illustrate the techniques covered by the text, others show before and after drawings from Mike Lin’s students. Lin is sometimes criticized as being formulaic and producing students whose styles all look alike. To a certain extent, that’s true. But keep in mind, this is architectural illustration, and not fine art; there is a great deal of objective technique to be had here. And it’s a little hard to argue with some of the before and after photos; while the afters may look somewhat similar, they are clearly superior to the before images.
It is over 20 years old, and it’s true that certain elements are dated. For example, his recommendations regarding fastening computer-generated text physically to a drawing is more or less obsolete in the age of PhotoShop and Illustrator. However, much of the text is surprisingly still relevant, no doubt in part because he focuses on fundamentals. Volumes have been written on perspective drawings, for example, but his 25-page chapter covers a great deal of ground in a small space, enabling the reader to get up and running quickly.
