You Can Draw Transforming Robots
ISBN: 1-932452-42-3
Publisher: Antarctic Press
Author: Sherard Jackson (with Doug Dlin and Robert Acosta)
Publication Date: June 2004
Series: You Can Draw Manga 
Price: $19.95
Pagecount: 192
Color: no
Breasts: no
Short Impression: Focused on Transforming Robots.

     Where the PLEX book is understandably very Bandai-style, this book is
almsot a reaction to that in terms of being STRONGLY Takara-focused.  Not
just Transformers, also several of the Yuusha (The Brave) series that Takara
did between Transformers Zone and Beast Wars II.  For instance, one robot
design that comes up a lot is a cross between GaoGaiGar and Fire Dagwon.
     The first chapter is ten pages on drawing tools, which strikes me as
being as anachronistic as the Graphic-Sha series's concentration on
screentones.  Why do I say that?  Well, while I cheerfully wallow in my
pseudo-luddite art style, where everything is done on the physical page, the
way to go these days is tablet and photoshop (or equivalent).  Anyone who'd
be tempted to go out and buy all the art supplies Jackson recomments in this
chapter would probably be better served by finding a decent tablet.  They
make 'em so they'll pick up on brush/pen angle and pressure now, after all.
And a beginner is better off with pencils and pens from Wal-Mart until
they're good enough to get any use from better tools.
     Chapter 2 is much better, IMO, going over the basics of mechanical
jointing and walking through what is essentially G1 Prime's transformation
sequence in abstract form.  This is the first of many bits where Jackson's
lessons are what is called "toyetic", meaning that he shows you how to draw
things that would work as actual toys, rather than the cop-out "humanoid
robot with some vehicle bits hanging off" style favored by some.
     Chapter 3 starts with a very brief discussion of robot styles by era,
with a page for Nagai-style stuff of the 70s, one for the 80s, one for the
Beast-dominated 90s and a rather confusing and unsatisfying "00s" page.  Then
there's a lot of general advice on how to work out basic designs before going
into details.  It ends with the topic of taking a toyetic layout and
modifying it to be more dynamic, something Jackson does repeatedly in this
book.  I like that...use the toyetic stuff to make sure everything works, but
then fiddle with proportions to make it look better.
     4 and 5 focus on specific body parts (heads for ch4, everything else in
turn in ch5), and chapter 6 is a single extended exampls of using
foreshortening.
     Chapter 7 is about simple transformations (showing a jet and a car),
while Chapter 8 covers intermediate transformations (showing a cargo
helicopter).  The advanced transformations shown in HTDM #26 are not present
here, and don't seem likely to show up in YCD Mecha (where I'm thinking
several bits of HTDM #25-6 will be revisited).  Chapter 9 does animal
transformations, while the final chapter creates a combiner team that uses
extensive kibble and a jet like Micromaster combiners, but has a large core
figure like Scramble City style (Aerialbots, Stunticons, etc).
     Overall...I was a little disappointed.  Jackson did such a good job with
only a few dozen pages in the How To Draw Manga comics, and for all the extra
pages, this isn't that much more helpful.  It's still good, but felt kind of
bloated.