What do you think?
Rate this book
Painting Wildlife With John Seerey-Lester
Provides instructions in both oil and acrylic on painting wild animals.
- GenresArt
144 pages, Hardcover
First published March 12, 2003
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 of 1 review
April 23, 2026
This was enlightening.
Picked up at my local used book shop along with a few other wildlife art books completely by chance. Very happy I found this.
What made it immediately attractive in the store was not only the beautiful illustrations, but also the variety of mediums.
I’m pretty entrenched in watercolor right now, which I saw explicitly mentioned, but also acrylic and oil were featured a great deal as I was flicking through.
Seeing choice spoke to some medium versatility and probably openness in technique that could be easily translated to whatever the reader is using.
Upon actually reading it, not quite so much watercolor content as I had initially hoped. Really just a few field studies with it. The author seems to prefer finished pieces in acrylic and oil.
However, as I’d hoped, with just a little mental tinkering, you can take pretty much any of the advice and transfer it to whatever your chosen medium is.
That being said, this author is not a gatekeeper. Early on he tells you exactly what equipment he’s using: the brushes he’s using down to brand, series, shape and size; his palette and how to make one of your own, suggested color palette to start, his studio equipment and his field equipment.
As he walks you through concepts throughout the book, he gives example pieces you can follow along with that list all the exact materials he used down to paint brand and specific brushes, then tells you which to use and what to do with them in easy illustrated step by step instructions.
Incredibly thorough. Even if you’re just reading through, if you have any familiarity with painting already, you can look to the step by step photos & tell exactly what he’s talking about from photo to photo.
Honestly like an invisible man “paint with me” YouTube video speed run. Masterfully done.
He hands out hard-won tips he’s picked up as a lifelong artist like it’s nothing so if you’re just at the start of your work you can avoid a lot of pitfalls and make good habits early on.
Walks you through what to pay attention to most in the field, how to work a composition, how to translate movement and depth, the importance of greyscale, etc.
Piece by piece and project by project he makes sure you have the understanding you need before moving forward in the book.
But the REAL meat and potatoes of this book are the tutorials on various textures: how to do fur, feathers, leaf litter, fog, rain, snow, trees and water in such a way that it just looks obvious after he’s explained it.
What a GREAT teacher.
This book took me less than a day to read, but it cleared up so much that I kept bumping up against without knowing how to solve.
Worth every penny.
Picked up at my local used book shop along with a few other wildlife art books completely by chance. Very happy I found this.
What made it immediately attractive in the store was not only the beautiful illustrations, but also the variety of mediums.
I’m pretty entrenched in watercolor right now, which I saw explicitly mentioned, but also acrylic and oil were featured a great deal as I was flicking through.
Seeing choice spoke to some medium versatility and probably openness in technique that could be easily translated to whatever the reader is using.
Upon actually reading it, not quite so much watercolor content as I had initially hoped. Really just a few field studies with it. The author seems to prefer finished pieces in acrylic and oil.
However, as I’d hoped, with just a little mental tinkering, you can take pretty much any of the advice and transfer it to whatever your chosen medium is.
That being said, this author is not a gatekeeper. Early on he tells you exactly what equipment he’s using: the brushes he’s using down to brand, series, shape and size; his palette and how to make one of your own, suggested color palette to start, his studio equipment and his field equipment.
As he walks you through concepts throughout the book, he gives example pieces you can follow along with that list all the exact materials he used down to paint brand and specific brushes, then tells you which to use and what to do with them in easy illustrated step by step instructions.
Incredibly thorough. Even if you’re just reading through, if you have any familiarity with painting already, you can look to the step by step photos & tell exactly what he’s talking about from photo to photo.
Honestly like an invisible man “paint with me” YouTube video speed run. Masterfully done.
He hands out hard-won tips he’s picked up as a lifelong artist like it’s nothing so if you’re just at the start of your work you can avoid a lot of pitfalls and make good habits early on.
Walks you through what to pay attention to most in the field, how to work a composition, how to translate movement and depth, the importance of greyscale, etc.
Piece by piece and project by project he makes sure you have the understanding you need before moving forward in the book.
But the REAL meat and potatoes of this book are the tutorials on various textures: how to do fur, feathers, leaf litter, fog, rain, snow, trees and water in such a way that it just looks obvious after he’s explained it.
What a GREAT teacher.
This book took me less than a day to read, but it cleared up so much that I kept bumping up against without knowing how to solve.
Worth every penny.
Displaying 1 of 1 review