# SF Art Fans New Chris Foss Book **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 3, 2011, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sf-art-fans-new-chris-foss-book/595118 "2011-09-03T23:35:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Icerigger](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icerigger/32/432_2.png) [@Icerigger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icerigger)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2011, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sf-art-fans-new-chris-foss-book/595118/1 "2011-09-03T23:35:29Z")
Legendary science fiction artist Chris Foss has a new book coming out soon a complete retrospective of his work. This is quite a treat for me I do have an old and battered copy of his previous book from the early eighties. This one looks great. I have always loved his work. > **[Hardware: The Definitive SF Works of Chris Foss: Foss, Chris, Hughes, Rian:...](https://www.amazon.com/Hardware-Definitive-Works-Chris-Foss/dp/1848566980)** > > Hardware: The Definitive SF Works of Chris Foss \[Foss, Chris, Hughes, Rian\] on Amazon.com. \*FREE\* shipping on qualifying offers. Hardware: The Definitive SF Works of Chris Foss ---
**Author:** ![Baal\_Houtham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baal_houtham/32/13604_2.png) [@Baal\_Houtham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baal_Houtham)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2011, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sf-art-fans-new-chris-foss-book/595118/2 "2011-09-04T03:01:11Z")
I had the earlier Foss book, and that guy could sure paint spaceships. My copy seems to have vanished sometime in the last 20 years, but I remember that as good as he was at painting hardware, he had no feel whatsoever for rendering humans. That didn’t make me dislike him, but it was an extreme example of how different illustrators have different strengths. There are machine guys, landscape guys, cityscape guys, hero guys, cute-chick guys, ordinary folk guys, cartoon guys, horse guys. Most of the top line artists can fake their way through their weaknesses, but Foss’s people were painful to behold. ---
**Author:** ![Icerigger](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/icerigger/32/432_2.png) [@Icerigger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Icerigger)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2011, 10:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sf-art-fans-new-chris-foss-book/595118/3 "2011-09-04T10:58:40Z")
He did draw all the illustrations of people in the original if you can believe it, The Joy of Sex! ---
**Author:** ![Baal\_Houtham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baal_houtham/32/13604_2.png) [@Baal\_Houtham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baal_Houtham)\ **Post date:** [September 4, 2011, 12:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sf-art-fans-new-chris-foss-book/595118/4 "2011-09-04T12:06:39Z")
> [@Icerigger](#): > > He did draw all the illustrations of people in the original if you can believe it, The Joy of Sex! Now that you’ve said it, I recall that being mentioned in the art book – apparently he could do pencil copies of photos. And who knows, maybe he gotten more adept at humans in the last 20 years. A talented, imaginative guy. I’d like to think he’d still doing fine over in the UK – these are hard, hard times for illustrators. ---
**Author:** ![Meurglys](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/258eb7/32.png) [@Meurglys](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meurglys)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2011, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sf-art-fans-new-chris-foss-book/595118/5 "2011-09-05T13:42:40Z")
He’s not had anything much out in the UK for years - apart from a book about SF art, his most recent stuff was illustrating several of\* Jane’s [various military vehicles]\* books. But _Hardware_ is excellent! Pretty much eveything you’d hope for in a big retrospective.