Stop fretting over scattered scans and tattered copies.
Over 500 amazing historic drawing course plates, restored to original glory and ready to print beautifully at A3. Become a skillful classically trained artist by copying the plates that built the masters.
Bargue, Reverdin and Calame — 508 plates gathered, cleaned and organized into one archive. No incomplete courses. No cramped book pages. No cleaning up scans yourself.
You know these courses exist. Getting them into a usable form is the actual problem.
Dear artist,
You may have already seen some of these plates — saved from a website, extracted from an old scanned volume, or reproduced small inside a modern book.
But finding an image is not the same as owning a usable study plate. And finding several images is not the same as owning the course.
A serious plate study depends on details that weak reproductions destroy: the exact turn of a contour, the density of a hatched shadow, the structure beneath hair or foliage. When a plate is reduced too far, or arrives tilted, stained and inconsistently sized, those decisions become difficult to see — and difficult to print.
The Historic Drawing Course Archive exists to remove that obstacle: hundreds of plates, gathered, prepared and organized into three coherent collections you can print and work from immediately.
The difference between having the image and being able to study from it
Depending on the source, preparation may include cleaning the background, correcting page alignment, balancing tonal range and rebuilding a usable margin — never redrawing the plate or inventing lost information.
The archive turns scattered historical material into a coherent drawing library you can actually use.
Three collections. One coherent archive.
Bargue Collection
The gateway into academic plate study. Controlled problems of proportion, contour, value and edge, gathered as individual high-resolution files.
Reverdin Collection
A second major academic system, organized as its own course rather than dispersed across unrelated folders.
Calame Collection
Landscape studies: trees, rocks, rural architecture and finished compositions — a progression from natural form to pictorial structure.
Stop Buying Drawing Courses That Run Out of Material in a Weekend
Look Closely. Most drawing courses give you a few examples, a thin workbook, and then leave you searching for what to study next.
This archive gives you three substantial, complementary systems of visual training. Together, they provide more than 500 printable plates—enough material for years of serious, structured drawing practice.
Organized. Specified. Ready to print.
No physical prints are shipped. You receive the digital archive and print your own study sheets.
This archive is for
- Independent artists building a disciplined study programme
- Atelier students who want more material than the familiar plates
- Drawing instructors who need reliable reference material
- Art schools and classical collectors
- Artists building a structured, long-term curriculum
It is probably not for you if
- You want a video course with recorded instruction
- You want physical prints delivered to your door
- You intend to resell or redistribute the digital files
- You expect the material to assess your drawings for you
The Bargue, Reverdin & Calame Collection
508 individual plate files · A3 print preparation
By purchasing, you agree to the Digital Product Licence and Download Terms.
The 30-Day Guarantee
If you're not happy with your purchase, contact us within 30 days for a full refund. No questions asked.
Frequently asked questions
No. This is a digital archive of high-resolution files you print yourself or through a local print service.
Plates vary in size and shape, and are all suitable for A3 printing.
PNG.
Yes, files can be reduced, though fine marks and tonal transitions will appear smaller.
Yes. All three collections in this archive are complete.
No. Preparation focuses on cleaning, alignment and print formatting — never redrawing or inventing lost detail.
A separate written multi-user licence is required before the files are shared or used as classroom resources. Contact Burst Books to arrange one.
Yes, more collections are available now. You'll be informed of these during purchase.
No, these are digital scans of the authentic originals gathered from museums and archive sites.
Stop searching. Start studying.
Bargue. Reverdin. Calame. Figure, portrait and landscape study — 508 plates, organized, prepared for A3 and ready whenever you are ready to draw.
Buy Now !!P.S. Every hour spent finding, cleaning and resizing plates is an hour not spent studying them. This archive has already done that work.
P.P.S. Examine the sample plates at full size before deciding. The plates themselves are the evidence.
