How to Illustrate a Children’s Book in 6 Quick Steps

Children are at a developmental stage in life where they are discovering themselves, and trying to figure out what it is that resonates with them and what they find impactful. Often this is a very sensitive stage and requires a lot of care to ensure that the development of a child is done in a way that is very helpful to their future growth. The fact of the matter is they are heavily influenced by whatever material they are exposed to.

To create a children’s book that’s perfect and leaves a positive impact on a child you need to make sure it’s colorful and vibrant, children aren’t attracted to too many words, they want their senses to be stimulated, which is why a children’s book requires illustration and design. The way to do this is to go about creating a colorful design and drawing interesting characters that fascinate them, as well as events being shown in a very vibrant and colorful way. in this blog, we will learn how to illustrate a children’s book.

Whether you wish to illustrate a children’s book for you or if you wish to do it for someone else, either way, it’s a rewarding experience.

Do you want to write and publish a children’s book? here is the list of top 10 fiction writing agencies that will help you write and publish your book.

6 Quick Tips for illustrating a children’s book

1. Look for inspiration

Inspiration is an important first step for any creative project. Sometimes it’s difficult to find inspiration, and in some cases, inspiration can be overwhelming. The best way to manage this is to use an app on your phone or start journaling to help you remember any thoughts that might come to mind. The benefit of this approach is the fact that even though it might seem like an exercise in futility at first, eventually you can go through your notebook or app and come across a brilliant children’s book idea. if you are having trouble in crafting appealing illustrations then you can also hire a book illustrator to craft an engaging illustration for your book.

2. Plan out your age range

The age range of children’s books is defined. However the thing is, books that target toddlers are far different from books that aim at children starting school. Target a specific age range. For example, picture books normally target the ages 3-8. But the age of your target audience determines how complex the story is. As well as how much text it includes.

3. Put your mind in the audience

After figuring out the age range and deciding on that, you now need to think about your audience and their interests.  Furthermore you need to research how they might interact with picture books as well as story books.

4. Look at other children’s illustrations:

Go over other illustrations. See what draws you to a particular illustration style or genre. Thus don’t copy someone else. Find inspiration and allow your creativity to flow.

5. Begin creating your story brief

Work on creating a general outline for your story, the beginning, the middle, and the end. Therefore you may also end up getting a brief from the art director or even a book editor if you work with a book publishing house.

You might find this interesting our guide to writing a children’s fantasy story.

6. Craft your illustration style

Picture books allow young readers to have an idea and lasting impression, this is due to the illustrations within them. The words themselves don’t do as much for the children as the illustrations themselves do for their sense of self and the world around them. There are many ways to go about this for example:

• Comic book: The comic book art style has a very long and popular illustration history, and it utilizes a pop art style. This art style has bold imagery, a brighter color palette as well as having repetitive patterns.
• Traditional storybooks: These have sketch like appearances. Hence they use color pencils, ink and watercolors.
• Photo realistic: This art style takes inspiration from photographs causing it to have a life-like appearance in the illustrations.
• Vector art: Art style using geometrical shapes. Furthermore vector art uses a program such as Adobe Illustrator. This art style is colorful, cartoonish, and clean, a look that children find very appealing.
• Portrait: This is an art style that focuses on character expression, gesture, physical characteristics, and mannerisms. This is an art style for character-heavy books where the entire focus is less on the plot and more on the character.

Conclusion

We hope that you were able to gain some value from our article in learning how to illustrate a children’s book. Therefore By learning from the best you will be achieving great things.