Child Book Illustrator

An illustrator can either make or break you’re your chances of success.

This child book illustrator page is part of my, ‘Write 4 Kids’, program.

Before we go any further, I’d like to invite you all to download a copy of my first children’s picture book, ‘The Fabulous Sock’. It’s completely free, and it will show just why I think Izabela, my illustrator, is definately one of the finest around.

My child book illustration guide

An illustrator is equally, ‘if not more’, important than the actual writer.

Why?

Because you have to remember that we’re writing for younger children, and with younger children, comes a significantly shorter attention span. You’ll usually find with any child picture book story, that it’s designed to a certain extent, for the parent and child to read and enjoy together.

Therefore, in my humble opinion, you have to create both the story and the illustrations to appeal on two levels. Allowing the child to focus its attention on the illustrations, while the parent reads the story. A good child book illustrator will be able to do this for you.

More on this in, ‘Creative Writing’

I first started telling the tales of, ‘Charlie and the Yums’, to my kids about six years ago, and as you’ll see from the books, the Yums, Charlie’s friends, are actually magical mirror images of the toes from his own right foot.

I found this extremely helpful when telling the stories, as I could use my kid’s toes as an ideal substitute for child book illustration This in turn, helped hold their attention, and was also lots of fun as they could name and play with their toes at the same time.

When I finally decided to put this website together and make Charlie and his friends available to all the little ankle biters out there, I wanted the stories to have maximum impact. The way to do this, I decided, was through top quality illustrations and set out to find a child book illustrator that could bring Charlie and the Yums to life.

How I found Izabela.

Not being Rockafella, I had to try to find the best possible illustrator, and at a price I could comfortably afford, and so, began my search for a child book illustrator by contacting artists from all over Europe and the U.S.

Extreme, and disappointment, are just not strong enough words to describe how I felt at the pitiful results that started pouring in. And you’d have a coronary if I were to quote some of the figures demanded for this incredible array of absolute pap!

Back to the drawing board!

Plan B. Scour the Net for alternatives.

I actually came across what I was looking for quite by chance. I was going to try my hand at freelance writing to earn a few extra bucks, when I came across several sites advertising freelance illustrators. It looked promising, and was also free, a huge plus for my, artistic ability un-appreciating, bank manager.

So, I placed a couple of ads on what I thought were two of the better sites, (See list below), and waited. I didn’t wait long. I received hundreds of applications from countries all over the world. Some of which I’d never even heard of. However, the first application I received was from Izabela. Talk about fate!

I’d only asked for one example, and she had sent three. Her attention to fine detail was awesome. Nothing I received afterwards even came close to the quality of her work. So, I cancelled the ad and Izabela and I set about creating the characters for the Charlie and the Yums book series.

I’ve been working with Iz for almost five months now, and she has far exceeded my greatest expectations. Nothing has been a problem for her, she co-operates completely and her input regarding illustration design and content has saved me countless hours and has allowed me to concentrate on putting this site together.

If you’re perhaps interested in contacting a child book illustrator yourselves, I could not recommend Izabela highly enough. You can find her at:

kyokis27(at)aim.com - Just change the (at) for @ This avoids spamming!

Or if you’d like to try the freelance agencies as I did, see the list below. Look under the headings, illustrating child book - child book illustration - child book illustrator.

These are not direct links, as I am not affiliated to them in any way, and receive no financial benefits. They’re listed purely for your convenience and are themselves free to use. Please type the address plus the usual, ‘www.’ extension.

allfreelancework.com

allfreelance.com

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