How to become an Illustrator for Children’s Books

I’ve written a short version of this answer so many times to people who have asked how to get started in picture book illustration, that I thought I’d put my best advice in one place for you to reference.

I started my journey into book illustration around 2016 and have now illustrated nine books for traditional publishers of all sizes. I’ve had wonderful critique groups, mentors and community support along the way and love to help new generations of illustrators get started on their journey. I hope my post will give you the tools and inspiration to get started.

Managing Expectations

Becoming an illustrator is a marathon, not a sprint. Sometimes people are in the right place at the right time, but depending on the level of skills you are starting with, it will more likely take years to learn and create a portfolio and to get your first book deal. Illustrating books is very competitive, you will be handed a lot of rejections, but all of us in this community know how hard it can be and we are kind and supportive. Make friends with peers who are on the same path as you so you can lift each other up when things are looking down.  While this career isn’t for the faint of heart, it is incredibly rewarding and everyone who is in the industry does it because they love creating books for kids.  With that being said, lets get right down to business with my top 10 tips on how to get started illustrating picture books.  

1. Read a Lot of Books in the Genre You Want to Illustrate

I can not stress this enough. If you asked Taylor Swift who her favorite musician was, wouldn’t it be bizarre if she replied she doesn’t know, because she doesn’t listen to any music? Similarly, if you want to illustrate picture books, you should be reading them and know who your favorite illustrators are. If you know what is currently being put out into the world, it is much easier to align yourself and gain traction.

The second reason you want to read a lot is because you can use books to learn about illustration.

When I was starting out, I was carrying home 2 brimming bags of books from the library every other week. I would read them, and examine character design, color palettes, learn how illustrators drew backgrounds, get ideas for layouts and page turns, and figure out anything else that I was having issues with.

2. Draw a lot

Spend a lot of time drawing and practicing. The more you draw the more a style will emerge. If you don’t have a lot of experience in art, then you can begin with master studies, copying work from illustrators that you admire. This will be more useful to you than just looking at illustrations, because when you are forced to break the work down to make it yourself, you’ll be able to learn much more from it. (Note** Master studies are for you to learn from, but they should not be something that you post online, or claim as your own work.) 

For online classes to learn basics, I recommend SVSLearn.com. They have structured their classes into learning paths, unlike on many other platforms that offer individual classes. Other platforms that can be good resources for illustration classes are 21Draw, Domestika and Skillshare. I also teach a series of picture book illustration classes that are hosted on both Skillshare and Gumroad. 

Having a style is important to stick out from the crowd for agents and art directors. I don’ think you have to find a style, we all have a natural way of doing things and the more you do art, the more you fall into natural ways of solving problems and the more your style will find you. 

As a relief, you don’t necessarily need to be the best illustrator in the room (I feel like I never am). If you have a unique style that fits into the genre that you are trying to get into, it’s easier to get noticed. Art directors want to see work that:

- looks current

- shows that you can draw characters consistently

- shows emotions

- shows movement

- includes storytelling

- has great colors

- shows kids and animals

- has a variety of representation of characters within the limits of what you want to illustrate. (I.e. If you don’t want to illustrate books about robots and cars, don’t have a bunch of portfolio pieces with those.)   

3. Learn About the Industry in General

Knowing how the industry works and where you fit in it as an illustrator is very helpful. It will make you more professional, help you be more strategic where you place yourself to get found, and helps make rejection less personal. (My agent just sent rejection letters from 3 editors yesterday.)

One of the best places to learn about the children’s book industry are through SCBWI.org. They are an international organization with regional chapters. The main organization hosts big conferences, webinars and has two great handbooks that are updated regularly: one for self publishing and one for traditional publishing. They are the most up to date place to get information about publishers and agencies for kidlit when you are ready to submit your portfolio. 

SCBWI also has regions, and it’s get to get involved with your local region and see what in person and online programming they offer. Webinars and events are usually very affordable, and a great way to get professional critiques on your work, and a way to get to know industry professionals (agents, publishers, editors and art directors), what they do and look for. 

I have been a member of SCBWI from very early in my journey and have learned so much from events, in-person meetings, volunteering, and made so many friends along the way. I’m not an affiliate for them, but think that they do a fantastic job on educating authors and illustrators and creating connections.    

If you like to listen to podcasts, I recommend these:  

• SVSLearn 3 Point Perspective Podcast

• Creative Peptalk, by Andy J Pizza’s 

• Picture Book Look by Kirsti Call and Kim Chaffee

• Print Run, by Erik Hane and Laura Zats

• The Children’s Book Podcast, by Matthew Winner

• The Illustration Department Podcast, by Giuseppe Castellano

4. Find Your KidLit Community

If you didn’t get the gist of my feelings yet: I love the kidlit community. Being able to connect and be a part of a community is important to my mental health. It’s nice to have places to ask questions, feel seen and get feedback. I recommend SCBWI local regions and events, and online communities like Kidlit411 - blog and FaceBook group, and Tara Lazars Storystorm community on FaceBook. The Kidlit411 blog is incredibly well organized and is a great resource to find information about all things kidlit. It is updated monthly with new articles. Tara Lazar’s Storystorm is an online event that happens on her blog at the beginning of each year. It’s a really fun month long event to brainstorm ideas for stories and illustrations. The community is the most active during that time. 

For graphic novels I recommend Kids Comics Unite. They have a Mighty Networks community that is active and has a free and paid membership. The free membership has a nice active community too.

SVSLearn.com also has a forum that is free to join. It is also a place to get feedback and ask questions, but most of it is related to the classes being taught on the platform.  

If you want to write: Julie Hedliund’s Picture Book Summit and 12x12 are great for learning and community (paid members only), and Manuscript Academy is also another place that has a free and paid membership options.  

For community elsewhere on social media, I recommend Bluesky. I like the ability to follow several kidlit feeds on there. Most notably #kidlit and Kidlit Mega Feed. Debbie Ohi has great instructions on how to follow feeds and be plugged in on Bluesky. (See some of the feeds to follow below)

5. Community - Peer Critique Group

You can not grow in a vacuum. In addition to reading a lot of books, you also need to get feedback on your work. A critique group works in two ways: you get direct feedback on your work and you get to look at others work and give feedback on it. Noticing points of improvement in others work helps you avoid similar mistakes in your own work so either way you are critiquing, will improve your work.

It can be challenging finding the right people to critique with. You might have to shuffle through a few groups/people to find the right fit. The best places to look for people are through online communities, like Kidlit411 (which already has sub groups for authors and illustrators to find critiques). You can make a post that you are looking to find critique partners, or ask if anyone is willing to swap critiques. Include your own skill level, so you are more likely to find some one at the same level as you. SCBWI chapters often have critique groups that they help form, so reach out to your local team if you are a member. 

Once you find people who you fit with, keep in touch with them and then see if they’d be willing to form a group with you. I find that about once a month is a good interval to meet. Find the place that works best to critique, it can be via Zoom or Google Teams, on Discord, a FB group, a chat, etc. For my groups we have a place to chit chat during the month, like a FB messenger chat, and then host a meeting via zoom once a month, or when we all agree on it.    

6. Professional Critiques & Mentorship

At some point before you start submitting to agents and art directors, you might want to get a mentor or pay for a professional critique to get a feel for how close you are to being ready. (This isn’t to say that you should stop learning when your work is ready to submit. I still work on all aspects of my skills to keep my work fresh and update my portfolio to match my current skills.) Getting a professional critique will give you direction and save you time from guesswork. Because it costs money to get a professional critique, it is helpful to have a peer critique group first, to help you hone your craft closer to professional work, and then a professional critique can help you polish everything up for submissions. 

SCBWI offers relatively inexpensive critiques in conjunction with most of the regional webinars, events and conferences. In addition to feedback, the critiques a great way to get a feel for an agent/editor/art director who you would like to work with in the future. I also recommend getting critiques from professional illustrators, because they are already working and know how to get to the point where you want to be. In my experience illustrators will often also be more generous with their time and feedback compared to agents and art directors.

Other places for critiques are the Manuscript Academy - mostly for writing. I’ve purchased a dummy review from an editor before and had a good experience.

Many illustrators these days offer critiques and mentorship (myself included), and if you find some one who you really look up to, and they don’t have anything posted on their website, you can send a polite email and ask if they would be willing to give you a critique and how much they would charge. Try to be brief but specific in your first communication as to what you are asking them to do.

7. Free Opportunities for Feedback

There are a few free mentorship opportunity for authors and illustrators. I’ve participated in the PB Rising Stars mentorship as a mentor and love their mission, but as it is a free opportunity, it is very competitive to get picked. They are amazing though and definitely worth getting on their email list to know when submissions open. We Need Diverse Books is another free mentorship program for diverse authors and illustrators worth looking into. It’s often a good idea to get started on your skills and have a portfolio together when applying for better chances of being picked.

Once you attend events, are active in online communities, get to know people in your community personally, and make genuine connections, it is ok to reach out and ask questions from more advanced peers (while being mindful of their time). I have reached out to more advanced friends to ask a question or get feedback on my work many times. I always give them the option to decline if they are busy. Ask first before sending anything and be thankful for any response that they have time to give back. I am so grateful for my mentors, and people who have answered my questions over the years, and am now happy to pay it forward when I can. 

One way I’m doing that is through my classes on Skillshare. All the classes have the invitation to submit projects and questions related to kidlit either in the classroom (more private) or on social media (public + make sure to tag me so I see it). I’m always happy to give feedback on illustrations, and answer questions as long as I’m not overwhelmed with time.   

8. Portfolio - Get Found

In order to get found by art directors/agents, you have to have some way of getting your work online. If you are working digitally, in Procreate or Photoshop for example, this should be pretty straight forward. If you are working traditionally, for example in watercolor or pencils, you need to figure out a way to either scan or photograph your work appropriately to showcase it online. 

Put together a basic website. I personally host my website on Squarespace, and can recommend them. Wix is another one that is used by a lot of people. I did have a Wordpress site for about 20 years, but there were so many issues with hacking in the last few years, that I didn’t want to deal with that anymore. 

If you are mostly wanting to illustrate picture books, here are some general guidelines for your online portfolio: 

• Make sure you have some art on the front page so that a visitor will immediately see it when they come to your page.

• Keep things looking clean, with white or light background, but have happy pops of color in your banner, logo etc. 

• Make it easy to find your contact information

• Add social media links in an easy to find location 

• Only put your best art on, and update regularly. Your work is as good as your weakest piece. Better to have 5 great pieces than 10 mediocre ones.

• If just beginning, try to stick to one style of work. (One style does not necessarily mean one media.) If you have more than one style, there needs to be enough strong work in each style to have a section of it’s own. 

• Make sure that your portfolio is kidlit friendly. If you also do adult themed work, these might be best put on a different website under a different brand name. Publishers don’t want kids and parents coming to your site and finding inappropriate work for their audience.  

Look up some of your favorite illustrators websites and see what they have done for inspiration. 

9. Get Found - Social Media & Beyond

Social media can be exhausting. My best advice is start with one or two platforms that you feel most comfortable with and start sharing there. Social media platforms are always changing, so it’s best to pick the one that you want to work with. Possible sites could be Instagram, Tumblr, Bluesky, Facebook, TikTok, Linkedin, Cara and X. When posting, make sure to use appropriate hashtags for your industry and theme for what you are posting. So for example if I post the following image:

I would tag it with industry words: #kidlit #kidlitillustration #picturebook #picturebookillustration #kidlitart #kidlit #kidsbooks #bookillustration #illustrationartists #childrensbooks #illustrator #childrensbookillustrator

Words teachers/librarians/parents might use: #raisingreaders #boardbook #cutehalloweenillustration

Media: #digitalart

Theme hashtags: #halloweenillustration #halloween #horsecostume #knight #trickortreating

You can also post on themed days. #Kidlitartpostcard (1st Thursday of every month) and #portfolioday are two good ones to look and participate in to boost your visibility. When posting, make sure to use the hashtags in your post - see my example post below.

Aside from social media, you can also make industry connections and get submission opportunities from kidlit webinars, conferences, & comic cons. 

10. Spend Time with Kids 

Hanging out with kids can be a bit trickier, as not everyone has kids, or hangs around kids for work. As a parent I also don’t want a stranger around the playground drawing or talking to my kids. If you don’t have a chance to interact with kids, but have a heart to serve, you could see if the local library, church or school has a kids program where you could be qualified to volunteer. (If working with kids is new to you, be prepared for a background check.)

Hanging out with kids is a great way to see how their little minds work, what gets them excited, and get ideas for new books and illustrations. It also helps you get in touch with the kind inside. Reading to kids is also a great way to see how they react to books and illustrations, and when showing your work to them they are a great unbiased audience who will give you the truth without sugarcoating it. LOL  

Summary

These are my top 10 tips to get yourself started in picture book illustration. Questions like submitting to editors and agents shouldn’t be at the top of your list of things to do if you are just starting out, which is why I haven’t touched on those subjects here. It’s first important to learn what book illustration is, to build a portfolio, understand the industry and have a community, before taking the next steps to active submissions. 

I’f you want to learn more from me, I’ve created multiple picture book classes with more coming as I have time to make them. You can find them on:

• Skillshare (free if you already have a membership, or get 30-day free trial with my teacher link) and 

• Gumroad (shop individual classes) 

You can learn how to create characters, draw consistently, how to research books to learn from them, how to create dummies etc. 

Follow along my blog for more helpful articles or sign up for my once-a-month newsletter to be notified of new classes, blog posts and events in one spot. A few of the links in this blog are affiliate links.