How to find Illustrator for Children's Book

How To Find an Illustrator for Your Children's Book

1/11/2016

Sketch from Addison's Starfish Adventure

If you are looking for children's book illustrators, there is a good chance you have written or have a rough draft for a kids book. Maybe you just have an idea. That's great! You have taken the next step in becoming a published or self-published author! Flushing out your concept and actually writing your idea down on paper can be a tedious process. Not to mention the polishing and creating revision after revision!

You've invested a lot of time and effort into your story so far, I know because I have gone through it and I am currently going through the process again right now.

There are literally tons and tons of children's book illustrators at your disposal thanks to the internet. That said, the process of sifting through and finding children's book illustrators can be an arduous task.

How do you find an illustrator for your children's book?

If you are going through the traditional publishing route and trying to find an agent to publish your kids book, then they will also help you find illustrators that will be a good fit for your story. If this is the case, focus on finding your agent or publisher.

If you are planning on publishing your book yourself via Amazon and other sites then you have a little more work to do here. There are quite a few places to find illustrators on the web these days and here are a couple:

Look at children's books you like and reach out to those artists. Keep in mind that these illustrators may have contracts with publishers or may only want to work with publishers because they know they are going to get paid.

Here's an illustrator I really like: Dan Salmieri
Dragons Love Tacos is the latest children's book he illustrated. I am huge fan of Dan's art and definitely encourage you to check out his work!

Dragons Love Tacos Kids book

Full spread from Dragons Love Tacos

Quick sketch as I work on my new kids book

If you aren't having any success, just do a Google Search and look for illustrator websites and find some art that stands out to you and matches your vision and contact them.

I hope this article helps you find the illustrator for your children's book and the journey is as painless as possible

If all else fails, you can always reach out to me if you like my style and we can discuss the possibility of working together.

Cheers!