Building a story snowman

Thoughts on illustrating a picture book manuscript

Hi friends,

A few years ago I wrote a story about a snowman. This story was in rhyme, and I loved it so much that I never sent it to any publishers. Why? Because I wanted it all to myself. Not just the story, but the illustrations. I was envisioning this story a certain way, and I believed that I could make it happen myself. I was determined to make it happen myself.

The story went through the usual rounds of writing and rewriting. I polished that manuscript to a pristine shine, and then I set it aside while I took classes and learned a lot about the process of illustrating a picture book.

In the meantime, I taught a workshop through my local SCBWI about writing picture books, with my friend and fellow picture book creator Jessica Linn Evans as my co-teacher. During the course of this course (haha), Jessica did a fantastic presentation on why and how to create storyboards for your manuscripts, even if you’re not an illustrator.

At this point I was already pretty familiar with the hows and whys of creating a storyboard, but I enthusiastically followed Jessica’s instructions (and did my homework) for that lesson, and created a storyboard for my snowman story. This is it:

It would take me a while to gain the confidence as an artist and illustrator to really pursue this project. The story went through another round of revisions and I spent a year or more figuring out my illustration style. Most of that was spent working on the project I started when I took the Children’s Book Pro course through SVS Learn, but I also went a little crazy creating block prints, including the little ones I made for Inktober 2024.

But recently I realized that all the learning was becoming procrastinating, so it was time to go back to the snowman and create a book dummy. I began by creating some character sketches on my iPad (see one of them at the end of my New Year post, in case you missed it), then I created a small, 5 x 7 block print version of a scene from the manuscript. I started small because I thought it would be a sensible way for me to be sure I was moving in the right direction (or maybe I was just still a little chicken). You may have seen the original block print in my post about surviving winter.

My illustration process thus far involves a combination of traditional and digital techniques, most often handmade block prints that are edited and colored in Procreate. This allows me to create art by hand, but also saves time and resources in creating finished illustrations.

I imported my scanned block print (also called a linocut) into Procreate and created a color palette using a photograph of a snowy scene. Then I set to painting! There is something really satisfying about filling in an image with color. It makes me feel like a kid with a coloring book!

When it was finished, I was really happy with the results.

“Why so sad, my snowy friend?”

The next step in this process is to make a storyboard with my revised manuscript. I did the first part of that the other day with just the text, so now I know how I want the story to be all laid out. I’ll create rough sketches of each scene in a visual storyboard, and then decide which of those sketches to turn into finished art. That will be 3 or 4 scenes, probably. Hopefully before the end of the summer I’ll have a book dummy that is worthy to show to editors!

If you’re interested in learning more about storyboarding for a picture book manuscript (which is helpful for writers as well as illustrators), I’ll be writing in depth about it in a future Workshop Wednesday post.

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In honor of all the illustrators out there whose work has inspired me to pursue illustration, here are some books that have been illustrated (and in some cases, written) by some of my favorite children’s book illustrators:

• My Friend Rabbit by Eric Rohmann

• Home in the Woods by

  Eliza Wheeler

• John Ronald’s Dragons: The Story of J.R.R. Tolkien by Caroline McAlister, illustrated by Eliza Wheeler

• Song of the Water Boatman and Other Pond Poems by Joyce Sidman, illustrated by Beckie Prange

• North Woods Girl by Aimée Bissonette, illustraed by Claudia McGehee

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