How to Illustrate a Children's Book: For Writers Who Can't Draw

1. Lesson 1 Intro Illustrate Children's Book : Hello, and welcome to how to illustrate a children's book for writers who can't draw. My name is Eve Heidi Bintock and I'm a full time children's writer. I can't draw, I have illustrated more than 150 children's picture books. Here are covers of just six of them. All of my books have been licensed by Mattel and many other companies. So if you can't draw, don't let that stop you from creating illustrations for children's picture book. In this course, I'll show you step by step how you two can do it, and it does not involve artificial intelligence. This course is for beginners who cannot draw and who have never illustrated a book before. You will learn the types of source images you can use to base your illustrations on. You will see a wide range of artistic effects that can be applied to your source images to create a unique illustration. You will learn how to combine images to create a unique character and how to select areas of an image to create unique backgrounds. You will learn where to find source images and you will learn how to emit images using photo impact. This skill can be adapted to any image editor you decide to use. For your class project, you will be able to use image editing software and already existing images to create a unique character and to place this character in a unique background. Let's get started. Okay. 2. Lesson 2 Source Images Illustrate Children's Book: In this lesson, we'll look at the types of images you can use to base your illustrations on. The source images you can use include photographs and vector art. This is a book I illustrated under the pseudonym Marjorie Day. I used photographs for my source images. I applied artistic effects to photographs in order to create images that look like they have been drawn or painted. Here is an example. The photo on the left is the source image. The illustration on the right is the final result. Here's another example. In later lessons, I'll take you step by step through the editing process that achieved the transformations. Another type of source image you can use is vector art. You can adapt illustrations that other artists have created. I'll show you a simple example from my book, the illustrated alphabet of things that go. The cover has an image of a helicopter, along with the title in a fun font. First, I took a drab drawing of a helicopter and turned it into a colorful, playful image by changing the colors. I then applied a chalk effect so the picture would appear to be hand drawn with colored chalk. I applied the same chalk effect to all the images in the book. For the cover, I flipped the image, so it was facing right to encourage the reader to turn the page. In this lesson, you have learned that you can create great illustrations based on photographs and vector art. Okay. 3. Lesson 3 Artistic Effects Illustrate Children's Book: In this lesson, you will see a variety of artistic effects applied to a source image. On the left is a photograph of a girl blowing on a dandelion. Next to it is a gallery of images created by applying artistic effects to the photo. This page shows four effects by the photo impact program. Watercolor, finger paint, color charcoal, colored pen. Okay. And this page shows four effects by is Pick hobbyist software. Impressionism, pop comics, Sunday comics, pulp comics. Please note that each software program has options that allow you to control the artistic effect. So these images are only examples. You may achieve different results for each artistic effect depending on which options you choose. For many more examples and the names of software that can create these effects, please download the PDF for this lesson. Most any image editing program that you would use has its own selection of artistic effects. You are not limited to the ones I cover in the PDF. 4. Lesson 4 Unique Characters Illustrate Children's Book: In this lesson, we'll look at combining images to create a unique character. You don't have to be satisfied with just the images you can find. You can combine parts of images to create something new. Some of the pictures I have created from my books have combined parts of ten other source images. But I'll show you a simple example. For my book, how bees make honey as told by bear. I created the perfect bear by combining the head of one bear with the body of another. This bear's body plus this bear's head equals the perfect bear. For the bear's body, I made sure to choose a character set that showed a bear in different poses. This would add variety and interest to my book. I then replaced the head I didn't like with the head I loved. Here's a tip when choosing vector art. For a given book, choose illustrations that are in the same style. For example, I wouldn't mix illustrations that use outlines together with those that don't. The goal is to create a consistent look and feel within a picture and between pictures in your book. In this lesson, we've looked at combining images to create a unique character. Next, we'll discuss how to create unique backgrounds. Okay. 5. Lesson 5 Unique backgrounds Illustrate Children's Book: In this lesson, we'll discuss how to create unique backgrounds using vector art. Okay. I wrote a story called I wish I had a pet raccoon. It begins this way. I wish I had a pet raccoon. I'd let him play inside my room. I chose a bedroom background to begin with. I then selected different portions of it for different scenes of the story. For the raccoon, I used vector art of a set of raccoon poses. Okay. I have another example to show you from my book, Squirrel Finds Shapes. I selected a landscape image that had a birdhouse in it as an example of a pentagon. The birdhouse is near the upper left corner. I selected a portion of the landscape to highlight the birdhouse and then placed the squirrel on the tree limb. Again, for the squirrel, I used vector art of a set of squirrel poses. Okay Please note that when you select a small portion of a larger background, you'll often find that you must enlarge the small portion in order to use it for your illustration. To enlarge small images, I use pixio photo maximizer. It can enlarge a picture up to 1,000% without loss of quality. In this lesson, we have learned how to create unique backgrounds with vector art. Next, we'll look at where to find source images to base your illustrations on. Okay. Okay. 6. Lesson 6 Where to get source images Illustrate Children's Book: In this lesson, we'll talk about where to find source images to base your illustrations on. Okay. Three good websites for licensing inexpensive royalty free images are Adobe stock dreams time and Shutter stock. I have a subscription to Adobe stock where I get 40 images a month for about $100 a month. That works out to only $2.50 per image, which is a real bargain. The PDF associated with this lesson has a list of websites for finding free and low cost images. Be sure to use images that are high resolution 300 DPI, which is necessary for printing books. I use the JPEG file format. The websites I showed you allow you to download free C images. These are low resolution images that have watermarks on them. This enables you to try out the images before you purchase a high resolution version. Now, complete the assignment for this lesson. Okay. 7. Lesson 7 Image editing software Illustrate Children's Book: In this lesson, we'll look at image editing software. The software I use is photo Impact P 13. As of this recording, it's available on Amazon on a DVD for $89. This software is intuitive and very easy to use. In later lessons, I'll show you how I use it to edit images. I know there's other software available that has similar functionality, but I find they're not as easy to use as photo impact. If you do use other software, this course will still be valuable because you'll know what functionality to look for. These other programs include Adobe Photoshop elements and Coral paint shop P. They each cost less than $100. There is also the free software known as GIMP, which is an alternative to the professional level photoshop. However, I find GIMP too difficult to use. You can take courses on this and other platforms to try to learn how to use it. I've listed all these programs in the PDF of resources associated with this lesson along with some tips for opening C images. 8. Lesson 8 Editing How to flip an image Illustrate Children's Book: In this lesson, you will begin to learn editing techniques used for the picture called one Goose swimming. I will show you how to do this using photo impact P 13, but you can look for the same functionality in any image editor you decide to use. Here is the original photograph on the left and the final illustration on the right. Okay. First, we'll learn how to flip and image horizontally. Open the original photograph in the editor. Right now, the Goose is facing left. You want to face right, the opposite direction because this placement encourages readers to turn the page. To reverse the direction, the Goose faces, click the edit menu and select rotate and flip. Then choose flip horizontally. Okay. Now the goose is facing the opposite direction that was very easy to do. Okay. 9. Lesson 9 How to apply artistic effect Illustrate Children's Book: Now we'll learn how to apply an artistic effect to an image. The image can be a photo or vector art. We'll continue using the photo of one goose swimming. You can apply any artistic effect that you want, but here we'll apply the cartoon effect. To select this artistic effect, first click on the effect menu. Next, choose artistic and lastly, cartoon. A dual view of the image will appear showing the before image on the left and the after image on the right. The default style is smooth and the default detail value is 30. If you'd like the effect on the right side of the screen, click. If not, you can always adjust the settings to see a preview of the after image on the right when you're satisfied, click. Here's what the image looks like with the style set to flat and the detail value set to 60. We'll work with this image in the next lesson. Okay. 10. Lesson 10 How to change a color Illustrate Children's Book: Now we'll learn how to change the color of the water. We'll continue using the image of one goose swimming with the cartoon effect applied to it. First, we'll choose the tool we want to use to select the water. We want to choose the magic wand tool. On the left side of the photo impact working space is a column of icons. Near the top of the column is an icon of a box with dashed lines. It's highlighted in yellow. That's the standard selection tool. Click the down arrow next to it. From the menu that pops up, choose Magic Wand tool. To select the water, hover the magic w cursor over it and click. You'll see dash lines around the selected area. Okay. Now we'll choose the tool we want to use to change the color. We want to use the bucket fill tool. On the column of icons, click the Buck and fill icon. Now we'll decide which color picker tool we want to use. Near the top left of the photo impact workspace is a box. Click the box to get a menu. From the menu, you can select the Windows color picker tool. This is the one I like to use. This is the Windows color picker tool. Select the color for the water and click Okay. Now you're looking again at the image you're working on. To change the color of the water, hover the bucket fill tool cursor over the image and click once. Your picture now looks like this. You've just learned how to change the color of the water. Okay. 11. Lesson 11 How to copy, paste, save layers Illustrate Children's Book: In this lesson, you will learn how to copy and paste and to preserve layers when you save a file. We're picking up with our illustration after we change the color of the water. Let's say you're not yet satisfied with the way the water looks, and you want to add some visual interest. You decide to copy a portion of water from another picture and paste it on the picture you're working on. Here's what your second photo looks like with the same cartoon effect applied to it. Now you use the magic wand to select an area of water that you like. The selection is enclosed by the dashed line. To make sure that you only copy the selection without any of the surrounding water, which is a different side of blue, you'll need to shrink the selection a bit. To do this, click the selection menu and then expand slash shrink. A little window will pop up at the lower left corner of the photo impact workspace. Set shrink to two pixels and click Okay. Okay. Now, to copy the selection, press the control and C keys at the same time. Go back to your first picture to paste the selected water area, press the control and V keys at the same time. See the light blue water area in the upper left that you copied from the other picture. If you want to move it, click it and drag it. Right now, it's an object floating above the underlying picture. There are two layers. If you want to be able to move the pasted object later on, you'll need to preserve the layers now. To preserve the layers, save the image as a file as follows. Click the file menu, then save as. The save as window will pop up. For save as type, choose UFO and click the save button. Okay. The file is now saved and the layers are preserved. You have just learned how to copy and paste and to preserve layers when saving a file. Okay. 12. Lesson 12 How to change color saturation level Illustrate Children's Book: In this lesson, you will learn how to merge layers, how to change the color saturation level and how to save the file for use in your book. We are continuing with our picture. In order to appeal to children, we want the colors to be brighter and more saturated. But before we change the saturation level, we must merge the layers. To do this, click the object menu, then merge all. Now, we'll move on to changing the saturation level. Click the photo menu, then color, and lastly, hue and saturation. A dual view of your picture now appears showing the before image on the left and the after picture on the right. In this example, I've set the saturation level to 60. Here's the final illustration. Now, let's save it so it can be used in your book. To save the file so that it can be used in your book, click the file menu, then Save as. For Save as type choose JPEG. Now your illustration is ready to be used in your book. This is the end of our series of lessons on editing one Go swimming. We took a boring photo and turned it into a beautiful illustration. You too can do it. 13. Lesson 13 Editing How to crop Illustrate Children's Book: In the lessons to follow, you will learn editing techniques used for the picture I call Mother Goose. As with the previous picture, one Goose swimming, I will show you how to edit using photo Impact P 13. But you can look for the same functionality in any image editor you decide to use. Here are before and after versions of the Mother Goose picture. In this lesson, we'll learn how to crop an image to exclude an unwanted object. This photograph shows a mother goose and 13 goslings. However, the text says that a mother goose can have up to 12 goslings. We have to remove one gosling from the photograph. We'll learn how to do this by cropping the original photograph. Okay. Near the top of the column of icons, click the standard selection icon. Change the view of the photograph, so it's small enough for you to create a selection with one movement of your finger or hand. To change the view, choose a number from the percentage menu. With the selection icon active, place your cursor on the photograph and click hold and drag. You'll see a box form within a dotted line. Drag the corner of the box until the area of the photograph that you want to keep is enclosed in the box. Use the arrow keys to adjust the placement of the box. Notice that the gosling on the far left is outside the box to copy the area inside the box, press the control and see keys at the same time. To paste the area that's inside the box as a new image, click the edit menu, then paste, and finally, as new image. Okay. Here's what the cropped image looks like. Now there are 12 goslings which matches the text. 14. Lesson 14 How to brush out an object Illustrate Children's Book: In this lesson, we'll learn how to remove one gosling by brushing it out. We'll work with the image after we've applied the cartoon effect and increased the saturation level. First, we'll choose the color we'll use for the paintbrush. To do this, click the eyedropper icon. Then move the eye dropper cursor over the blue water and click. The paintbrush color will be the blue color of the water. Okay. Now, click on the paint brush icon. The paint brush cursor is a circle. Hover it over the gosling you want to brush out. Then click hold and drag the cursor. You have now removed the goslings head and neck by painting them the same color as the water. Here are some tips. You can adjust the size of the paint brush circle on the tool settings window, which appears at the lower right of the workspace. You can also enlarge the view of the picture to make it easier to color over the gosling. Here's the picture with the sling brushed out. Now, the number of goslings in the picture matches the text. 15. Lesson 15 How to change picture dimensions Illustrate Children's Book: In this lesson, I'll show you how to change the image dimensions, changing it from horizontal to square. We are continuing with the same picture. I planned on using this picture for the title page, I wanted room within the picture for the title, the author and illustrator names, and the publishing company. I created room by making the picture both higher on the top and lower on the bottom. In this lesson, I'll show you how to do it. Under the file menu is an icon of a blank page. Click on it. The new image window will pop up. Set the resolution to 300 pixels per inch. This is the resolution you'll need for a print book. Set the width to the same width as the image you are working on. In this case, the picture is 7.5 " wide. Because we want to make the image square, we'll also set the height to 7.5 ". Here's a tip. You can switch back and forth from inches to pixels by clicking the little down arrow on the units menu. When you're finished setting the resolution width and height of the new image, click. A new blank Canvas is created. Next, we'll copy the image onto the blank canvas. Click on the picture underneath to copy it, press the control and C keys at the same time. Now click on the new blank Canvas to paste the picture onto the blank Canvas, press the control and V keys at the same time. Next, we'll center the pasted picture on the Canvas, both vertically and horizontally. We'll click the object menu, then choose a line, and finally center both. Look closely at this picture. The pasted image is floating over the background. If the shade of blue at the top of the image were the same as the shade at the bottom, we could change the background color before merging the layers. However, since the blue shades are different, we must merge the pasted image with the background and then change the color of the white areas to match. You have already learned how to merge layers and how to change colors, so we'll skip to the final picture. Here is the final square picture. This is the end of our series of lessons on editing the Mother Goose picture. 16. Lesson 16 Editing How to select, resize, and order objects Illustrate Children's Book: We'll look at a new book now. It's called Squirrel Fins Shapes. Okay. This is a picture from the squirrel book. We'll learn how it was put together. In this lesson, you'll learn important actions that you will often need to do. You'll learn how to select an object, resize it, and arrange the order of overlapping objects. I've already placed three animals in the scene. They are all floating over the background, so there are two layers here. We're going to place a squirrel into this picture as well. We use the magic wand tool to select the white area around the squirrel. Now, we'll invert the selection in order to have the squirl selected instead of the white area. To do this, click the selection menu, then choose invert. The squirl is now selected. We'll copy and paste the squirl into the scene. To copy, press the control and C keys at the same time and to paste, press control and V. Now, we'll make the squirrel smaller. To do this, click the transform tool icon. A resizing box will appear around the squirrel. To change the size of the squirrel, just drag a corner of the box. Right now, the squirrel is on top of other animals. We want to put the squirrel behind them. We'll do that next. The squirl is still the active object, all we need to do is click the object menu, then choose a range order, and finally, send backward. The squirl is now behind the other animals. All that's left to do is to merge the layers and save the image as a Jpeg You've already learned how to do this. The picture is now complete, and so is this lesson. Okay. 17. Lesson 17 Conclusion Illustrate Children's Book: In this course, I have attempted to demystify the process of creating illustrations for a children's book when like me, you don't know how to draw. I have broken down the editing steps into bite sized actions that can be adapted to any image editing software you decide to use. I have not covered all the editing actions you can take, but I've given you a good start. Okay. I hope this course has encouraged you to create your own illustrations. Please let me know about your successes. Thank you for taking my course, kind regards. Okay.