Children's Book Illustration Portfolio Tips
If you want to illustrate children’s picture books, the best way to market yourself is with a well-edited portfolio. You should showcase the kind of work an art director (AD, for short) at a traditional publisher would want to see in order to make the decision to hire you. An AD never knows what kind of manuscript might show up on their desk in need of an artist, so, creating a portfolio that shows variety is a great strategy.
What should you include in a children’s book portfolio? Let’s break it down.
Characters
Character design is the foundation of a solid children’s book illustration portfolio. Any story you bring to life will follow the arc of a character, or characters. Showing how you design characters is a portfolio must-have.
Facial expressions and moods
Your picture book characters won’t feel the same emotion throughout your entire book—that would make a super-boring book, right? The key to your portfolio here is variety. You want to show an art director that you can draw different emotions. And if you’ve ever been around a child, you know that their emotions can be exaggerated. Use these observations to your advantage! Draw your characters as not just happy, but elated! Not just sad, but devastated! Not just scared, but terrified! Show a mix of moods throughout your art… pro tip: eyebrow shape and placement can play a huge role in helping convey emotion.
Body positions
There’s no better portfolio-killer than a drawing of a character standing in place, facing forward, and smiling in a generic way. Children love to MOVE! It’s important that you show your characters' bodies in motion, at different angles. Think about the actions that kids do: running, jumping, sleeping, climbing, sitting, playing... Better yet, observe some kids you know, take notes, and put that inspiration into your drawings.
Age-appropriateness
The sweet spot for picture books is ages 3-7. If you want to draw for this audience, the children you show in your portfolio should look the same age. Check proportions, and ask others for feedback on what age your children appear. Clothing, hairstyles, and other details you add should also look “right” for that age. (For my Gen Xers: don’t have an Andrea Zuckerman in your drawing of the kindergarten-aged class, KWIM?)
Humans and animals
Not all children’s book characters are human. Animals that are depicted with human qualities and behaviors—think: a bear standing in the kitchen making pancakes for breakfast—are called anthropomorphic, and they show up a lot in picture books. A good children’s book art portfolio should include a mix of humans AND animals that you enjoy drawing! On the flip side, if you dislike drawing elephants, do not include them in your portfolio, because, if you include them, it pretty much guarantees that drawing elephants will be the first illustration job you are offered. Oof!
Woodland animal characters I created for PORCUPINE CUPID by Jason June
Interactions
Characters interacting with each other is another way to strengthen your portfolio. For example, you may want to show a parent tucking a child into bed (pro tip: it’s a great way to show how you draw adults vs kids), or two animal characters arguing over something. This will help show an AD how you convey action and emotion between characters, which is an integral part of visual storytelling.
Environments
Children’s stories can take place in pretty much any environment, real or fictional. It is important to include a lot of variety in your portfolio, and will show an AD the breadth of environments you’re able to draw.
Indoor vs outdoor
Think about indoor environments that are familiar to children. A bedroom, classroom, or living room are all good places to start. What details can you add to make them really specific? What details might show that environment belongs to YOUR character?
Outdoor environments are a great way to show how you tackle drawing grass, trees, water, sky, and structures like houses and buildings. It’s also a great way to show how you draw places that are specific to kids, like playgrounds and school yards. Do you like to draw urban environments? Farms? Suburban streets? Include them in your portfolio.
Indoor living room scene from BUNNY’S STAYCATION, written and illustrated by me!
Seasonal
Seasonal or holiday books can be popular titles, so you may want to consider adding some scenes that look specific to certain months. Snowy environments might win you a winter book, or fall foliage may get you a spooky Halloween story to illustrate.
Day vs night
Art directors will also want to see how an artist handles day vs night—this is something you can cover in your indoor and outdoor scenes. Bedtime stories are very popular (for children AND book sales!) so showing an AD how you draw a child snuggling up for bedtime is a helpful default to include.
Repetition and Sequences
Picture books are typically 32 pages, which means you are basically illustrating a very long sequence. Being able to tell a story, AND draw a character over and over again, in different moods and angles, looking the same every time, ain’t easy... but it’s an important thing to prove to an AD you can do.
Character studies
Character studies are the perfect way to show how you’re able to achieve character continuity. Draw the same character with different expressions, in different poses, from different angles, and make sure it all looks like the same character. This can be done as a collection of spot drawings displayed together. This will give an AD confidence that you can be consistent in drawing a character throughout a picture book.
My character designs for the kids in OOPSIE-DO! by Tim Kubart
Make a mini-story
Create a several-panel mini story, kinda like a little wordless comic, for your portfolio. This will not only show that you can design and draw a character in repetition, but that you can successfully tell a story through expression, pose, and environment-no words needed. A picture book AD’s dream!