I hear all of the time from people who tell me they’re not creative enough/talented enough/good enough/etc. to illustrate a picture book. But for a lot of people, despite this crippling belief, illustrating a picture book is still a quiet dream in the back of their mind..
What if I told you that I know that you’re creative, talented, and good enough to tackle a picture book? But, like anything, you have to want to do it, and you need to learn a few skills first (don’t worry, it’s nothing crazy!)
Warm up before you draw
It’s so basic, but no one ever talks about it! We warm up our muscles before we work out, we warm up our car before we drive on a frosty morning, we should be warming up our hands, and our minds, before we draw.
You may enjoy creating some abstract shapes to get your hands warmed up, or you might want to jump into the world’s roughest sketch, and hey, maybe one day you’ll beef it out into a finished illustration, but for now, just create it with the intention of never looking at it again.
Give yourself permission to draw something ugly! To draw what feels good, whatever comes to mind first! If you’re struggling to decide what to draw, look to your left and draw the first object you see (right now, my options are tripod or ficus). Commit to drawing the object in it's entirety, but prepare yourself mentally for it to be ugly (if I wanted to warm up right now, my goal would be to draw the world’s ugliest ficus).
You warm up should be truly terrible, to be discarded, or hidden away in a cupboard for your future self to find and to laugh at once you’ve published your beautifully illustrated picture book (trust me, that day will come). Every single one of the pieces of art that am most proud of, I’ve created after a, frankly, hideous warm up drawing. The uglier the warm up, the better the final artwork. I don’t make the rules, that’s just the way it works.
Take your time!
When I was first getting into painting again as a teenager, the way that I found it enjoyable was to put on music, or an audiobook and get lost in it all. If you can, carve out some time for it, especially if you’re working in a medium that requires a bit of set up and tidying up, you don’t want to be feeling stressed that you don’t have enough time. Stress does not equal great art.
I like to think of drawing like meditation. For me, it’s a chance to think about not much while I do some busy fidgety work with my hands, which happens to be my favourite combo for relaxing.
If you’re struggling to find time to create, take a walk outside instead, or scroll through Pinterest for easy art ideas. Allow room for your creativity and you might just find that you’ll feel a need to create, when you have a little time.
Keep working on it
Practice makes perfect. I know, I know. It’s not what people want to hear. But seriously, I look back at art I created a year ago, two years ago, a decade ago, and I can see how far I’ve come. It’s a journey, no matter who you are, how far along the journey you are, or how much “natural talent” (which I think is a bit of a scam) you have to begin with. And I will say that it’s a really enjoyable journey; you just have to start, and keep going.
Here's a very quick sketch I did recently vs the finished illustration, as a wee reminder that every beautiful piece of art you've ever seen in a book, a gallery, or a home, evolved from an idea, and many, many stages of drafts...
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