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How to give your picture book art more visual impact

Lilla here. Today I’m going to make you flip out, literally. Over the past week or so, I’ve been sharing some FREE assignments that I created for you to get ready for my online course, Illustrating Children’s Books. I hope you’ll join us: class starts Monday, July 7th, so book your spot now! How to give your picture book art more visual impact Today I’m going to help you make some magic that will give your picture book illustrations more visual impact. Whether it’s dreamy, moody, whimsical or witty, digging deep into a manuscript and creating all those little details is one of the most rewarding parts of children’s book illustration. Think about your audience. Children are so in touch with their imaginations: they are going to love the imaginative worlds that you create. In Illustrating Children’s Books, we spend a whole week on creating a dreamy full page spread

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FREE: How to create a setting for a picture book

Illustrating Children’s Books 2025 starts in just over a week, on Monday, July 7th! To help you get ready for class and warm up your creative muscles, we’re sharing a series of five FREE assignments from course co-teacher and renowned art agent, Lilla Rogers: read on for Part 2! How to create a setting for a picture book What’s Illustrating Children’s Books? It’s an incredible five-week LIVE online course that will teach you everything you need to know to launch or boost your children’s picture book illustration career. This will be the twelfth time that your teachers, art agent and Make Art That Sells founder, Lilla Rogers, and acclaimed children’s book art director and author, Zoë Tucker, have run this course – and each time, it just gets better and better! Art by Make Art That Sells student Pamela Goodman for Illustrating Children’s Books. You’ll create a pitch presentation containing

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FREE picture book illustration assignment – Part 1

FREE picture book illustration assignment – Part 1 Our student-favorite LIVE online course, Illustrating Children’s Books, starts in just over a week, on Monday, July 7th and there’s still time to sign up! Why is this course, which is now running for the twelfth time, so popular? Why do our students take it again and again? Because it’s incredibly rigorous but also playful and fun – and it really works. Tons of our students have gone on to get picture book illustration deals, land agents, and more after taking this course (you can read some of their stories here). Plus it’s led by industry experts. Your teachers, former top art agent Lilla Rogers and renowned children’s book art director and author Zoë Tucker, will teach you everything you need to know about the wonderful world of children’s book illustration, in an accessible, step by step way that will break everything

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HOW many picture book deals?!

Building a lucrative career in the dreamy world of children’s book illustration is totally possible – and we’ve got the receipts to prove it (see below!). It isn’t just about skill or style – for example, you also need to show an art director or publisher that you have what it takes to create a character that will appeal to children, and that you can recreate in different poses and with different expressions while still being identifiably the same character. That’s where our student favorite Illustrating Children’s Books course comes in! Now in its tenth year (and twelfth iteration), you’ll spend five intense weeks creating an eye-catching ready-to-send pitch presentation that contains everything you need to show an art director or publisher so they give you that gig! Meet your teachers! Former top art agent, Lilla (left), and children’s book art director and picture book author, Zoë (right), have tons

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Create your dream book cover

Create your dream book cover Everyone knows that you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover … but from that pile of unused journals (we see you – and yes, we know, they were just too pretty to pass up) to browsing your local bookstore, that’s exactly what we all do. Plus it’s one of the key things that an art director or publisher will look at when they look at your picture book illustration portfolio. Some of the many thousands of books agented by Lilla Rogers Studio. Check out those amazing covers – and see how the lettering can really add to the overall impact. A book cover needs to work hard to get you to pick the book up out of thousands of others on offer. It needs to look good even if viewed as a thumbnail online. It needs to tease a little bit of the story,

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HURRY! This incredible offer ends TODAY!

HURRY – our 72 hour flash sale on Lilla’s Art Recipes: Drawing Faces ends TODAY! Usually £59 (approx. $80) you can grab it now for only £12 (approx. $16)! Being able to draw faces will get you more illustration work in tons of markets including editorial, books, children’s picture books and more – and more work means more money for you. It’s particularly useful for the children’s picture book market – and Lilla’s Art Recipes: Drawing Faces includes extra teaching on how to draw children’s faces to help you boost your skills in this area. The ability to draw faces also makes your illustration career more interesting and more rewarding, plus it’ll give you confidence and – oh yes – it’s really fun! In Lilla’s Art Recipes: Drawing Faces, former full-time illustrator Lilla Rogers will teach you how to draw faces in a completely new way, breaking everything down so

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HUGE NEWS for Illustrating Children’s Books students!

Illustrating Children’s Books 2025 starts in just over a month, on Monday, July 7th, and we have some fantastic news: Tamisha Anthony will be joining Lilla and Zoë for one of the reviews! Illustrator, educator, Make Art That Sells student and now author Tamisha with some of the books she’s illustrated. Who’s Tamisha Anthony, we hear you ask? She’s a busy working professional illustrator, with five gorgeous picture books under her belt since 2022 (her clients include Penguin Random House, Little Brown, Macmillan Publishers, and Chronicle Books), and another SEVEN on the way – including her very own author-illustrator debut! She’s a gifted and passionate educator, who’s taught at institutions including the New York Historical Society and the Harlem School of the Arts, as well as leading two incredible Make Art That Sells courses of her own: Redrawing Black History and Find Your Art Style with Style. She’s a Make

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Is this our best ever offer? Happy birthday to us!

Happy birthday to us! Make Art That Sells turns 12 this year, and to celebrate we wanted to share what might be our best offer ever: Lilla’s Art Recipes: Drawing Faces for just £12 (approx. $16)! That means it’s reduced from £59 (approx. $80)! Sign up now and get Lilla’s Art Recipes: Drawing Faces for just £12 (approx. $16) – but hurry, HURRY, this offer is only available for the next 72 hours! Grab your spot here. Faces get you jobs! Some cool products with faces from artists represented by Lilla (and Lilla herself!). Being able to draw faces hugely increases how much work you will get. Sign up now for just £12 (approx. $16 USD) in our 12th birthday sale! Being able to draw faces is great for creative career, because it can hugely increase how many illustration jobs you get. In this fun short course, former top art

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What should you do if your style isn’t on trend?

Lilla here! I was an art agent for 30 years, and I’m also an illustrator, an author, a columnist, a speaker, and an educator. I love sharing what I’ve learned from my decades in the industry. It’s just over a month now until the start of one of my favorite courses (spoiler alert: they’re all my favorites), Illustrating Children’s Books, which I teach alongside my brilliant friend and colleague, children’s book art director and author, Zoë Tucker. This will be the twelfth time we’ve taught Illustrating Children’s Books, and every year it just gets better and better! Children’s book art director and picture book author Zoë Tucker with three of her picture books. Zoë co-teaches Illustrating Children’s Books with me, and between us we have a wealth of expertise to share! As you probably know, I worked as an art agent for 30 years, during which time I agented many

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Get started with Procreate – FREE guide!

Make Art That Sells student Ruth Burrows is an artist, professional illustrator, and author of The Illustrator’s Guide to Procreate, and she’s created a fab FREE project especially for you to help you create some gorgeous florals that will look amazing in your illustration portfolio. Don’t miss this amazing FREE tutorial! Click here to download your copy. Florals are fantastic for your portfolio because they’re always in style and can be sold in so many art markets, like fabric, home décor, greeting cards, wall art, journal covers and more. Ruth is a professional illustrator and author of The Illustrator’s Guide to Procreate, which was agented by Lilla Rogers Studio and is filled with easy to follow projects to help you get started with digital art. In this project, Ruth will show you in an easy step-by-step format how to get started in Procreate by creating and arranging a beautiful bouquet.