Freelance Fridge- Illustration & Character Development
Children's Book Illustrator & Character Designer
Development Process
Here are some posts of my development process on various client projects. You can read through the stages of each project. This will give you a great idea of how I work with my clients.
- How to Teach Your Grownup to Read Children’s Book
Another book completed and out! This one is titled How to Teach Your Grownup to Read. It’s a funny children’s book with tools to help teach your child to read. A light-hearted way for grownups and kids in the stage of their child learning how to read.
I’d love to share a bit of my process here for you, for this unique and challenging book we illustrated.
As always, after reading the story and brainstorming a full plan with my client, I began sketching 3 style concept drawings for the main fox boy character. We wanted something cute and simple.
My client loved the second “B” option! She just requested to add some shorts. And with that approval, I could begin finalizing this first character.
And this is how our cute little fox turned out!
After that, I sketched out the other characters in the story… Mom, Dad, and the little frog friend who shows up in each spread.
Once those other character design sketches were approved, then I could finalize them. Here’s the final lineup, all in scale with each other. Fox Mom, Fox Boy, Fox Dad, and the little Blue Poison Dart Frog.
The character lineup for each book gives my clients a clear picture how how we will be approaching the illustrations for the book itself. And there’s no surprises with how characters will look once I start sketching those pages.
With the characters done, I could start sketching the interior pages. In this book, some pages were pretty straightforward with how to incorporate the text, like this one.
With other pages, like these, the author had a plan to go back and forth from the narration and the characters talking with each other. I had to approach this children’s book in a hybrid sort of way… part of the book was more like a picture book, while most of it was handled more like a comic book. It took some real time to plan out the talk bubbles and the main text in a way that it all flowed together naturally when reading.
After ALL of the interior sketches were drawn and approved, then I began work on the book cover art. This is the initial sketch and title design for this book. Our client approved without any real changes, which is always great!
My client wasn’t quite sure what background color she wanted, so she requested to see a few options. Here’s the 3 color variations for the book cover that I shared with her.
She chose the blue background for the book cover. Here’s that option, showing both the front and back wraparound cover design. You may notice the darker framed areas on this, which are the bleed and trim lines. I remove those for the final print files.
Once the cover artwork is completed, then I begin into finalizing the interior illustrations. Here’s one of those near the beginning of the book. You’ll see with these examples, that I really leaned into the expressions and humor of this book…
…especially with this book taking place in the same setting for a good portion of it, I wanted to make sure the variation and interest came from the characters themselves.
Our client was so open and collaborative as we worked together. I think that’s what helped make this unique approach to a book turn out well.
And if you have a young one who is learning to read, I’d encourage you to click the book image above and order a copy for yourself! There are so many excellent tools to help us grownups encourage and assist kids in this sometimes scary journey of learning how to read.
Also, if you are a publisher or independent author looking for an illustrator that can take on unique kids book projects, feel free to send me a message through my website here! I’d love to talk with you more about your book and how I can help bring your characters to life in the pages!!
- Rodney Makes It Rain – Animals Playing Basketball Children’s Book
I had a wonderful time illustrating this kids book about a cute little dachshund puppy dog who loves his blankie and just wants to play basketball with all the other big animals. It’s available now if you’re interested in picking up a copy for yourself.
As per usual, after reading a new book, I start every new children’s book project with character designs…
The main character is the first part of the process. I started out by sketching 3 different style sketches for Rodney, the cute little puppy of this story.
The author LOVED the 2nd character concept sketch, with just some very minor changes to the cheek, to match the spots on the dog that inspired her story.
With approval, I moved to the next phase, which is finalizing the main dog character in the full color, illustrative look. This is the final look that will be used within the book illustrations as well.
After that, well, Rodney has several other basketball players that show up throughout the book. I take time to sketch out the character designs for the remaining characters of the kids book. Now, this isn’t an exhaustive group of book characters, but the ones that I know will show up on more than 1-2 pages. I think these ones are important to get right, before starting the actual page sketches.
With the author’s approval, I also finalize the rest of characters in color as well. We’ve got a pretty good looking team here!
Once characters are finished, then it’s time to begin sketching the book pages, yay! I always like to start the interior sketches first, then end with the cover sketch. That gives me time with the characters, which I feel helps me to create the best cover design later on. This is the first spread of the interior, which was a doozy! It took a good amount of time to draw this entire establishing shot, with the full outdoor basketball court, skyline, and of course all the fun animals playing the game!
Using stilts to reach the basketball hoop 
Excited to join the game! 
Playing basketball and rocking it! Here’s a few more interior sketches, to give you a look at the process. You’ll notice the gray framing, which is the trim and bleed guides for the final book printing. I have to make sure that all the text and the important parts of the drawings, like faces and action, stay inside those guidelines. We don’t want anything crucial getting lost or cut off in the final printed children’s book.
After all the interior pages have been sketched, then I work on designing the book cover. I try and design the title and text in conjunction with the sketch, so that they work well together. It’s always surprising how long this piece can take to get right.
And then of course, I finalize the cover of the kids book, once I’ve received approval from the publisher and/or author. This is the entire front and back of the wrap-around cover. I finish up the cover before finishing the interiors, because it allows for the marketing and promotion of the book to start! I think it will really stand out on a bookshelf in stores or when browsing online.
Once the cover is complete, I finish the illustrations of the interior. Here’s that big first spread! It was a lot of work, but I’m really happy with how it turned out!
Here’s another interior illustration from this cute dog book. This was one of my favorite poses to draw! I really wanted it to make the reader laugh.
This book had lots of moments for me to draw fun expressions. Here’s Rodney the dachshund trying to use stilts to reach the basketball hoop. As you can see, it doesn’t quite work out.
Another fun illustration for this picture book was a confident little Rodney, approaching the animals to try playing basketball again. He’s quite the determined little puppy!
As with most children’s books, I like to include “spot illustrations” or “vignettes,” to give the reader’s eyes a rest. With all the detail in some of the other pages, it’s helpful to mix in a few simpler pages. It also increases reader engagement.
A hero shot of Rodney dribbling the basketball down the court. Any discouragement he faced earlier in the story is all gone now!
I hope you enjoyed seeing more of my process with this book. I take great care in each and every book I illustrate. And I really love illustrating books with animal characters!
If you are needing a great illustrator for your next book or project, feel free to message me and let’s talk! And thanks for reading!
- Gidget’s Graduation – Kid’s Book with Preschool Bugs
This is the second book in an adorable children’s book series that we illustrated. We have LOVED working with these little buggie characters! It was an honor to be able to illustrate this next book in the series!
With these books, a wonderful owner of a small chain of preschools requested for us to illustrate books based on her line of “Kindness Bugs” characters. As you may have seen from the original book post, we got a chance to redesign all of those characters and create a more appealing branding style.
Frankie the Firefly was the first character to get his own book. This time, the 2nd book featured Gidget the Grasshopper…
Before starting any new artwork, I did need to write the story itself. Our client gave me the privilege of actually writing and illustrating her books! For the 2nd book, she asked for it to be focused on the graduation of their kids from preschool, as they prepare to start Kindergarten. I really had a great time writing it, and again, I had my wife (who was a former preschool teacher), help give me tips for a few things to include as well.
Even though I had already designed a style and a series of insect characters for the 1st book, there were a few new characters that I needed to design for Book 2. This sketch shows the grasshopper parents of Gidget.
Another couple of cute characters that show up in this story are some very young baby bugs. Here I sketched a caterpillar and bee.
And one of the more important new characters I drew was the ladybug Kindergarten teacher that comes to visit the preschool. She had to be very warm, friendly, and approachable.
After I sketched the new characters and our client approved, then we finalized them in color. Here’s Gidget’s grasshopper parents once more, now in their final looks.
And next were the caterpillar and bee babies. Adorable!
And of course, the final character design illustration of our sweet ladybug Kindergarten teacher! Isn’t she the cutest?
The next step was for us to begin sketching the interior illustrations for this kids book. For this particular book, because I had such a packed schedule at the time, I did partner with an amazing artist colleague of mine to help illustrate the book. In the rare times that I don’t illustrate a book fully myself, I ALWAYS work extremely closely with my artists, to ensure that the final artwork fits my vision for the book. I work as an Art Director on the project, offering sketch-over notes and advice throughout the process. Plus I handle all the communication with our client and the final print output as well. This sketch above is an example of the initial sketch I received from my artist colleague…
I then take the initial sketches I get from my artist partner and draw over top of them, providing advice & notes, as well as posing and composition improvements. Even though I’m providing a lot of sketching, it does help my artist friends to learn and improve with each project we work on together.
My artist colleague then provided me with updated sketches for each spread. Here’s that update. Of course, this still isn’t finalized linework or color at this stage. I send this over to our client for approval, as we complete each spread sketch.
After we complete ALL the interior sketches, then we work on the cover artwork. I had already designed a font styling that we wanted to carry over through the series, so I designed the 2nd book title in a similar fashion. This is my artist colleague’s initial sketch for the cover. I do enjoy developing wrap-around style covers. This is the front, spine, and back of the book cover.
Once again, after I received the initial sketch from my artist, then I provided sketch-over notes and improvements. Since the cover is so important, I try and provide a lot of help within the sketching phase.
And here’s the final sketch we sent over to our client for approval. She loved it and we were off to the races for finalizing the artwork of this book!
With all the approvals we needed, we started by finalizing the cover illustration. I always like to complete the cover before the interior illustrations. Why? Because it allows the client to begin drumming up interest in the book and start their marketing.
With the cover finished, then we began finalizing the color illustrations for the interior of the kids book. Here’s one of them, where Gidget the grasshopper is waking up in her bed, excited for preschool!
Even with partnering with an artist colleague, I’m spending some time with the final illustrations, tweaking colors and details to get things exactly how I want them to be.
This was a fun spread, where Gidget is imagining what Kindergarten might be like.
There are a few simpler illustrations mixed in the book. This one is where Gidget is raising her hand to ask her teacher, Miss Moth, a question.
And here’s when Miss Moth, the preschool teacher bug, invites in Miss Peach, the ladybug Kindergarten teacher. She’s visiting the classroom to answer all the little buggies questions about what things will be like after they graduate preschool.
Here’s the finalized illustration from the sketch I shared earlier. Miss Peach, the ladybug, has a craft for the preschool bugs to do!
And in this illustration, dear Gidget had made her card craft for Miss Peach! How sweet!
Later in the book, all the young insects are performing during their preschool graduation ceremony. At this point, they are all wearing their cute little graduation caps and gowns.
Another thing I love to do is character vignette illustrations in children’s books. This helps give the readers eyes a break from full illustrations, and keep interest. Plus it’s always fun to draw characters with different fun poses and expressions! All these bugs are singing in different ways!
And near the end of the story, Miss Moth is reading a book to her graduating class during the final ceremony. These bugs are heading off to Kindergarten soon!
Another successful book completed for our wonderful client! She wanted a book she could give to her preschool kids when they graduate from her school. I hope they all love it! And if you have a little one who is wondering about life after preschool, I’d encourage you to pick up a copy of this book for yourself too! Click on the cover above to snag a copy.
And if you are a business, publisher, or indie author who needs an illustrator or character artist for your brand or book, I’d love to hear from you! I really enjoy helping build brands and books that are expressive and appealing.
- Wilson the Wombat and The Nighttime What-If Worries
We had a wonderful time illustrating this book, Wilson the Wombat and The Nighttime What-If Worries! It’s such a cute book to help kids with their bedtime worries. Plus it’s written by a licensed therapist, so the techniques are spot on.
As with any children’s book I work on, the first thing I do is review the publisher’s and/or author’s manuscript to see if it’s a good fit for me. I love illustrating books with animal characters, plus I have some nephews & nieces who struggle with worries, so I was very excited to be a part of this kids book.
After we agree to work together, then I start with style sketches for the main character. This book’s main character was a cute young wombat boy named Wilson. It’s always fun for me to sketch a variety of looks for characters. I send these to the client for them to decide which one feels right to them for their book.
It wasn’t a big surprise to me when our client chose the 1st character concept sketch. I loved this one the most myself too!
After her approval, I went ahead and finalized Wilson the Wombat in color and the final look. Our client loved him! His cuteness, mixed with the endearing worry on his face, really captured the essence of what this story is about.
Next, after the main character design is completed, I begin sketching out all the other supporting characters for the book. There was quite a fun cast of Australian animal characters for this book! Once these sketches were all approved by our client, then I began finalizing those in color as well…
Here is the character design of Wilson’s wombat Mom, with her cute little bow!
And here is the character design of Wilson’s wombat Dad. Definitely wearing “dad” glasses!
One of the friends and cohabitators of the wombat family is this Black-Footed Rock Wallaby. Wombats share dens with different animals, so several of these supporting characters are those animals.
Another fun character to design was this echidna!
And you can’t do a book with Australian animals and NOT include a Koala. This one took a few sketches to get approval, but I’m glad we worked together to get a version our client really loved.
Another cute critter is the Australian Bilby. They are kind of like marsupial kangaroo mice.
A Blue-Tongued Skink lizard was another enjoyable character to design. Gotta love their blue tongues!
And who doesn’t love a penguin? This species is called the Blue Fairy Penguin.
Last but not least, we have the Australian Dung Beetle. I love his little sweatband! This particular character was one our client asked to be included on every spread of the book. A little bug that children could look for with each and every page turn.
After all of those characters were designed and finalized, then I set up my art files for the book and began the interior sketches. This page spread is the opening shot of the book, where we see the wombat family in their den. You’ll notice above that there’s space where our client’s manuscript goes, but also a couple of green spots. Those spots were for additional supporting text. They include fun facts about wombats and the other animals of the book. It was fun and challenging to plan & prepare for the various spots of text around the illustrations.
Here’s another one of the sketches I drew for the interior of this kids book. This one was particularly satisfying to sketch because I love drawing underground cutouts of scenes!
I continued with sketching the rest of the interior pages for the full children’s book.
After that, I start developing the look for the book cover. Not only do I draw the sketch, but also, I develop the title and text design of the book. In today’s day and age, it’s even more important that the title of a book is easily read at a small thumbnail size. Because her title was a bit long, I decided the most crucial part of the title was “Wilson the Wombat” and then I stacked the rest of the title underneath. This book is part of a series, so that title treatment can carry through to future books and create a strong brand.
After all the sketches for the interiors and cover are completed and approved, then we first finalize the cover. I like to make sure to finish the cover art before the interiors, as it gives our clients the cover to use for promoting and marketing their book while we finish out the rest of the book.
Of course, after that cover is complete, we work on finalizing the interior illustrations. For this particular book, I partnered with a great local artist colleague of mine to finalize the illustrations in color. I don’t partner with artists on books all that much, but when I do, I take on an Art Director role as I guide my artists through the finalizing of my sketches. I usually design, sketch, and finalize the characters all myself, then I sketch the pages. Then I have color treatment meetings with my artist to help them understand exactly how I want the illustrations to be finalized. Also, I am always fine-tuning the color illustrations I get back from my artist, to be certain that everything is up to my standards.
Here’s another cute illustration from the book, where Wilson the Wombat is brushing his teeth before bed.
And here is Mommy wombat tucking little Wilson into bed for the night.
Here’s that underground wombat den cutout illustration finalized! Part of the story here is how wombats block the entrances of their den with their bums, to protect their family from predators. You can also see the wallaby hanging out in their home too.
With this being a therapy-based book, there’s visual and text that helps kids understand their worries. One aspect is that worries are a bit like an invisible dragon. Our client really wanted the dragon to be non-threatening, to emphasize that the worry isn’t scary. And with reminding ourselves of the truth, we can make those invisible dragons of worry disappear.
This bedtime illustration is near the end of the book, as Wilson the Wombat dreams of peaceful places. This is a great night-time book, that we specifically illustrated to help children wind down from their fears and find calming rest.
It was an honor to be a part of this children’s book. We loved illustrating it! Feel free to click on the cover above, if you are interested in picking up a copy for yourself!
And if you are looking for an experienced illustrator for your children’s book, feel free to send me a message. I always love talking with publishers and authors alike!
- Unicorn Parties Are Soooo Exhausting – New Children’s Book
I’m super excited to share about our latest children’s book called ‘Unicorn Parties Are Soooo Exhausting.’ It’s about a cute little girl and her very picky, very silly unicorn. She has to throw him a birthday party and this unicorn has some odd and peculiar requests. Needless to say, it’s very exhausting!
Our new book is on Amazon (and anywhere online that you buy books online) and we think you’ll really love it! You can order a copy for yourself by clicking HERE.
Written by my lovely wife, Corissa Koenig, and illustrated by me, James Koenig! It’s our very first book created together as a husband and wife team!
So what inspired this story? We were planning to babysit our niece and she called Corissa the day before. She told us that the next day was her unicorn’s birthday and we needed to celebrate it! Corissa, being the amazing auntie she is, asked our niece what the unicorn wanted for his party. Our niece had some cute and silly requests and we all enjoyed having a unique unicorn party the very next day!
We sat up late that night thinking about it, and just started spouting off some silly rhymes. As we laughed about the day, we began exaggerating the unicorn’s requests more and more. We had 75% of the story worked out that night! And the rough sketches you see above were my very first doodles, inspired by this tale. :)
When I had a chance to really start diving into the illustrating of this book, I did like I always do: I started with some character concept sketches for the main characters. Here’s some I did for finding the best look for the star of our book. The final choice being in the bottom right.
And next up was discovering the look for the girl, Eva. She’s loosely based off our niece, but I still toyed with some versions. The one on the right with the expressions was what we settled on.
The next step, after character concepts are approved, is working on the color finals. I always like to finalize the main characters in color before I start any page illustrations. This way the look & feel, the style, of the book is established. Plus, these character poses work great later on for promoting the book.
After the main characters were developed, I could start into the interior book sketches. Here’s one example of the sketches. As per usual, I prepare art layout files first- with the bleed and trim guidelines set up. It’s important to do that, so nothing crucial gets cut off.
Here’s another children’s book page drawing example, so you can see more of the process. I had a lot of fun with the glue paste in this one! And for every book I work on, I like to sketch out all of the pages before I start finalizing in color.
Once the drawings for all the book pages have been completed, I start finalizing each illustration. For this book in particular, I decided to print out my sketches, then ink them by hand with a brush pen, then scan them in and add color. I love to ink by hand, so this made the book even more fun to illustrate!
This book starts off quick! This little girl’s unicorn is waking her up because he’s soooo excited about his birthday party today!
And here’s one of the sketches I shared above, but finalized in color. These characters really come to life throughout the pages!
The crafting here really brings me back to childhood. There’s still something fun and therapeutic about cutting paper, coloring, and using glue. We don’t do it enough as grown-ups.
And what party is complete without scuba gear? I really love all the random silliness within this story.
And here’s just one more page (it’s hard not to want to share them all!). You can see the original concept sketch coming full circle here in the final illustration.
All in all, this was such a fun book to illustrate! I loved being able to use my imagination to get really zany and creative with all the monsters in this children’s book. And my wife and I really, truly appreciate all the support for our books. You can click on the image above to head to Amazon for your own copy to share with your family! And here’s the link again, for ordering your own copy:
- Mush-A-Roo Dog Sledding Kangaroo Children’s Book
I loved illustrating this unique story! This book is about a kangaroo with extra large feet who travels to Alaska to become a sled dog!
This book is titled, Mush-A-Roo: The Adventures of Seven The “Dog Sledding” Kangaroo. The name of the Kangaroo is Seven and she’s so cute! And with any story I illustrate, I always begin the process by some style sketches of the main character…
This is the first concept sketch for Seven. 
This is the second concept sketch for Seven. 
This is the third concept sketch for Seven. My client/author fell in love with sketch #1. I was leaning toward that variation myself! It’s always nice when that happens. He did ask for her feet to be drawn a little larger, since that’s part of the plot of the story.
After my client’s approval of a main character sketch, I proceeded to finalize the kangaroo in color with the final visual look for what the illustration style would be for the book.
After the main character was approved in color, then I worked on the sketches and finals for the other main characters found throughout the book. I always like to do character designs for the most important characters in a book- the ones that show up on more than 1-2 pages. These were those characters:
- The best friend of Seven, a parrot named Scratch. I decided to do an Eastern Rosella, since that’s a parrot actually found in Australia.
- The main sled dog, Chester, who doesn’t like Seven the Kangaroo at first.
- And the sled musher, Pete, a loving man who takes great care of his dogs and gives Seven and Scratch a home.
After the characters are complete, then I can begin my art file preparation and start sketching the actual interior pages. I like to begin each book by sketching the interiors, then save the cover art for last. In the sketch above, we see Seven the Kangaroo and Scratch the Parrot playing (near the beginning of the story).
And then with this next children’s book interior sketch example, we see Seven having tripped on her big feet and fallen into a muddy puddle. Her family is laughing at her misfortune.
Here’s that page sketch finalized for the kid’s book. Normally, I complete the entire book’s sketches before I start finalizing any illustrations with color and shading.
And again, Seven here having fallen into the mud, with her buddy trying to console her. Poor Seven! What will she do?
As you probably guessed, the cute kangaroo and her parrot friend decide to fly to Alaska for a change. I really had fun illustrating this map page!
I’m not sharing all of the pages within this book, but here’s a particularly fun one. You can’t have a children’s book about Alaska without showing the Northern Lights! This was a tricky page to illustrate, to capture the vibrant sky.
Without giving too much away, our kangaroo friend joins a dog sledding team and after training, set off to win the race. In an unexpected twist, Chester the lead dog falls in the ice!
But Seven the Kangaroo thinks quickly and act fast! She helps get Chester out of the water since her feet displaced her weight better than the other dogs. Chester is saved! As far as what happens next, well, I’ll leave that a mystery… You’ll have to pick up the book to find out how it ends!
You can click on the cover image above if you want to check out the book on Amazon and pick up a copy for yourself! It’s an adorable story and a great message about not judging others and working as a team. I’m sure you’ll love it!
And lastly, if you are a publisher or author and would like me to illustrate your book, feel free to reach out through my contact page. I would love to talk with you more and read your story!
- The Little Indian Runner Children’s Book
I had the great privilege and honor to illustrate this children’s book for a Native American author from the Comanche Nation. It’s a sweet and lovely story that all young kids can enjoy!
The book is titled, “The Little Indian Runner” and features a young Native American boy, who just LOVES to run! It follows his journey of running from place to place in his village.
As with every book I illustrate, I always start with character style sketches for the main character, to show a few different looks for the book. I wanted to be particularly sensitive to the depiction of the characters in this book, as so many cartoon depictions of Native Americans in the past have been inappropriate. I spent a lot of time talking with the author and asking him about his Tribe and his preferences in cartoon styles. These are the 3 style sketches I presented to him for consideration.
And this was the author’s favorite choice. Option 1 with some adaptations of the patterns of his outfit to fit more closely with the Comanche Nation.
After the author approved the final character sketch, then of course, I finalized the boy in color. I made sure to use the colors he requested to best represent the Comanche Nation. I decided to keep a little bit of a sketchy look to the linework for this book.
After establishing the main character, then I start prepping my art files with the interior text and begin planning out interior pages. Since this book had minimal text, there was more left open for interpretation for the illustrations. I suggested that perhaps the boy is running from place to place within his villiage. And we see him getting tired as he heads back from the farther parts of the camp, leading up to him falling asleep on the final page, as written. The author loved that and I was able to rearrange a couple stanzas to fit that illustrative storyline more.
Here is another example from the interior sketches. The little Indian Runner running alongside a painted horse in the corral. I purposely left the author’s text off of these, but when actually working with the client, I have the manuscript placed on each sketch so the author or publisher can see it as a whole.
And here’s just 1 more sketch example. This is closer to the end of the book, when the Native American boy is getting sleepy while walking back home, with fireflies (or lightning bugs) in the night sky.
After getting the entire book sketched out and approved by the client, then I start finalizing the illustrations with color and shading. Here’s the illustration of the Little Indian Runner in his tipi, hugging his mother with his siblings close by. With all the pages of this book, I took great care in researching proper items to include and every page was reviewed and approved by the Native American author. It was very important to me to give great respect and honor to him and his heritage.
This might be one of my favorite pages within the book! I loved drawing this painted horse!
This is another special page to me, as this is where the boy runs to visit his aunt and uncle. It made me think of all the wonderful visits we have with our own nephews and nieces! Plus, it was fun to draw the canoe in particular.
I suppose almost all of the pages within this book are special to me, haha! I thought a lot of my grandmother with this spread. I am not Native, but my grandparents really admired Native American culture and invested a lot in purchasing artwork from Native American artists. They also taught me a great deal about their culture and took me to many events celebrating their heritage. So naturally, there is a lot of heart in this interaction between the boy and his grandmother on this page.
And as I mentioned, as the book goes on, the sun starts setting and the Little Indian Runner gets more and more tired as he heads home. I loved illustrating the colors on this page with the sunset reflection on the water!
And sharing just one more page (it’s hard not to want to share them all!) Our boy is getting even more sleepy as he watches the lightning bugs in the night sky. It was really fun to draw all the fireflies and add the glow to them!
Here’s the cover of The Little Indian Runner. It’s a great wind-down book for reading to your kids at bedtime. And a wonderful way to introduce them to Native American culture if you are from another background. You can pick up your copy today on Amazon or Barnes & Noble, or wherever you buy your books online.
Oh! And one final update! This book has been doing GREAT online! It’s been the #1 new release in it’s categories on Amazon for quite a long time! I’m so excited that it’s being so well received! Hope you love it too!
And if you have a book that needs illustrating, I’d love to talk with you! I work with publishers and also independent authors. And unique, different stories are my favorite to illustrate! Feel free to click the button above and reach out to me.
- What Would You Do At The Zoo? – New Children’s Book
Although I’ve illustrated 43 other children’s books, this is my first personal collaboration with my mother-in-law! My mother-in-law, M.B. Roosa, is an accomplished writer, having published many kid’s stories in Highlights for Children, Humpty Dumpty, and Children’s Playmate. So, naturally, I was very excited to have a great writer on our story!
This cute zoo book we teamed up on is now available on Amazon HERE (or click on the image above).
I am really excited to debut this book! I loved drawing all the animals and musical instruments throughout! I hope you all enjoy it!
Quick update, another exciting moment for What Would You Do At The Zoo? is the Hardcover version is now available at Barnes & Noble’s website HERE! (or click on the image above) So exciting!
Now, for the breakdown of my process for this book…
For this children’s book, like I do with all the books I illustrate, I first designed the main characters of the story. Here’s the main girl and boy characters from this book. I wanted to try and bit of a different style for this book. Something that used a rougher linework and a bit of a watercolor look. Let me know what you think of these kid characters!
After I get the look of the characters established, then I prepare the sizing and layout of the book and start sketching! As you can see here, I place the trim borders and margins in my art document, so that I can make sure I accommodate for that.
And here’s another page sketch. I make sure to sketch out all the pages of a book before I start finalizing the illustrations.
I always like to sketch the book cover last, after I’ve become very familiar with the story, characters, and feel for the book. Here’s the front & back spread. We wanted to only hint at the magic that’s in this book. Hopefully to intrigue readers to pick it up!
Now the fun part.. I’m sharing a few interior illustrations from our children’s book- What Would You Do At The Zoo?
Each page has animals and the musical instruments that rhyme with their names!
Here’s another interior illustration from our children’s book. A wolverine playing a tambourine, and a newt playing a flute!
And another fun page- a raccoon and owl singing together. You’ll see that I’ve used a monochromatic color for the background of each page. I felt that this would help draw out the magic of the story, while also focusing the reader on the characters themselves.
This is another fun page from our book. Here’s a taste of my published author & mother-in-law’s cute writing:
“If a chimpanzee led the symphony while playing a didgeridoo,
And a gazelle with a bell played a cello as well, how do you think they would do?”
One of my favorite musical animals to illustrate in this book was the baboon with a bassoon!
And as an illustrator, I couldn’t pass up sharing the big, musical parade page! This climactic page brought all the book’s characters back together. It was a lot of work but I loved how it turned out and the feeling it brought to our book.
Here’s a close up of the final front cover of our book. I think it intrigues the reader to take a peek inside!
Another fun thing I got to do for our book was to create cartoon versions of myself and my mother-in-law! We thought this would be a fun way to represent ourselves for the book.
Here’s a little bit more about myself and my mother-in-law… the creator’s of What Would You Do At The Zoo? Feel free to ask us more in the comments!
Did you know that our fun zoo children’s book is offered in 3 formats? Hardcover, Paperback, or Kindle e-book, there’s a version to fit any budget! Share the gift of reading with your little ones this year.
Thanks for taking a look and learning more about my process! If you would like to order copies for your store, library, etc, feel free to contact me. Also, if I can help illustrate your own children’s book, reach out anytime! I’m always excited to talk with authors!
- Gamma Grunts Deck Building Card Game Artwork
I had the great privilege to illustrate & design for this awesome deck-building game, Gamma Grunts! It’s LIVE on Kickstarter right now! Check it out HERE (or through www.gammagrunts.com)
Here’s a close-up of the front of the box I illustrated & designed the Gamma Grunts table top game! Which one would YOU recruit for your world domination?
I’ll go ahead and share more of the artwork as well as my process for designing and illustrating the artwork for this board game…
The first thing I worked on was the logo design for the card game. A great logo design is a key component to any business or brand. A strong logo can convey professionalism and instill confidence in the consumers. I created 2 logo options for my clients (as seen above). After discussing, we settled on #2, but with the “Grunts” font from #1.
Here’s how the final logo turned out, combining the font from one concept into the other. I feel that this logo design is really suited for the game. It’s fun, bold, and interesting to look at. This logo gives the viewer a clear vision of what the game will be like… mad scientist related with lots of toxic ooze!
After creating the logo, it was time to develop the art style for the game as a whole. To begin, I sketched 3 style options for one of the game’s starter cards, The Brute. By drawing a few different approaches, I was able to start establishing the feel for the game. My clients liked #3 best and felt it represented their vision perfectly!
Since I had approval on this sketch, I wanted to finalize 1 card in its entirety, before starting into any of the other cards.
So, the next step was digitally inking the linework and adding color. I had sent this flat shaded version of the art for approval, before adding the shading.
Lastly, once I received approval on the color illustration, I added the final shading to give it the final pop! I was very pleased with the final look for the card illustrations, and so were my clients!
Along with creating the illustrations for each, I also needed to design a frame, icons, and flavor for the cards themselves. My clients had taken time to explain the game mechanics to me, and share what elements would need to be included on each card. These items included: Cost, Attack Power, Defense Strength, and a Description Section. Here’s my initial rough sketch options for how the card details could be laid out. My clients liked #2 best. They especially loved my idea for the tank of Gamma Juice behind the card description section.
After approval of the initial rough, I finalized the card frames in vector. When designing, I made sure to take the longest name/description card, to use as my base for how big the fonts and text could be. Then I could be sure that it would work perfectly for all the other cards. These are the 2 main types of cards…
Grunt Cards – Colored with green Gamma Juice, these are the monsters that you recruit and fight on your behalf.
Disruption Cards – Colored with orange Gamma Juice and lightning bolts, these are special cards you can use to stop or change what other players do to you.
With the first card and the frame finished and approved, I moved into the sketches of the other cards. Here’s the sketch for the Power Surge card. I tried to bring a lot of uniqueness and character into each sketch.
Here’s another card sketch, The Mosquito. The trucker hat was a last minute add on my part, and my clients loved it!
This card, Laser Beam, was a bit tricky. I wanted to make sure that everything fit well within the limited illustration space for the card.
Another card sketch, the Hazmat Courier. Since my clients wanted this guy to be carrying 2 big jugs of Gamma Juice, I wanted to make him pretty beefed up.
And what’s more fun than a cyclops brute bursting out of a birthday cake?
One more card sketch, the Deep Sea Angler. Originally, this card was meant to be an angler fish within a fish tank. I encouraged my clients to have me create him as an actual humanoid, murloc-like beast. They were willing to let me give it a try and luckily for me, they really loved it!
And the sketchwork continued… With any deck building card game, there’s a whole bunch of cards needed. My clients had ideas for each card, based on their mechanics, but they were very open to my interpretation of each. I had a blast illustrating all of these cards! As you can see, I tried to have a good amount of variety and humor in all the cards.
Before showing some more of the colored cards, I wanted to explain the 3 types of cards you start out with when playing the Gamma Grunts card game…
1) Gamma Juice is your Resource in the game.
2) Brute is the first of many Grunt cards, to fight your opponents.
3) Discovery is the first of many Disruption cards, that you can use at any time.
You then recruit more Grunts & Disruptions to build your deck, defeat your opponents, and win the game!
Here’s one of my clients’ favorite card illustrations for Gamma Grunts– The Bomber Puppy! (don’t worry, no Corgis were harmed in the making of this game).
Another fun card illustration for Gamma Grunts– Laser Beam! Look out Grunts! I really like how the glow effect turned out for this card.
Another handful of Gamma Grunts cards found in the game…
- Focused Grunt (too focused to notice the gym on fire)
- Half Brian Lackey (when you only need half a grunt)
- Shy Grunt (shhhh, don’t scare him off!)
- Mitosis Mike (double trouble!)
Here’s one of my favorite cards I drew for Gamma Grunts– The Mosquito! I’ve always been a fan of humanoid-animal hybrid monsters. Probably because of my childhood (and adulthood) love of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
Another fun card was this mad scientist for the Power Surge card! You saw the sketch earlier, here’s the final look!
And here’s a little nod to Breaking Bad… the Hazmat Courier card. I had to make the bunny suit yellow! And I like his shiny orange rubber gloves.
Another card that has been getting a great response is the Gamma Guzzler! I think people like seeing the grunts chugging Gamma Juice.
Another handful of Gamma Grunts cards found in the game…
- Super Brute (had to get a few superheroes in this game!)
- Unstable Isotope (when you want to dump toxic ooze on your opponents)
- The Regenerate (you had to expect an undead element to show up eventually)
- Soy Lint Green (now you know how they make Gamma Juice)
And continuing on, here one card that was a hoot to draw, the Surprise Support card! I made sure the colors were bright and festive!
And what mad scientist couldn’t use a brute to cheer him on? Here’s the Moral Support card art!
And this Contaminated card was super fun! I went all out on the boils and sores, thinking it might be taking it too far, but my clients LOVED him! I almost feel sorry for the guy…
Another one of my favorite illustrations for the cards was this Deep Sea Angler. Nothing more fun to me than drawing a ocean monster of sorts! The bigger the teeth, the better!
And just a few more Gamma Grunts cards found in the game… Can you catch all the pop culture nods in these cards? A few parody cards brings a bit more fun to the game.
- Major Brute
- Smash!
- General Anesthetic
- The Gruntinator
- Invisible Grunt
- Master of Draw
Lastly, to accompany the cards, I also designed some player boards and a shared deck stacks board. Between my clients and myself, we made sure it was clear where each type of card would be placed and how the boards would help gamers keep track of everything.
And here’s what a typical game would look like when in the middle of the gameplay. Cards are placed in various areas of your personal player board. There are also stacks of cards on the shared board, where you can recruit more cards for your deck. Chaotic, zany, and fun… just like any mad scientist game should be!
What game is complete without the board game box? Here’s the back of the box design…
And of course, the most exciting part, the front of the box. With the huge surge of board game interest, it’s so important to have a box design that really grabs a customer’s interest. The box serves as the “face” for the game. If it’s interesting and fun, then someone will pick it up and look at it more. And hopefully the art is exciting enough to purchase it. Then they’ll fall in love with the game itself when they get it home and play it!
Again, if you would like to support this game, you can back the Kickstarter NOW! Click HERE or the box image above. Thanks for your support for this super fun game! I’ve had a blast creating the art and I look forward to the opportunity to finish the remaining cards once the Kickstarter campaign is a success!
If you have a board game or card game you are developing and need a great artist for it, I would love to talk with you. My wife and I are avid table top gamers, plus I really love creating artwork and illustrations for games! Feel free to contact me through my website here and we can discuss how great art can set your table top game apart from the pack.
- Ranger Trek Expedition Journals – National Parks Project
Over the last 2 years or so, I’ve been working on a big product & branding campaign for a business who sells in the National Parks! Finally finding time to share some of the work… Here’s an initial preview of the main Ranger Trek Journal & the Park Stickers & Patch. I’ll share more of the development over the next few weeks! And if you are interested, you can buy Ranger Trek products at www.RangerTrek.US or at your local National Park.
The first thing I needed to do for the Ranger Trek project was to develop a look & style. I drew the main Park Ranger girl in 3 styles for my client to choose from.
They liked #3 best, with a few tweaks. Here’s how it turned out. ? Next up is color!
Once the main character was approved for Ranger Trek, I finalized the girl in color, and created the boy character as well. I made the final artwork vector, so that my client would have the most versatility with the art.
After creating the 2 main characters for Ranger Trek, I started developing some logo concepts for the new brand. 1-3 are the initial concepts. They liked #1 best and we worked on a couple final tweaks to end up on #4. I like to work in Black & White or Grayscale for logos, to make sure they are strong designs, before I make the color version.
Here’s the final Ranger Trek Logo Design! I kept colors that would feel like nature, park rangers, and jr park ranger badges. You can see all their products at www.RangerTrek.US
After the main characters were designed, and the style developed, then I could jump into the
specific Park Theme Character Stickers! Every National Park has a general theme or interest, like Revolutionary War or Fossils. There’s a unique character to represent each one.
And here’s the National Park Themes Page laid out with the characters! This page helps clarify what you might see at each type of park.
Here’s a few closeups of the National Parks Stickers… These are just a handful of the Themes… Each park with a Junior Ranger Program has a sticker for it!
Here’s how the Ranger Trek Park Area Stickers look in the final packaging. Each set of Park Stickers are packaged into the areas or regions of the country. You can buy set of stickers for your area of the country at www.RangerTrek.US or at your local National Park.
And of course, the fun part about the Ranger Trek Expedition Journal are the pages inside! You can use them to journal, draw, scrapbook, and more.
The other fun thing about the Ranger Trek Expedition Journal is that it also contains a map & full list of ALL the National Parks that have a Junior Ranger Program! You can check them off as you visit each one!
My Ranger Trek characters also became embroidered patches! It was really cool to see the art transformed into these collectible patches. You can get your first patch FREE just by joining the Ranger Trek Club at www.RangerTrek.US
I was also able to create some other souvenirs for the Ranger Trek brand… Postcards and Magnets! Here’s just a few of those. Look for them at your local National Parks!
I also got the opportunity to design a few Ranger Trek products exclusively for Yellowstone National Park! The products include some special Yellowstone Journal Pages, Stickers, Postcard, Magnet, and Mini-Magnet Set.
One last image for Ranger Trek… This is a poster design to help promote the Junior Ranger Programs in the Parks. These will start being put up at a few National Parks across the country!
If you would like me to help create an entire brand, product line, and/or character designs for you, please feel free to contact me through my website. I would love to talk about your ideas and your product goals.
I look forward to helping you create appealing characters and successful products too!
- The Sweetest Bird Children’s Book Illustrations
I finish yet another children’s book! This one is called The Sweetest Bird. It is available on Amazon (just click the cover picture above). This story is about a stork who delivers animal babies of all kinds. It’s a very heartwarming, humorous children’s book. This was actually my absolute favorite children’s book to illustrate to date! The author gave me quite a bit of creative liberties, which I believe helped make for the best book.
I’ll share a little bit about my process for this book below…
Whenever I start a new children’s book, I always like to start by developing the style for the book through the main characters. This book only had 1 main character, so I focused on creating the look for the baby-delivering stork. Here’s the 3 concept sketch options for the stork.
The author had stumbled across me because of another cartoon stork I had drawn, so that artwork was my starting point for style. I wanted to create a new, unique stork for him though. My client had a clear vision of how he wanted the stork to be dressed and had sent me a great deal of outfit photos. This stork is meant to have a bit of the feel of Tim Gunn- being very dapper and having great taste in fashion. The other important aspect my client wanted was for the stork to be dressed in a different outfit on every single page. That was a fun challenge!
After reviewing the 3 concepts, the author liked #1 the best. I made a couple minor alterations, such as adding the glasses. Then I got a quick approval and it was time for color!
For obvious reasons, the author wanted all of the stork’s outfits to have elements of pink or blue. Here’s how the final color character design turned out. This character design illustration not only serves as a representation of the style moving forward, but it also is a great piece for promoting the book (online, social media, and printed for trade shows, book fairs, and such).
With the the main character established, I could start into the actual book page sketches. Here’s one of those pages. You can see that I like to indicate the trim, bleed, and margins within the sketch for my clients. Also, I blurred out the text on these images, just for the author’s protection.
And here’s another sketch from the book. I had a lot of fun with this book especially, because the author was so open ended with me. He knew he wanted animals for each delivery, but he wasn’t sure what animals for each page. I was able to review the manuscript and offer suggestions for the animals. Then, in the drawing stage, I got creative with each of their homes… imagining habitats that would fit best for each of them.
Sharing just one more page sketch… I sketch all the pages for a children’s book before I start finalizing any of them. Things are much easier to revise (if needed) within the sketch phase, than once things are finalized.
I always save the cover sketch for last, after I’ve drawn out all the interior pages. I like to work this way because it allows me to get really comfortable with the characters and the story. The story sinks in more for me, which then helps me make decisions for what the best cover illustration can be for the book. Unlike some other illustrators, I personally like to design the title/logo for the book and work out the final layout for the text. Because of my graphic design background, I believe that I can create title imagery that fits well for each book I’ve illustrated.
Once all the sketchwork is done, I can start finalizing the book! Here’s the final, illustrated cover artwork. What better cover illustration than the stork knocking on a door? This leaves a little intrigue for the viewer… hopefully choosing to pick up the book to see more!
I’ll share a handful of the book illustrations here. For this page, the stork is delivering an alligator baby. The country swamp environment was fun to create.
I wanted to have a contrast in sizes of animals throughout the book, so one of the suggestions for a page was ladybugs. I thought it would be funny to have a surprised ladybug being given 3 babies. I couldn’t remember what ladybug larvae looked like, so I had to research that. It proved a creative challenge to make them cute!
Another fun page was this underground armadillo home. This is the point of the story where the stork overstays his welcome.
Also, I wanted to mix in a few simpler pages with the more detailed scenes. This is one of them, two cute orangutan babies in a box. Can’t get much cuter than that!
For this page, the story talks about how some babies don’t look like you, so a magical unicorn baby seemed like a good choice. I had a lot of fun drawing the kangaroo’s double-take on this page.
Sharks are one of my favorite animals to draw, so I had to find a way to work them in on a page! This brings a fun environment change to the book, having the stork scuba diving. And I think that baby shark turned out so cute!
For this birds page, my client had wanted the stork singing to a wide medley of birds. I enjoyed thinking of which birds to include and drawing them all out with thier chicks. I tried to incorporate birds of various shapes and sizes to make the page really fun & interesting to look at.
This barnyard house was a fun one too. This page talks about how tired parents can be with newborns. I instantly thought of having the sheep drinking directly from a pot of coffee! A great late night scene!
And for the very last page, we decided to have the stork delivering a human baby. It seemed to be a great way to finish out the book, especially with the sweet words on this page.
I hope you enjoyed learning a bit more about my illustration process. If you like this book, I’d certainly appreciate your support! You can buy the book by clicking on the cover image above! It’s available in paperback and Kindle format, and Hardcover is coming soon! Thanks so much!
If you would like to talk with me about illustrating your children’s book, feel free to contact me through my site here. I’m always excited to talk with publishers and independent authors alike.
- Atomic Pangolin Character & Logo Design
I created this character and logo for a client’s social media brand: Atomic Pangolin. This client is a builder, creator, maker who is starting to share his work online. He wanted a fun, unique character and he loves pangolins! Pangolins are a bit like armadillos, but with plate armor that looks more like dragon scales. The final art is vector, which allows for the most versatility for printing. I really LOVED developing this character! I’ll share a bit of the process for this project below…
I always like to start business mascot designs or character designs with a few concept sketches. Although my client knew he wanted the character to be a pangolin, he wasn’t quite sure what outfit or genre he wanted it to be. I suggested that I could sketch one Steampunk style, one Retro Space Ace style, and one as a Superhero. Here’s 1 of 3 character concept sketches. This is the Steampunk one. I had a lot of fun including some tools he uses and all the outfit details.
Here’s 2 of 3 character concept sketches. This 2nd concept is more of a Retro Space Pangolin. I have always loved the old, vintage scifi suits of the 1950’s and 1960’s, so this was a blast to draw.
Here’s the 3rd & final concept option for the 3 character concept sketches. This 3rd Superhero version was a fun one too!
Of course, as you saw, the client loved the Steampunk concept art the best. I was glad to hear that! I then finalized the character in color vector. After the main character was created, my client and I played with a few font options to consider for the name. These are the top 3 options I presented to him. He picked the middle option for the final.
And here’s a look at the text-only version of the logo for Atomic Pangolin. I wanted to give him some versatility to be able to use the character or logo separate from each other if/when needed. Sometimes it might be useful to have this version for a smaller area use of the logo/brand.
Lastly, here’s the final character by itself. As I mentioned, all the final art is vector, which allows for my client to get the artwork printed on shirts, various sized prints, stickers, banners, and more. I know that this character will help my client’s social media presence grow as he shares more of his work & business. A strong logo and/or character mascot can make a brand much more memorable.
If you need a great character-based logo design, or simply a great series of character designed. I’d love to be your character designer. Feel free to contact me by clicking the button above and let’s talk!
- Noah’s Ark Children’s Book Illustrations
A large Christian publisher, Baker Publishing, gave me a chance to illustrate several children’s books about Bible stories. This was especially significant to me, as a Christian artist myself. This children’s book was appropriately named ‘An Ark in the Dark’ and depicts one of the most famous and beloved stories in the Bible, Noah’s Ark. I’ll share a little bit about the process below…
Before starting to draw page sketches, I always like to begin a children’s book by developing the look of the main character or characters. I started by sketching Noah. In all of these Bible books in the series, the author wanted young looking versions of the Biblical characters. My first version of Noah was a little chubbier than this, but I like how he turned out in the end.
After sketch approval, I finalized Noah in color. This shows the final illustrated look for the character before I start into the pages. That way the author and publisher get a good picture of what to expect the characters in the story to look like.
Another important aspect of this Noah’s Ark book were the two mice. These two mice show up on almost every page of the book. They are hidden throughout, so that it becomes a fun thing for kids to look for. It reminds me of how the Little Critter books all had a mouse and spider to find on each page.
After the characters were approved, I started the page sketches. Here’s a page sketch showing Noah resting for a moment on the Creator’s Toy Chest- a wooden toy chest that shows up in all of the books in the series. This toy chest is a symbol of God’s power, and each main character relying on it. I enjoyed researching about the various wood-working tools that Noah would have been using at the time to build the ark. I show many of those tools throughout the pages.
And you can’t have a Noah’s ark book without a page with animals arriving two by two! You may have noticed that I show the trim size and extra bleed area on the border of the sketches. Publishers and authors alike are glad to see when I take time to consider these things that are sometimes overlooked by artists.
I’ll share one more children’s book page sketch. This is a celebration feast page after the flood is over. I also took time to research what types of food they would have been eating in the Old Testament days. I feel very honored to have a chance to illustrate my own version of the Noah’s Ark story. It’s been done so many times, I tried my best to bring a fresh look and interest to the story.
And here is one of the illustrations from the final children’s book. There’s quite a range of emotions that Noah goes through as the story progresses. Both Noah and the mice bring those emotions to the forefront in this book. I’ll share a few more of the illustrations below…
For this page, the author had a lot of specific animals written out in the page’s text. I had to make sure I fit them all into the illustration. That’s no easy feat!
This is definitely one of my favorite pages- a view of Noah and his family tending to the animals inside the ark. For me, I can’t remember a Noah’s Ark children’s book that depicts the inside of the ark. I wanted to captivate children and give them a sense of what it might be like inside of the ark. Also, I am a bit of an animal buff, so I was sure to include a few of my favorite animals into the page. Most of the time you see things like lions, giraffes, sheep, etc in a book about Noah. I wanted to illustrate a few animals that I had never seen in a Noah’s ark book before.
This is my wife’s favorite page- Noah, his family, and all the animals descending down the mountainside after the flood had receded. The author gave me another difficult one with all the animals on this page! There was a whole lot of things to depict! In the end, all the hard work was worth it. I think it turned out to be a really beautiful illustration. And really, can you have a Noah’s ark book without showing a lot of animals? :)
This book took about 20 hours more to illustrate than any of the other 3 Bible children’s books. Even so, I absolutely loved drawing the illustrations for this book. I look forward to sharing it with my nieces and nephews. And I also look forward to reading them to our own children someday.
One final illustration I wanted to share was the endpapers. Most big publisher books have end sheets, or end papers- the illustrations or patterns in the front inside cover and back inside cover. Having a little artwork on these pages can really add to the professionalism and give the book a nice feeling. I thought it would be fun to draw Noah walking along, not quite sure why these animals keep following him.
Side Note: I’ve left out the text on all these illustrations, because I wanted to encourage you to purchase a book for yourself. Not only will you be able to read the whole story, but you can also see the many other spectacular illustrations that I haven’t shared here. You can pre-order the book, along with the 3 others, here on Amazon:
Just click on the cover illustration above! I appreciate all of your support. I know you’ll love the books.
And whether you are a publisher or an independent author who’s written a children’s book, if you are looking for a great illustrator, feel free to reach out to me. I would love to talk with you about your story and see how I can help create wonderful illustrations for you. I am happy to answer any questions you may have about the process.
And to end things, I’ve created a quick video about my process while illustrating this wonderful children’s book:
Thank you for watching my video and I hope you enjoyed learning a little about what happens behind the scenes!
- My Creative Process for Designing Small Toy Figurine Collectibles
I’ve been wanting to create a blog post and some tutorials about my process for creating and building characters for use as collectible toy figurines. I wanted to share how I develop characters for retail- specifically figurines used for blind bags, blind boxes, vending, adult toy collectibles, and toys-to-life gaming figurines. I finally found some time to develop my own character, and document the process, from start to finish. Here’s my breakdown, from the perspective of a toy character designer:
First off, normally I am designing and modeling original characters that I come up with for clients. This project was especially fun, because I was simply creating a character that I wanted to make for myself. I started out by looking through some existing character designs of mine, and narrowing it down to these three guys: my shark in a scuba diver suit, my Robin Hood medieval dragon, and my sweet-hearted stone tiki guy.
At this point, I knew that my original character concepts wouldn’t work well for small toy figurines. It was important to me, as I was creating my video tutorials and process, to show how to design characters that would work well in a small, minifigure size. When designing for vending capsules, small blind boxes or bags, etc, it’s extremely important to give the collector the most value possible within the size limitations. So I always think about volume, and how I can maximize the space within a ball, capsule, bag, or box. If you have tall, thin figures, or figures with an extremity jutting far out, then it ends up shrinking the size of the rest of your figure, in order to fit that longer item within the packaging. I try and keep things close to the body, and proportioned in a way that makes the toys as big as possible within the packaging. Of course, if there was no limitations in the packaging size, then I’d design them differently, but in the world of retail, you almost always have constraints to your packaging sizing. The sketches above show how I revised my 3 original character concepts, to bring them into character designs that would work well for small toys. I decided also to sketch out a 4th character, the rhino paladin with angel wings.
After sketching out my 4 character concepts for use as small toy figures, I went ahead and finalized the artwork in color. I digitally inked the sketches and added simple color, keeping in mind the limitations with how much painting or pad printing can be done on small inexpensive collectible toys. Since I love creating characters, I’ll share a little more about each one below…
This first character design is Dragon Hood. I liked the idea of a dragon, who is usually the bad guy in medieval stories, actually being the good guy. I felt that a character like this would have a lot of appeal to collectors.
My second character design was this scuba shark. I absolutely love fish and the ocean, so naturally, one of the characters had to be fish related. To keep things simpler for minifigure toy production, I removed the glass helmet from my original concept, so that there wouldn’t be a need for a completely separate mold for that piece (if/when it goes to factory production). This is one way to keep costs down.
The third character concept I developed was my stone tiki god. I liked the idea of a buff rock tiki, who is super sweet. For the smaller toy concept, I decided that adding a little color/paint to his face would give him a little more appeal with kids and collectors. If he was just all grey rock colored, I don’t think he would be quite as desirable in a collection.
And the last concept I created was this rhino paladin. I have had an idea for quite some time of an angel who is a rhino. I love the idea of a really tough, strong angel, ready to go into battle. The tricky part with this guy is that if he were to go into toy production, he wouldn’t work well for round capsules, due to the size of his wings. He would work alright for a blind box though.
After sharing the 4 concepts on my social media channels, the voting came back with a tie between the Dragon Hood and Scuba Shark. I decided then to 3D model the Scuba Shark. I always use zBrush to model characters for toys. ZBrush feels more like sculpting with clay, which I love, and it has great built-in features for prepping for 3D printing. This screen shot shows the model pretty much completed, before rendering and exporting. Each part of the figure is built as a separate shape and then merged together. It’s a long process to design and build a model in 3D, but feels quite rewarding in the end.
And here’s the side-by-side comparison of my original character concept for the Scuba Shark and the final color 3D render. This guy was more challenging to model than I had original thought. The part that took the longest was getting his unique head shape right. I feel like he turned out great in the end though.
And if you are interested to see all sides of this Scuba Shark 3D model, here’s a turnaround video. I really like how the posing and sense of weight turned out on this character.
Also, if you are interested in watching my 3D modeling process, to learn zBrush, or to learn more about how I work, you can click on the image above to go to all my YouTube tutorials that I created for this Scuba Shark. I have video tutorials for each step of the process. And I’m always happy to talk to you more about how to make a great toy series or collectible figurine.
I have sent my 3D model off to a company for 3D printing. I am currently waiting to receive it back. Once I do, I’ll be sure to update this post with a few photos of that.
And lastly, if you would like to talk with me about developing a minfigure or toy line for your company or brand, please feel free to contact me anytime. I love working on projects like this, because I love toys!
Update: Here’s a few photos of how the Scuba Shark turned out as a 3D printed figurine. I am really happy with the detail and results. Feel free to click on any of these photos to be directed to the online 3D printed store to purchase one of your own! (available in a variety of colors)
Thanks for your purchases of this original character of mine! I hope you love looking at him every day on your desk or shelf!
- Warrior Knight Woman – Character Artwork for Video Game
I just finished creating this warrior knight woman character concept for a new client of mine. This character is for a new video game in development, using the Unreal Engine 4. Here’s a little bit about my process…
My client had a really great, detailed description of how they envisioned the character. So for this project, it wasn’t necessary to create a medley of concept sketches. It was very clear what they wanted to see. Here’s the initial sketch I created for the female video game character. The style is a little bit more realistic in proportions than what I normally get hired to do, but I love working in a variety of styles, so that wasn’t a problem at all. I enjoyed the change of pace. I also liked the fact that their description of the character didn’t have her in scantily clad clothing. She’s wearing armor and a cloak that covers her nicely and is more practical for fighting than many of the female characters you see out there in video games.
My client absolutely loved the initial concept sketch, so I was able to move into the other views quickly. My client had asked for a 4 view turnaround for the character, so they could supply it to their 3D artist for modeling. The biggest challenge with turnarounds is keeping the right proportions throughout the character. I would say for this warrior knight in particular, the biggest challenge was drawing all the detail in her armor and cloak several times!
To go along with the warrior knight, I asked if she had any weapon or prop to also be designed. My client described a magical crystal sword that she would eventually wield in the video game. I enjoyed sketching out this one-handed sword for her. Again, my client loved the sketch right away, which is always a great feeling, knowing that you captured what they had pictured in their head right off the bat.
Here’s how the crystal sword turned out when I finished it up in color. You can almost feel the gravitational pull of the purple glowing orb in the center, holding all the crystal blade pieces together. I used a little bit of leather and metal to tie in with the character’s clothing and match it all together well.
And here’s all 4 character turnaround views for the warrior knight girl, completed in full color. You’ll notice that there’s a few pieces of crystal on her belt and her eyes match the glowing orb of her weapon, which also helps tie the sword into her ensemble, showing that she is the true keeper of this mystical crystal sword. I loved my client’s idea to have her hair fading into an orange color, which I feel contrasts quite well with her blue and silver cloak.
Here’s a larger image of the three-quarters view of the final character design. I really enjoyed developing this character and I look forward to working on more character designs for this client in the future, as their game progresses.
And lastly, here’s a close-up of her face, so that you can see the detail I illustrated.
I would love to talk to you about your characters (whether for video games or other products) and share how I can bring value and strong imagery to your stories, games, and products. I would be happy to explain more of my process or provide you with a quote. Feel free to contact me and we can talk about your project!
