Communication

This process will always be very communicative!

First we will discuss what your story is about and what you envision for the design. This includes the characters and how the story will be told through pictures. I will send some concept sketches over to establish the general design of the book and make sure we are on the same page. There will be a back and forth as I send concept drawings. You will have time to review, suggest edits and approve all designs before we move further.

Storyboarding

After we have a good theme I will start working on the storyboards for each page. We will discuss any specific layouts, scenes, or page designs you have in mind. I usually establish the full storyboard for the entire book to make sure everything has a good flow from start to finish. When everything is laid out I run them by you for review and make any necessary edits. Since these are just storyboards this process usually doesn't take too long.

Production

Once all the pages are sketched out I start working through sections, usually about 5 pages at a time. These pages are final renders with full color! The only thing not included here is the text. Every few pages I will send over the full illustrations for you to confirm or suggest any edits. This lets you see the progress as I work through the pages and make sure everything is as you envisioned. If any edits are needed I will adjust before moving to the next section. This part of the process takes the most amount of time, but is the most rewarding because you really start to see the final project come together as more and more pages are finalized.

Review and Finalization

After everything has been fully drawn and edited as needed I send it all your way so you can see all the pages together for a final confirmation on the illustrations.

If you have selected Text & Formatting for your project, this will include an editor to read over the text to ensure that the grammar and punctuation is correct and ready to print!

From here is when I can start adding the text to the pages. We will discuss font preferences and I will layout the manuscript on each page. When all the pages have text I will send your way to confirm everything is looking good, some edits may be needed to move some text around but generally this will be one of the last steps.

Layout and Printing

As for the cover and back, it really depends on your preference for when they get done; though I typically do them last as I have more finely tuned the style, character and story by then.

At the end of the project once all the illustrations and text are finalized I will send the high resolution files your way. Depending on the specific publication requirements will depend on the file format I provide.

Cover

If the project is only for a cover this entire process is much faster as it only includes one illustration. Each step listed above is just about the same, if not shorter, as I want to make sure that your story is captured in the cover image.

If you have any questions about the process or feel that a different process would work better for your project feel free to reach out to me to discuss further on my Contact Me page.