Anna's Online Journal!

Today I thought I would try out using a graphics tablet as I think that is how a lot of children’s books are illustrated now.

This was my first attempt…

 

Then I had a go at drawing a giraffe for my own story…

 

 

 

Which turned out better than expected. I may use these giraffes in my story so will save them for now. I have decided the one on the left is a beautiful girl giraffe and the one on the right is a male giraffe that has no markings.

I have also drawn a lion that looks a bit like Scar from the Lion King.

 

And am trying to figure out a landscape for my story.

The target audience of a children’s book is very important. In fact, it is probably more important than with an adult book as children develop their literacy skills so fast and change so quickly. You also want to challenge a child, so you would not give a 10 year old a picture book with single sentences. You also wouldn’t give a 4 year old a book that is text heavy. So this all has to be considered when creating a children’s book.

As I would like to make a book that focuses more on the images than on the text, I have decided to aim my book at pre school children (3-5 year olds). It will include 1 or 2 sentences on each page and will rely on the images to help the child tell the story and guess the vocabulary if they are struggling.

Now that I have determined my age group, I have decided to look at the best-selling books aimed at preschool children on the Waterstones website.

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As Stick Man is the best-selling book,I have decided to look into it.

Stick Man was published in 2008 by the same lady who created The Gruffalo (Julia Donaldson). The book is about a stick that goes for a jog. A dog then picks up the stick and plays with it, children play poo-sticks with it, a swan makes a nest with it, a boy makes a mast for his sandcastle with it and an arm for a snowman with it, a family use him as firewood and then finally santa comes down the chimney on him and takes him back to his stick family.

The book personifies the stick, making him sound like a human so that children can feel empathy.

The book is beautifully rhymed which is something I could have a go at:
“Stick Man lives in the family tree,

With his stick lady love and their stick children 3.

One day he wakes early and goes for a jog.

Stick Man, oh, Stick Man, beware of the dog!”

The illustrations are fairly simple and easy to follow but they are effective and pleasing to the eye. I will admit that even I enjoyed looking at the Stick Man book which shows that children’s books can appeal to all ages.

Stick Man has been so successful that it was animated for Christmas Day last year on BBC One.

Some might question why you would want to bother creating books for children and what the importance of them is…

• The first 7 years of a child’s life are the most important in terms of language development
• Children’s books often teach children how to deal with real life problems by taming them down
• The books can be a source of knowledge
• They can heighten a child’s creative side
• They introduce life and death to children
• They teach children new vocabulary and syntax
• They introduce children to onomatopoeia, alliteration and other language
• Cognitive development
• Developing emotionally
• Help motor skills

Different ideas and approaches I have thought of:

• A story about a giraffe
• A story under the sea
• A collage
• Attempt illustrations myself?
• Attempt to make illustrations on Illustrator?
•  Need to decide on an issue to tackle

 

 

 

I am quite excited to take on this next brief of designing a children’s book. I studied child language acquisition for my English A level where we created a book and am looking at becoming a primary school teacher so I feel this brief is quite relevant for me. I also enjoy looking at beautifully illustrated (or humorous) children’s books.

Some of my favourite children’s books are:

I have discovered from my favourites that I appreciate the illustrated designs more.

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Here are some children’s books that I found on Pinterest that I like the look of:

 

 

 

I like the simplistic design of the first and third books the most. I think I will want my designs to be relatively simple and just using a good colour scheme like these too. I feel like you could create a book like the ‘Little Owl Lost’ using a collage which might look quite nice. I am not sure if my drawing abilities are up to scratch to create a book that is as beautiful as ‘The Great Paper Caper’.

 

 

 

via GIPHY