Illustration for Children’s Books: Creating a Joyful Universe
A course by Maddy Vian , Freelance Illustrator
Learn to illustrate an original story by combining digital and traditional illustration tools to create friendly characters and bold scenes
Learn to illustrate an original story by combining digital and traditional illustration tools to create friendly characters and bold scenes
Bring fun and energetic scenes in a children’s book to life through illustration. Freelance illustrator Maddy Vian has been drawing and writing books since she was a child. After graduating with a degree in illustration, she turned her hobby into a full-time career. Maddy believes in bringing empathy and kindness to the creative process when illustrating and has since worked in art direction, packaging design, and, most recently, illustration for children’s books.
In this course, she shares her expertise in children’s illustration to teach you how to imagine and draw a different world. Learn to create captivating narratives using color, objects, characters, and shapes to design scenes with stories behind them.
What will you learn in this online course?
18 lessons & 19 downloads
- 100% positive reviews (66)
- 1,987 students
- 18 lessons (3h 10m)
- 19 additional resources (3 files)
- Online and at your own pace
- Available on the app
- Audio: English
- English · Spanish · Portuguese · German · French · Italian · Polish · Dutch
- Level: Beginner
- Unlimited access forever
Recommended software for this course
Adobe PhotoshopWhat is this course's project?
Draw a scene using digital illustration tools for a children’s book that features a child character.
Projects by course students
Who is this online course for?
This course is for anyone who wants to explore illustration that combines digital and traditional techniques or with an interest in creating children’s books.
Requirements and materials
Basic knowledge of drawing programs such as Photoshop would be beneficial. You will also need drawing materials like pencils, paper, and a graphics tablet, iPad, or Wacom Cintiq.
Reviews
A course by Maddy Vian
Maddy Vian is a UK-based freelance illustrator who immersed herself in drawing at a very young age. She was experimenting with drawing before she could even write, and eventually went on to study illustration and animation at Kingston University in London. There, she began sharing her work online and, after building a professional network of clients, took her freelance career full-time.
Maddy has worked on everything from art direction to packaging design and now specializes in illustrations for children’s books, where she focuses on bringing kindness to her creations to convey warmth and comfort to her readers. She has worked for brands including Penguin Random House, Ohh Deer, and Twitter UK.
Content
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U1
Introduction
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About Me
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Influences
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U2
Thinking Inside and Outside of the Picture
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Traditional Materials, Drawing Tablets and the Ugly Sketch
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Learning About Proportions
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How to Make Characters Younger or Older
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Dressing Your Character
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The Character in the Space
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Juggling Ideas and Moving Forward
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U3
Drawing the Final Project: Alex in Their Bedroom
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The Ugly Sketch That No One Sees
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The Details in Action
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Adding Colour: A Tree Doesn’t Have to Be Green 1
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Adding Colour: A Tree Doesn’t Have to Be Green 2
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Adding Colour: A Tree Doesn’t Have to Be Green 3
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Adding Colour: A Tree Doesn’t Have to Be Green 4
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Adding Details 1
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Adding Details 2
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U4
Saving, Sharing and Selling Yourself
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Exporting the Illustration and Sharing Your Work
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Tips for the Future
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FP
Final project
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Illustration for Children’s Books: Creating a Joyful Universe
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What to expect from a Domestika course
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Learn at your own pace
Enjoy learning from home without a set schedule and with an easy-to-follow method. You set your own pace.
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Learn from the best professionals
Learn valuable methods and techniques explained by top experts in the creative sector.
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Meet expert teachers
Each expert teaches what they do best, with clear guidelines, true passion, and professional insight in every lesson.
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Certificates
PlusIf you're a Plus member, get a custom certificate signed by your teacher for every course. Share it on your portfolio, social media, or wherever you like.
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Get front-row seats
Videos of the highest quality, so you don't miss a single detail. With unlimited access, you can watch them as many times as you need to perfect your technique.
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Share knowledge and ideas
Ask questions, request feedback, or offer solutions. Share your learning experience with other students in the community who are as passionate about creativity as you are.
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Connect with a global creative community
The community is home to millions of people from around the world who are curious and passionate about exploring and expressing their creativity.
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Watch professionally produced courses
Domestika curates its teacher roster and produces every course in-house to ensure a high-quality online learning experience.
FAQs
Domestika's courses are online classes that provide you with the tools and skills you need to complete a specific project. Every step of the project combines video lessons with complementary instructional material, so you can learn by doing. Domestika's courses also allow you to share your own projects with the teacher and with other students, creating a dynamic course community.
All courses are 100% online, so once they're published, courses start and finish whenever you want. You set the pace of the class. You can go back to review what interests you most and skip what you already know, ask questions, answer questions, share your projects, and more.
The courses are divided into different units. Each one includes lessons, informational text, tasks, and practice exercises to help you carry out your project step by step, with additional complementary resources and downloads. You'll also have access to an exclusive forum where you can interact with the teacher and with other students, as well as share your work and your course project, creating a community around the course.
You can redeem the course you received by accessing the redeeming page and entering your gift code.
Adobe Photoshop
laki_singh
This course exceeded my expectations! The instructor explains everything clearly, making it easy to follow from basics to advanced levels.
harald_pizzinini
Very nice course
floraristarain
hermoso
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maristelakamiya
Ótimo curso, bem simples de entender
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jewelll
I learnt a lot. I am still working on Procreate, but it seems through the process as she does using PS, I’ll do a switch to improve my artwork. I’ll definitely do the project, and certainly the first one I will manage to post. Thank you for the course.