I started sending queries to publishers and agents at the end of January. We’re now nearing the end of June and there hasn’t been any interest in developing my first book idea yet, so I’ve been working on the second while continuing to improve my story telling and illustration skills.

With so many ideas that I’d like to develop—and yet so much to learn—I’ve been trying to take my time and balance both processes.

On the writing side, I started by writing the outline and making the first page chart. With a different point-of-view and narration style than the first one, I feel like it’s off to a good start.

On the visual side, I’ve started taking an online character design workshop which has already taught me to look at character design and drawing in a whole new way. I don’t want to share too much about that yet but here’s a peek at a different online colour workshop I did, and some rough sketches from trying to work out some visually interesting angles and compositions.

I’ve also started experimenting with a limited palette of gauche instead of watercolour. I really enjoy the texture and vibrancy of the colours and am excited to see how this will progress!

Picture book illustration

Recent Posts

Julie Bateman

Hi there! I've been a self employed graphic designer, working from a home office in Barrie, Ontario Canada since 2003.

In the summer of 2022, I decided to start an ink & watercolour travel journal to document an upcoming road trip from Ontario to Prince Edward Island with Rob, my husband, and Bella our Old English Sheepdog.

From there, I fell in love with drawing, painting and documenting my world in sketchbooks. That learning process inspired me to follow the dream of writing and illustrating a picture book for children.

That's where this blog begins.

If you're interested in collaborating or hiring me for freelance projects, please email me at julie@batemandesigngroup.com

 

Recent Posts

Bella Learned to Paint!

Bella Learned to Paint!

Last weekend, the brave folks at the Huronia Museum in Midland, Ontario hosted their first dog friendly workshop. Combining the Indigenous storytelling experience with a collaborative painting class, this workshop was a fundraiser for the museum and Ontario SPCA...

Professional Development Days

Professional Development Days

Last year, along with writing and illustrating my first picture book, I added schedule quarterly professional development days to my list of intentions. As a self employed graphic designer, my days often get filled with client projects, so it felt important to make...

Creating the Final Artwork

Creating the Final Artwork

So, here we are—working on the final artwork during this cold, snowy week in January. I've 'finished' the first spread and have started working on the second. I love this part of the process! Although many illustrators seem to prefer working digitally using software...

Making a Dummy Book

Making a Dummy Book

This week was a lot of fun! We learned a lot about the importance of making dummy copies of our books to test out the format, page turns, pacing, etc. To make mine, I scanned in the thumbnails that I made last week, enlarged them a little, added text in InDesign, then...

Thumbnails

Thumbnails

The Picture Book Course was back this week, after three weeks off for Christmas. Although I enjoyed the downtime over the holidays, it felt great to be back at it! As I mentioned before, I had a story idea in mind when I started this course, but I took the...

Our True Colours

Our True Colours

Okay, I know I said I wasn't going to work on the book again until after I'm finished the Picture Book Course—but I changed my mind. I was sad yesterday, so I started choosing a colour palette to cheer myself up. On Saturday morning, I woke up to our find our...

Imposter Syndrome

Imposter Syndrome

Imposter syndrome is a behavioural health phenomenon described as self-doubt of intellect, skills, or accomplishments among high-achieving individuals. Now, I wouldn't say that applies to me exactly but last week when the other students in the private Facebook group...

Picture Book Course

Picture Book Course

Eek! Here we go!  In September, I celebrated 20 years of being a self employed graphic designer. Perhaps because of that milestone, one of the goals I set for myself this year was new: to write and illustrate a picture book inspired by my old English sheepdog...

Character Development

Character Development

I finished the first draft of my manuscript this afternoon! Wow, does it feel great to be able to say that! My production schedule has been very full with graphic design projects lately. In between juggling three larger, long term projects with the day-to-day website...

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Please join our email list if you’re interested in watching my journey to becoming a published picture book author and illustrator progress. If you’re a Kid Lit Agent or Publisher, or if you’re interested in a collaboration, I’d love to hear from you! Please feel free to email me at julie@batemandesigngroup.com if you have a direct inquiry.

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