My First Paycheck & the Pains of Becoming a Professional Illustrator

A few months ago, I sent in a cover letter and sample drawings to try to become an illustrator for a magazine called Stone Soup, where kids write and illustrate poems and stories. Two hundred and fifty kids send in stories or drawings each week, so I knew I had a really rough chance of getting in. But after a few weeks, I heard back from them and I had the job! Well, in theory, I had the job. I was on board as an official illustrator. That meant my drawings were in the files and I could be called on anytime in the next couple years to illustrate a story. Or not. But then, within just weeks, I got an assignment. This blog is about illustrating for a magazine in just 12 simple steps.

I wanted to do the first drawing in one hour, one day. Well, let me tell ya, THAT sure didn’t happen! My first drawing turned out to be one of MANY sketches.

Step 1: reading. I read (and re-read) the story and the note on which scenes I was to illustrate. Stone Soup’s editor suggested details and characters to include. In brief (because you don't want me to give the story away and my preliminary sketches will give you a glimpse): back then and far away, a girl, a masked ball, a bird.

Step 2: research. Back when my parents had unlimited internet access and I HAD internet access, a.k.a. before the quinta, I got on Google images and searched “clothes from the 18th century.” What I got were video game characters, people dressed in garish polyester based on 18th century clothes, and two pictures I wanted. I also looked up furniture and bluebirds.

Step 3: my first illustration, or rather, sketch. This was the one I thought was THE ONE and wasn’t.

Step 4: more sketches. I drew blue crayon pictures and showed them to my mom. Almost all my work goes through my critics/editors, a.k.a. Mom and Dad. My mom’s the art critic and my dad is the copyeditor. She says, “I like this and this. But Gemma is the main character; are you SURE you want her in the background, behind the chair, in profile? This is the most exciting moment of her life, after all. Those aren’t exactly period chairs. What you could you do with this empty space. If these two things were in the same picture, it would be perfect.”

Step 5: drawings. I drew LIGHTLY, in pencil, in perspective, in detail all the things that we had liked in my many blue crayon sketches. I showed the drawing to my mom: “What about making the window bigger? And what do you see through the window? Can you see through the curtains? Are they blowing? Oh, I thought we liked the OPEN window.” I revised, filled in, finally finished the drawings.

Step 6: color sketches. I made copies of my illustrations and tried different color schemes, methods, media (settled on markers and pencil), and asked for feedback from my critic: “Yes, yes. No, no, no. Wait, I like that yellow. Pink, silver, black? But that will blend in with the wall. We won’t see your details.” She liked the painterly look on the pics hanging on the wall. The reflection in the mirror (which you can’t see in my sketch) was tricky.

Step 7: color. Looking at the color sketches, I colored in the pictures verrrrrrrrry caaaaaaaarefully. I used up all my MP3 player’s battery while doing this. Most listened to tracks: “Pavement” by Lindsay Mac and “My Song” by Brandi Carlile.

Step 8: Mailing. We packed off the drawings, my cover letter, and a photo of the illustrious illustrator (ha!) and sent it registered mail. “É o mais rapido e seguro,” we were assured at the post office. (Translation: this is the quickest and safest way to send your work.)

Step 9: Tracking. It was NOT the quickest or safest way to send it. Days later, many exchanges of e-mails with the editor later, many calls to Portuguese and US postal offices later, etc., it was still stuck in customs in NYC. Why?! What did they think I was trying to smuggle in?

Step 10: Panic. The production schedule might be held up.

Step 11: Whew! We made it, by a day.

Step 12: My first paycheck, ever!

Now we have the finished product. But YOU have to look for the July-August issue of Stone Soup (probably available any place they sell magazines, by mid-June, I think) to see it!

Maybe my next blog will be about the pains of posting blogs or getting them past two critic/editor parents.