This inspirational post is all about showing you a great selection of different ways the digital medium is put to use in the modern day world to create illustrations for children’s book covers: from toddlers’ short novels and picture books, to books about color for the youth, to older kids who have a keen interest in art and design – and of course everything in between.
My Life with the Lincolns
Author: Gayle Brandeis
Illustrator: Unknown
Clean cut shapes, custom typography and a touch of texture make for an interesting children’s book cover, and suits the story (based in 1966) very well.
Happy Birthday, Bad Kitty
Author: Nick Bruel
Illustrator: Nick Bruel
This humorous and funky “bad kitty” illustration has an interesting characteristic, making it appeal to kids and adults!
The Water Seeker
Author: Kimberly Willis Holt
Illustrator: Unknown
The limited greyscale and yellow color scheme here makes this an interesting cover, enough to make anyone’s curiosity run wild.
What the Ladybug Heard
Author: Julia Donaldson
Illustrator: Lydia Monks
A typical modern day children’s book; packed full of color and simple but adorable character illustrations.
A Book About Color
Author: Mark Gonyea
Illustrator: Mark Gonyea
A minimalistic but compelling cover for a book about color aimed at children interested in art and design.
Popville
Author: Anouck Boisrobert and Louis Rigaud
Illustrator: Unknown
This captivating book cover makes use of the great pop-art style, a huge art movement that emerged in the 1950’s.
Bad Kitty
Author: Nick Bruel
Illustrator: Nick Bruel
Another illustration of “bad kitty”, again using humor to make the cover appeal to youngsters and adults alike.
Why Is Snot Green?
Author: Glenn Murphy
Illustrator: Unknown
A popular illustration style used in modern day children’s books. This illustration makes use of oversized body parts and related colors to help emphasise the title and the reason behind the book.
Invasion of the Road Weenies
Author: David Lubar
Illustrator: Unknown
This book cover, although it appears quite strange, is probably irresistible to pick up if you were to see in a store. The character design, varied (bright) color scheme and patterns in the sky makes it stand out like there’s no tomorrow.
The Battle of the Red Hot Pepper Weenies
Author: NAME
Illustrator: NAME
Another “Weenies” cover that has the same effect as the previous one. The pink, orange and blue/green color scheme actually works really well together, and the three-dimensional style text pops out to grab your attention.
The Cabinet of Wonders
Author: Marie Rutkoski
Illustrator: Unknown
Some lovely and quite detailed vector silhouettes have been used in this piece, mixed with some beautiful, soft colors in the background making it quite a beautiful cover to look at.
Spilling Ink: A Young Writer’s Handbook
Author: Ellen Potter and Anne Mazer
Illustrator: Matt Phelan
Yellow and black has always been a favorite combination of colors for a lot of designers and artists, and this is the reason why. It’s a strong and powerful combination that is bound to attract every passer by’s attention.
Two Miserable Presidents
Author: Steven Sheinkin
Illustrator: Tim Robinson
This “vintage-style” illustration and typography suggests the book is set in the past (1856 to be precise), and does it very well. The washed out color scheme, the use of texture and the intricate linework makes this cover compelling.
Lemons Are Not Red
Author: Laura Vaccaro Seeger
Illustrator: Laura Vaccaro Seeger
A very simple but quite attractive-looking cover using a bold black typeface against a bright yellow background. The simple lemon illustration is in the color red, exactly what the title of the book is telling the audience the color of lemons aren’t. Simply confusing.
One Boy
Author: Laura Vaccaro Seeger
Illustrator: Laura Vaccaro Seeger
One Boy uses an extremely simple character illustration directly in the center of the bright red cover. Although very minimalistic, it works tremendously well, and looks great!
Ghosts in the House!
Author: Kazuno Kohara
Illustrator: Kazuno Kohara
This wonderful black and orange illustration with a hint of white being used for the “ghosts in the house” uses some very subtle screen-print/sponge style textures to give it that extra boost of creativity. This is candy to the eyes!
Here Comes Jack Frost
Author: Kazuno Kohara
Illustrator: Kazuno Kohara
A combination of clean-cut vector shapes with a gradient blue background with some subtle texture, and delicately detailed snow flakes.
The Wooden Mile
Author: Chris Mould
Illustrator: Chris Mould
The color scheme of black and red is another popular one, especially when it comes to anything remotely “scary”. This silhouette style illustration against the indistinct textured background is interesting and nonetheless well composed.
The Icy Hand
Author: Chris Mould
Illustrator: Chris Mould
Like the previous book (another by Chris Mould, in case you hadn’t noticed!), a limited color scheme is used with silhouette style illustrations, again to produce that “spooky” atmosphere. The big difference between the two covers is that fact that one is red, and one is blue. The blue in this cover design gives a chilled effect, working perfectly with the title of the book: “The Icy Hand”.
Rex
Author: Ursual Dubosarsky
Illustrator: David Mackintosh
A combination of patterns, paper textures, water color brushes and digital, textured typography has been used for the “Rex” cover to produce an interesting and compelling piece of artwork.
Hank Finds Inspiration
Author: Craig Frazier
Illustrator: Craig Frazier
With the use of simple shapes and gradients, as well as a fairly limited color scheme, this cover is stimulating. The use of white space makes the title of the book easy to read and helps it stand out without any over-the-top effects.
The Time Travelers’ Handbook
Author: Lottie Stride
Illustrator: Dusan Pavlic
The short slogan/blurb on the front cover suggests that the content in this book is “wild” and “wacky”. This is most certainly what the cover art suggests, too, using a “wacky” color scheme of black and orange, and a uncontrollably “wild” swirly pattern. It works well, and will definitely attract the youngsters.
The Adventurers’ Handbook
Author: Anita Ganeri
Illustrator: Dusan Pavlic
Like the previous book cover (from the same “handbook” series, and also illustrated by Dusan Pavlic), the slogan/blurb on the cover suggests the book is “extreme, extraordinary, and exciting”. The almost electric blue background with the black stripes pointing inwards certainly back this up.
Peep!
Author: Maria van Lieshout
Illustrator: Maria van Lieshout
This very minimalistic cover uses just three colors in it’s scheme: yellow, green, and black; and very little of them all. Although some type is fairly difficult to focus on for a long time, the cover is very attention-grabbing and captivating – after all, you don’t see many covers like this!
The Shy Creatures
Author: David Mack
Illustrator: David Mack
One of my personal favorites in the showcase; illustrator and writer David Mack uses some great line work combined with as little color as possible to create a compelling, interesting and really fun cover. If I were a child, I’d want to own this – in fact, I think I do ever as an adult!
The Poison Apples
Author: Lily Archer
Illustrator: Unknown
A traditional threshold and vector-style portrait has been used for The Poison Apples’ front cover. The use of swirly patterns in the background mixed with the flowly hair help to draw ones eyes into the piece.
The First Pup
Author: Bob Staake
Illustrator: Bob Staake
This is a great and very modern illustration, which the children’s book industry is starting to see more and more of. The clean cut lines incorporated with the shadows and glows help this piece burst into life.
Invasion from Planet Dork
Author: Greg Trine
Illustrator: Rhode Montijo
Another vector piece, using simple shapes and line art to produce a gripping illustration. The typography uses a strong drop-shadow to help it stand out and come away from the colorful illustration.
Basher Math
Author: Dan Green
Illustrator: Simon Basher
A simple selection of shapes, colors and gradients have been merged together for not just this book, but the following two too, to create colorful and vibrant illustrations to help sell these typical school subjects to kids.
Basher Chemistry
Author: Dan Green
Illustrator: Simon Basher
Basher Punctuation
Author: Mary Budzik
Illustrator: Simon Basher
I Am Reading: Alien Alby
Author: Kaye Umansky
Illustrator: Sophie Rohrbach
Yet another character illustration using modern day vector techniques to produce a great children’s book cover. The use of a gradient in the background really helps to pull this piece together and make it one.
