Illustration Career Growth

Your guide to growing to the next level of your illustration career.

I’ve landed 10 five figure illustration projects (picturebooks) in a row in 2 years from 3 continents.

This page is about how I did it. If you’re starting out you might use this as a checklist or a map. And if you are further along you might see it as a place to come for inspiration. Before jumping into illustration I was a startup co-founder and applied many of the frameworks and lessons into my approach to illustration.

  1. In this podcast episode, I talked with Tom Froese about, “How to be a successful illustrator at 40”

  2. For an overview of my Journey to become a picturebook illustrator, I drew a map and listed the steps.

  3. Some thoughts on Style: It’s a set of rules, It’s positioning, It’s a commitment

  4. Here’s how I created my ‘portfolio’ , and here’s how I’m updating it

  5. In Notes from a Third World Country , I write about how to be industry insider without moving to NY or London.

  6. In How to make a Living as an artist, I expand on the 1000 true fans concept.

  7. Here I write about how I got my first book deal

  8. The crowd-pulling power of easy to draw characters

  9. Classes I took, Post ArtSchool

  10. How to go from pain to Progress

  11. How to use Twitter

  12. How To get 10 000 Substack Subscribers, and other Math Problems.

If anything is not clear, hit me up in the chat!

PS: I’m always adding to and expanding this page.

Ugly Work

10 Minute Tasks to advance your illustration Career: