I’m having a harder time storyboarding this picture book compared to the one I had worked on previously. The last one was a lot less story driven and more of a conceptual poetry picture book, but with the one I’m working on now, I need to illustrate a specific story and consider the younger student audience that may rely heavily on the illustrations to understand the book.
A literary tool I am using in my writing is repetition, which I found to be used in a lot of children’s books including, All Are Welcome by Alexandra Penfold and The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. However, I don’t want to be too repetitive with my illustrations. I’m hoping to use various angles and formatting to make the images exciting and engaging! I want to avoid redundancy for students.
My Progress: I’ve done some very very rough drawings to lay out a simple storyboard, but I haven’t completed all the pages yet. The spreads above are those that I’m pretty set on and confident in. I’m stuck on a number of pages due to the redundancy issue I want to avoid, but I’m continuing to work through it. However, as you can see, there is some repetition in the illustrations with the row of plants, but I thought for the story, it was an angle that worked best to show the plant growth consistently so I’ll be using that throughout the book.
Also, a key point I need to keep in mind as I begin my illustrations is the importance of representation in children’s books. The Day You Begin by Jacqueline Woodson and All Are Welcome by Alexandra Penfold are examples of books that directly discuss diversity in schools. Although my story isn’t directly exploring diversity, representation of all different kinds of people with different skin tones and abilities is incredibly important for students to observe as they grow up in order to feel seen and included.
Next week, I’ll continue to storyboard and tackle the issues I’m having with it. Hopefully I have a full rough storyboard by next week, but I’m not expecting to finalize images to start official illustrating just yet!
Images illustrated by Yireh Park
stephaniepreston
Hi Yireh! Wow this project is amazing and your story is very creative. I love all of the thought and care that you’ve put into each component of your story and can’t wait to continue to read the rest. I do love the perspective you chose in your storyboard. Another book that has a variety of perspectives in its artwork is The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse by Charlie Mackesy. If you’re interested in checking it out.
Representation is so important when it comes to young learners. There are a variety of studies that track the correlation between young people seeing themselves represented in a role (via books, movies, tv, etc.) and an increase in interest, studies, and careers in that area. I love that you gave representation some deep thought and consideration to make sure to incorporate into your book. Thank you for sharing!