About Us
First things first—why should you listen to us here at Illustration Unlocked?
The internet is crowded with resources, tutorials, subscription services, all manner of advice to burgeoning artists as they take their first steps into the world of commercial art.
Illustration Unlocked is cut from a different cloth than these other sources in that we speak from real-world experience. The articles contained in these pages stem from interviews with professional artists and editors at different tiers and within a multitude of branches of the commercial art world.
Illustration Unlocked was founded in 2025 with the mission of taking the mystery out of success for novice illustrators. Here we aim to focus your professional journey through the lens of an editor’s eyes—to demystify the question of What are they looking for, anyway?
So, what are they looking for, anyway?
Thinking Like an Editor:
To begin to enter the professional workforce, it's important to have the right mindset and expectations. This not only extends to motivating yourself to draw and to hone your craft, but to see the professional world through the eyes of the people who will hire you. What are the business decisions editors are required to make? How about the publishers? What are the gatekeepers of the industry looking out for when a submission comes across their desk?
To answer these questions, you must understand your own role within the professional hierarchy. The illustrator is an essential member of a collaborative team, but always keep in mind that the key word here is collaborative. You can't go about making a unilateral decision once you are selected to a design team for a project.
Editors are focused on a myriad of business decisions regarding the publication and distribution of the book. Among them is the selection of an illustrator who understands the property to be illustrated, be it a literary book, a graphic novel, or a children's book, and is willing and able to work under the restrictions of the production timeline.