We illustrate children’s books for self-publishing authors, independent publishers and educators — picture books, early readers and chapter books, for children aged 2 to 12. Every illustration is drawn by hand. None of it is generated by AI.
Most books need more than one of the services below. Authors usually arrive with a manuscript and leave with character designs, interior artwork, a cover, and print-ready files for Amazon KDP, IngramSpark, Barnes & Noble or EPUB. You can also commission any single piece on its own.
Every book is quoted individually, because the work depends on how many characters there are, how detailed the backgrounds need to be, and how the artwork is split between full spreads and spot illustrations. Tell us about yours and we’ll come back with a firm quote and a timeline within one business day.
Our founder and lead illustrator, Amna Zaki, has illustrated more than 50 children’s books over seven years, and holds Top Rated Plus status on Upwork with a 100% Job Success Score. Our other illustrators each bring five or more years of children’s book experience. Between us, The Rainbow Stories has illustrated more than 100 children’s books; more than 50 of those are Amna’s own.
New to commissioning artwork? Read how to hire a children’s book illustrator before you send your manuscript. The case studies follow published books from first sketch to printed page.
You send the manuscript; we send back finished artwork, scene by scene.
Turn-arounds, expressions and poses, so your character looks the same on every page.
A personalised book built around one child — story, artwork and print-ready files.
Your text mapped out page by page, before a single final illustration is drawn.
Print-ready interiors, a cover wrap with the spine calculated from your page count, and an EPUB for the ebook — for books we illustrated and books we did not. See what we format
Artwork for readers, worksheets and textbooks, drawn for the age group it has to teach.
Book trailers, read-along clips and character animation — hand-drawn, starting from a storyboard.
Whatever part of the work you need, these are standard, and written into the quote rather than added to it later.
Timelines run from an accepted quote to delivered files, and they include the time you spend reviewing.
Enquiries are answered within one business day, Monday to Friday.
Most books that come through the studio belong to self-publishing authors with a finished manuscript and no illustrator. We also work with independent publishers who need a book covered end to end, and with educators who need artwork for teaching material. More than a hundred children’s books have been illustrated here, for readers aged two to twelve.
If you are weighing a studio against a solo freelancer or a marketplace, the difference is cover and consistency: more than one illustrator, files checked before they reach you, and one named person drawing your book rather than whoever is free.
If you know what you need, send us the manuscript. If you are still working out the scope, what moves the price of a children’s book sets out how a quote is put together.
Costs, timelines and what is included are above. These are the questions authors ask once they have read that far.
Usually four things, in this order: a character set, a storyboard, the interior illustrations, and a cover — then the files built to your printer's specification.
You do not have to work out which parts apply to your book. Send the manuscript and we will tell you what it needs and quote the pieces together.
Yes. Everything on this page is sold on its own. Authors come to us for a cover alone, a character set alone, or formatting for a book another illustrator drew.
No. We work from your manuscript as you wrote it. It stays yours, we do not rewrite it unless you specifically ask us to, and we do not share or publish it.
You receive print-ready PDFs at 300 dpi, built to the bleed, trim and spine specification of Amazon KDP, IngramSpark, Barnes & Noble or EPUB — whichever you told us at the quote stage. You upload them from your own publishing account.
If a printer rejects a file on specification, we fix it at no charge.
A character set or a storyboard. Both are small, self-contained pieces of work — a character set takes about three business days, a 32-page storyboard about three weeks — and both tell you whether the book holds together visually before you commit to a full set of spreads.
Yes — educational illustration for teaching and classroom material, and 2D animation. Both are quoted the same way as the book work: tell us what you need and we will come back within one business day.
Tell us the page count, the characters and your deadline. We will send back a quote and a timeline within 24 hours.
Start your briefTakes about three minutes. No obligation.
