Children’s Book Illustrator & Character Designer

Kingdom Waves Studios is looking for a Children's Book Illustrator & Character Designer to help bring an exciting original children's devotional adventure to life for Kingdom Waves Kids.

Closing Date: Friday 16 October 2026

Contract Type: Paid Freelance/Project-Based Commission

Hours: Flexible, project-based; agreed milestones and deadlines

Salary: To be negotiated based on confirmed scope, deliverables, experience and agreed rights

Location: Remote (Global)

Information

Created for children aged approximately 5-9 years, this imaginative devotional adventure brings together memorable recurring characters, storytelling, humour, adventure, faith-inspired themes, interactive activities and meaningful shared discovery.

At its heart is a desire to help children grow in faith, confidence, courage, character, identity and purpose, while creating opportunities for children and families to laugh, learn, talk, reflect, create and discover together.

They want to create more than pages that simply look beautiful. We want to build a warm, joyful and imaginative visual world that children want to enter, explore and return to - a world filled with personality, humour, wonder and memorable storytelling.

The project includes recurring animal and human characters, supporting characters, environments, narrative scenes and interactive visual elements.

This is an opportunity for the right illustrator to bring their own creative gift and contribute to something with deeper purpose and lasting potential. You won’t simply be executing a series of individual illustrations - you'll be helping to shape the visual identity, character world and storytelling experience of an original children's property from an early stage of its development.

They are looking for someone who is passionate about creating for children and who connects with - or can become genuinely invested in - the purpose behind what we're building. They want an illustrator who will contribute exceptional, dynamic and thoughtful ideas, explore visual possibilities and transform them into adventures, discoveries and imaginative experiences for children.

They seek someone who will work collaboratively with us to create something meaningful, engaging and memorable for children and families.

What You’ll Be Doing

The successful illustrator will work collaboratively with Kingdom Waves Studios to:

• Develop memorable, expressive, visually distinctive and consistent recurring characters, including animal, human and supporting characters.
• Create character-development and reference artwork, including model sheets, turnarounds, poses and expressions, establishing strong character consistency throughout the project.
• Produce engaging illustrations for character-led scenes and environments, communicating emotion, humour, personality, action and story.
• Create supporting artwork and interactive visual elements for child-friendly activities and engagement features.
• Help develop a cohesive visual language across characters, environments, scenes and interactive elements.
• Translate written briefs, story moments, activities and faith-inspired themes into imaginative, engaging and age-appropriate visual storytelling.
• Work with an awareness of composition, text placement, activity space and the practical requirements of children's publishing and interactive content.
• Contribute thoughtful original ideas while responding constructively to creative direction and feedback throughout an agreed phased development and approval process.
• Supply high-quality, professional, production-ready artwork, including appropriately organised and editable source/working files and agreed project assets where required.
• Undertake other related illustration, character-development and visual-development work that may reasonably be required as the project evolves, where agreed as part of the project scope, deliverables and/or any subsequent agreed changes to them.
• Deliver agreed illustrations, character artwork and other commissioned project assets in accordance with the project schedule, milestones, creative brief and approved specifications.

What They're Looking For

They're looking for an illustrator with a strong creative voice and an exceptional standard of craft, combining artistic excellence, visual storytelling and professional consistency.

You should be able to demonstrate strong children's illustration and character-design ability; distinctive and emotionally engaging recurring characters; consistency across poses, expressions and scenes; confident animal and human character illustration; and strong visual storytelling.

We particularly value imagination, originality, warmth, humour, storytelling instinct and creative curiosity - someone who can look beyond the obvious solution, notice the storytelling possibilities within a scene and bring thoughtful ideas to the project while remaining faithful to its heart and direction.

They want the artwork to feel alive. We want the characters to feel known. And we want children to be excited to discover what happens next.

They also value a collaborative, proactive, dependable and communicative working style, with the ability to work independently, manage agreed milestones and deadlines reliably, and communicate openly throughout the commission.

Previous experience in children's publishing, storybooks, workbooks, educational resources, activity books or interactive content is welcome, but not essential where your portfolio clearly demonstrates the required ability.

An understanding of Christian and biblical themes, or previous experience creating Christian children's content, would be advantageous but is not essential. Applicants should, however, be comfortable illustrating faith-inspired Christian themes and content.

Students, recent graduates, emerging illustrators and experienced professionals are all welcome to apply. We care about the quality, originality, consistency, suitability and potential demonstrated through your work - not simply the length of your CV.

About the Commission

This is a paid freelance/project-based commission, undertaken remotely.

The project will be developed in agreed phases, with flexible working hours and agreed review stages, milestones and deadlines. Applicants should have sufficient availability and capacity to undertake a substantial multi-stage illustration commission over the coming weeks and/or months.

The final project fee and payment terms will be negotiated and agreed with the selected illustrator based on the confirmed project scope, deliverables, level of experience and agreed rights. Payment will be made in agreed stages linked to project milestones.

As the commissioned character designs, illustrations and artwork will form part of Kingdom Waves Studios' wider publishing and media intellectual property, the successful commission will include an agreed written assignment of intellectual property rights in the commissioned final artwork and commissioned project assets to Kingdom Waves Ltd.

Full terms, including rights, usage, deliverables, payment and credit, will be clearly agreed in writing before commissioned work begins.

As Kingdom Waves Studios continues to develop its publishing and wider creative work, this project may lead to opportunities to collaborate on future projects. No future work is guaranteed, but we would be delighted to build lasting creative relationships where there is a strong mutual fit.

They sincerely thank all applicants for their interest in working with Kingdom Waves Studios.

Kingdom Waves Studios is a trading name of Kingdom Waves Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales.