Every Picture Tells A Story

One of the things I love about working with artists like Craig Bulloch and Bethany Lacey Freeman, is that when I asked for a picture of a dragonfly, they responded in the following way.

'Which breed of dragonfly do you want, a Scarlet Skimmer or a Common Green Darter?'

The picture you see above is of a dragonfly, who is often seen near ponds and rice fields in South East Asia. He is the main character in a story I have been writing for a while. A Vietnamese reader would recognise him. Isn't that amazing!

Attention to detail when writing a story is important. However, illustrations serve more than one purpose. They aren't just there to make the story seem 'more real.' Here are some other reasons why illustrations matter.

1 Pictures Build Comprehension

Images provide readers with visual clues that help them to understand what is happening. When the reader looks at a picture of Emma in Egghead the Movie as she stares at the screen of her mobile phone, just look at her eyes. They tell readers everything they need to know about Emma's anxiety and the challenges she faces.

2 Pictures Reduce Anxiety

A page full of text can be intimidating. Illustrations make a story feel friendlier and can act as a resting place for the eye.

3 Pictures Support Memory

We often remember things in terms of images. Pictures can make characters and settings more memorable and images can trigger off vocabulary recall. Look at a story like, Overnight Success and see how many vocabulary items are represented in the illustrations.

4 Pictures Encourage Prediction and Creativity

Readers can look at a picture and try to guess what happens next. Prediction in turn can generate a great deal of creativity. Try looking at all the illustrations in The Drum to see what story it tells. Listen to students come up with stories of their own as they interpret the pictures. I invite you, dear reader, to come up with a story of your own by looking at the picture of the dragonfly. Feel free to write your ideas for the story in the comments.

5 The Best Illustrations Tell their Own Story.

When I write a story, the artists are involved in the process from the very beginning. Every choice of visuals helps to tell the story, including the colours and themes that are involved.

6 Illustrations Bridge Cultural Gaps

A picture can instantly take a reader to a market in Bangkok, put them on an English double-decker bus or invite them inside a Mongolian Ger.

7 Illustrations Create Emotional Engagement

Readers know what fear feels like. They know what it means to lose something or someone important. They have their own lived experience that they can tap into to understand the story and illustrations help the reader to identify with key emotions.

8 Illustrations Can Add Information Not Found in the Text

Picutres can enrich the story by adding atmosphere and humour. They can provide the reader with clues or foreshadow 'future' events.

9 An Illustration can Encourage Observation.

Good illustrations reward careful observation. What is on Emma's desk? What posters are on Owen's wall? What is the dragonfly looking at? These are all questions that a careful observer will ask when reading our stories.

10 Artwork Supports a Different Learning Style

Some learners are naturally more visual than verbal. Illustrations are not just an extra for some learners. They provide a way of processing information and remembering a story.

Pictures are not mere decoration. They are there to tell the story together with the writer. Stories like Egghead the Movie, The Drum and Overnight Success would not be the same without the beautiful illustrations made by the young and talented artists I work with.