Publish A Coloring Book: How to Illustrate and Sell Your Book Online

Are you looking for a fun way to earn money from your illustrations? Have you ever wanted to publish a book? 

In this comprehensive course, I’m teaching you how to combine the two in a creative, profitable project: your very own coloring book. You’ll learn my entire design process from start to finish. By the final lesson, you will have published a beautiful book that you can sell and share with the world!

I’ll teach you how to:

• Choose a theme for your illustrations and gather inspiration
• Draw full-page line art with the right margins and specs for printing and selling
• Lay out your designs as a book in easy-to-use, free software
• Design an eye-catching cover that will attract buyers
• Self-publish your coloring book and start selling it immediately!

Self-publishing coloring books is not only creatively fulfilling, but it’s a fun way to earn real money from your artwork, too.

There’s a big market for coloring books, for both children and adults, so I’m sharing all the skills and nitty gritty technical details I’ve learned since I started publishing and selling my own.

This class is for all artists, whether you prefer digital illustration or pen and ink!

So long as you have the tools to draw black and white line art, whether that’s with pen and ink or digitally on your iPad or computer, you can publish your very own coloring book – and much more easily than I bet you imagine. I’m using the Procreate app for iPad to create my artwork in class, but you can follow along using any art-making tools you like, including good old pen and ink.

➤ About Me

I’m Molly Suber Thorpe. I’ve been a professional hand lettering artist and teacher for the past twelve years. I have a particular passion for teaching because I simply love helping other artists hone their skills, opening doors to new creative opportunities and profitable freelance careers. 

As a Top Teacher here on the Skillshare platform, I offer lots of classes about calligraphy, typography, Procreate, Adobe Photoshop, and creative freelancing. Check out my other classes.

You might also be interested in…

• Molly’s Lettering Toolkit (my archive of free hand lettering practice sheets)
• My mixed media Procreate brush pack
• My YouTube channel of illustration and lettering tutorials
• My lettering and calligraphy books

➤ Links & Resources

You can find a much longer, downloadable version of this list under the Projects & Resources tab.

Layout Design:

• Sign up for a free Canva account

Publishing with Amazon KDP:

• Register for a free Amazon KDP account
• KDP Cover Template Generator
• KDP Printing Cost & Royalty Calculator
• Amazon KDP Help Center

Public Domain Image Sources:

• CC0 Public Domain Details
• RawPixel
• Archive.org
• Wikimedia Commons

Optional Book Marketing Resources:

• Amazon Author Central
• Amazon A+ Content
• ISBNs from Bowker

My Procreate Symmetry Tutorials (for patterns, mandalas, and mirrored art):

• Border Illustration in Procreate: Symmetry Guides for Beautiful Art (Skillshare)
• Procreate for Absolute Beginners (Skillshare; skip to lesson 30)
• YouTube Symmetry Guide Tutorials (YouTube playlist)

Tools I Use in Class:

• SmudgeGuard Touchscreen Glove (1-finger style)
• Procreate App
• iPad Pro, 12.9-inch, 4th Generation
• Apple Pencil, 2nd Generation
• Read about my iPad recommendations and essential accessories

Book Page Template Margins:

It’s best to download and use the page margin template files from the Resources section of this class. (And your custom cover template can be downloaded here.) But if you need the exact illustration page dimensions that I recommend, they are as follows:

• U.S. Letter Coloring Page Template: Paper size: 8.5 x 11 in; Artwork area: 6.75 x 9.75 in.

• A4 Coloring Page Template: Paper size: 21 x 29.7 cm; Artwork area: 16.5 x 26.5 cm