How to Build a Color Palette for Your Picture Book Illustration

Color is one of the most powerful tools in picture book illustration. It helps set the emotional tone, tells the story beyond the words, and creates visual consistency from page to page. Whether you’re working traditionally or digitally, building a thoughtful color palette early on can make the entire illustration process smoother and more intentional.

In my book ‘Are You Bored?’, I created a custom palette that would reflect both the quiet, relatable moments of boredom and the joyful bursts of imagination that follow. with all the colors my aim was to create a colorful contrast to boredom, that’s why it’s one of the richest palettes I’ve ever created. I’m sharing that palette with you today - you’ll find the download link at the end of this post!

But first, let me walk you through how I build a picture book palette from scratch:

1. Start with the Story’s Mood

Ask yourself: what does the story feel like? Is it dreamy, energetic, calm, or chaotic?

‘Are You Bored?’ starts with quiet frustration and gradually builds into creativity and fun. I wanted the palette to reflect that journey — calm, soft tones with pops of playful color.

2. Choose a Limited Base Set

I usually pick 5–7 base colors that represent the overall emotional tone. These include:

• A main character color (like a favorite shirt or skin and hair tone)

• A background neutral (soft beige or warm gray)

• A couple of highlight colors (light pink, sky blue)

• A shadow tone (like a muted indigo or navy)
  Having a limited base makes everything feel cohesive — and it speeds up your workflow!

3. Think About Lighting and Shadow

I always include a shadow color and at least two highlight tones in my palette. For this book, I used:

• Multiply layers for shadows with desaturated purples or deep blues

• Add layers for light using pale blues and pinks
  This helps create atmosphere without straying too far from the palette.

4. Keep It Flexible — but Unified

I sometimes introduce small accent colors depending on the scene (like green for plants or red for toys), but I always sample from the original palette to keep things visually consistent. It’s a balance between variety and harmony. Because ‘AreYou Bored?’  was designed to be rather colorful, I used white background and more colorful elements that complement the characters, like toys and books. For the rainbow effect I chose a middle-light value and moved around the color circle to create an additional base-colors palette for background elements.

5. Test with a Sample Scene

Before I commit to a palette, I always test it on a rough version of a scene. Seeing how the colors interact with the character and environment helps me make quick tweaks before applying it across the book.

Bonus: Download My Palette

Want to try out the ‘Are You Bored?’ palette in your own work?

[Download my full color palette here]

It’s great for vivid, character-driven scenes and has enough range for both soft indoor moments and bursts of imagination!

Wrap-Up

Building a palette is like building a visual language for your story. Once it’s in place, everything else starts to fall into rhythm. I hope this post (and the downloadable palette) helps you bring your own stories to life with color.

If you’re curious to see how I applied this palette to a full illustration, check out the time-lapse and breakdown video here:

And if you’re an author looking for an illustrator who brings color and storytelling together, I’d love to hear about your project!