Breakdown of an Illustrators' Salary

What I earned (and lost) in 2023

Hey! Let’s talk about money!

Surface illustrator Jill Labieniec recently shared a wonderful infographic detailing the income/expenses of the first year of her creative business.

It was so insightful and I realized I should try to analyze my own business as a freelance children’s author/illustrator to learn from my successes and failures. Using the data, I could then make a game plan for 2024.

Like most creatives, my career had taken a bit of a turn this year.

Although I was still able to reach my six-figure salary goals, because of industry hiccups within animation and publishing, my main income sources have taken a dip. I’ve relied more heavily on my smaller revenue streams, and also experimented with some new streams too. I also wanted to see just how much money was being burned up by my boring admin subscriptions and my endless art supply hauls expenses.

Since I had just finished up my dreaded end-of-year scramble-to-do-bookkeeping, I had all the data ready to plug into a pie chart and make my own graphics!

(Once I figured out how to use a spreadsheet, that is. Thank you Finance Husband™! <3)

I also realized it would be a good idea to share all this data with you guys. It’s hard to find information on illustration salaries and expenses, and it gets even more complicated when you have all these income streams involved. Although I removed my numbers, I still thought it would be helpful to show my revenue comparisons, all my little insights, and my mess-ups.

Like @dril, I am no finance expert. I am figuring this out as I go!

Let’s go!

OVERVIEW

I’m going to start with an overview of my overall finances in 2022, compared to 2023. We’ve got my income, taxes, and expenses:

I earned a lower gross income than usual in 2023, largely because I was seeing significantly less money from book advances (almost 40% less!). I tried to make up for it via my various side income streams, which I will discuss below, but I still fell short of reaching what I earned in 2022.

However!

As you can see from my chart, my expenses were huge in 2022; more than double what I spent in 2023. This was largely due to the BIG spending involved when doing conventions and travel; something that I didn’t take part in in 2023. Because of the high expenses, in the end, my net incomes for 2023 and 2022 were roughly the same.

My taxes take a big chunk of my income, but it’s not as bad as it could be because I am incorporated! There are a lot of benefits that come with running your freelance business as a corporation rather than a sole proprietor, but my main reason is for the tax benefits hehe. It’s a bit of a headache at first to figure out, but a great accountant can make it a lot easier to manage.

The Importance of Diversifying Income Streams

As a picture book author/illustrator, I consider my advances (the payment I receive for working on books) to be my main career and source of income. However, like most of my colleagues, 2023 had been a bit of a rough year in publishing. I saw a huge decrease in the number of offers I was receiving from clients, and as mentioned above, I earned 30% less in book advances in 2023.

I went into 2023 knowing the industry was in a rocky place because of the post-COVID economy, and so I tried my best to focus on various other income streams for support.

My perspective on multiple revenue streams is that it is extremely important if you work as a freelancer, especially if the work you do isn’t always coming in consistently.

Having multiple streams is a safety net; if I’m not getting as many picture book projects in one year I can still rely on my backups to keep me afloat financially. The whole, don’t put all your eggs into one basket thing.

People ask me how I can juggle all these projects/income streams.

1. I have ADHD and have no work boundaries

2. Working smarter, not harder.

I think the important thing is that one or two of the streams should be passive (usually a big amount of effort once that can keep being reused for infinity); something like:

• Licensing an illustration repeatedly

• Royalties from books

• Affiliate links & Ad revenue

• Digital downloads

And if not fully passive, try to find ways to reuse and repurpose previously created work as well:

1. Creating art for one project

2. Turning that art into merch (stickers, as well as prints, as well as bookmarks etc)

3. Sharing the behind-the-scenes process on various social media sites. A longer timelapse for Youtube, a short clip for Tiktok, a single image post for Instagram.

4. The full breakdown and downloadable file on Patreon

It’s all about finding ways to work smarter, not harder.

It will take some trial/error to figure out what revenue streams are worth it in relation to how much money they make AND the time they consume.

I have tried and given up many work avenues (remember my Twitch stream?) so I’m no stranger to ‘failure; you eventually figure out what works best for you and your system.

INCOME

I’m mostly going to focus on 2023, but I wanted to first share some insights on my 2022 chart:

1. As noted, my book advances are much higher here. In 2022 I worked on three picture book projects, one board book, one graphic novel anthology, and one cover.

2. I tabled/presented at conventions! I did TCAF (Local) and Lightbox Expo (LA) in 2022; both very profitable shows, but had huge expenses involved, especially since I had to pay for flights/lodging for an assistant too. I didn’t do any cons in 2023 because I was busy with projects, but I hope to stick with local shows in 2024 to try to save a bit with the travel expenses.

Now I’ll briefly go over each of my income streams in 2023 (highest to lowest):

Book Advances

In 2023 I worked on two book projects (and had wrapped up on Lost Stick in Jan). I also started a board book, but haven’t been paid my signing fee yet. This is the fewest number of books that I have ever worked on in a year in my career, and it’s mostly because I switched to traditional media. Trad is way more labor intensive for me than digital art, and so I didn’t have the bandwidth to take on more projects (not that anyone was asking me for work lol).

Fewer projects = less money, but my priority right now is focused on the art creation/perfect results so I’m fine to take a pay cut here in the name of art.

squidward gets it

Another thing to note is that I haven’t been paid in full for all these books; I get paid in multiple installments. This is usually 25% on signing the contract, 50% on sketch delivery and 50% on final. Because it takes so long to work on a book, most of the money from my current books are paying me in 2022 or 2024; it just worked out that way.

Royalties

This includes royalties from my picture books, new translation/licensing deals, and the Public Lending Right program (a great program for Canadian authors/illustrators!)

This is 100% passive income, and I was quite surprised by how high this number was this year. Only recently have royalties become a solid part of my income.

Remember, you only start to earn royalties after your book earns enough to ‘pay back’ the initial advance the publisher paid you.

Out of the forty book projects I have worked on, only half of them are ‘qualified’ for royalties. The other books were work-for-hire contracts; either they were negotiated when I had my first agent or they don’t earn royalties as a rule, like book covers or IP projects.

And after nine years of this career, only three books have actually earned out their advance so I could start getting royalties.

These books are:

Kid Scientists: A non-fiction chapter book which is part of a successful series with multiple translations.

I Am Perfectly Designed: A celebrity book project

Bilal Cooks Daal: An award-winner!

I am really hoping that That’s Not My Name! earns out next year (fingers crossed!) but it might take a bit of time and luck. It is very rare for picture books to earn out, which is why it is so important to not rely on the promise of royalties, and instead negotiate for as high of an advance as you can.

My dream goal is to work on enough earned-out books that I can rely on royalty income alone, but that might be a decade or two down the line haha

Author Visits

School visits are a very new venture for me, not only because COVID restrictions stopped any in-person visits for a few years. But generally, schools seem to prefer to bring in authors to visit instead of illustrators. It baffles me since an illustrator brings 50% (or more!) of the work to create a picture-book, but also because children love the arts and could be so inspired by a visiting illustrator.

So it wasn’t until the publication of my author debut in 2022 that I finally started getting invites for visits. I signed up for a profile on Authors Booking, a great service I recommend to all my Canadian authors/illustrators. That autumn in 2022, I went to four schools and also did one Schoolism webinar, so my author visit income was quite low.

But once my book was nominated for the Blue Spruce award, I became the hot topic and was overwhelmed with visit requests for 2023.

Overall, I did 31 visits last year.

This was a combination of:

• Mostly in-person visits

• A few virtual talks

• School visits (Kindergarten to Grade 5)

• Guest lectures & portfolio reviews at Universities

Although I give the same standard presentation, I wouldn’t consider this ‘passive’ income. An in-person visit replaces a working freelance day, even when it’s just a half-day visit. I travel up to 90 minutes to visit the schools so it would eat up my morning and I’d be clonked out when I got home.

Although these visits were a big chunk of my income in 2023, I think they will play a much smaller part in 2024. My book is ‘old news’ now so I’m not seeing as many visit requests. In any case, I am trying to be more selective of my time and will only stick with the more profitable (but less requested) full-day visits or the more convenient virtual visits.

2022 Tax Refund

I debated including this in my chart since it’s not technically income, but it’s still money in my pocket so I added it in for some business insight lol.

As a corporation, I pay quarterly taxes that are determined by my estimated income for the year (I usually base it on my earnings from the previous year). 2021 was a hugely profitable year for me (because of my author/illustrator deal and the Target collab), and unfortunately, my 2022 income didn’t match it. I paid way more tax than I should have, and so I got a nice refund in 2023.

Since my 2023 gross income was lower than in 2022, I expect another chunky refund this year.

Patreon

Patreon is a partly active and partly passive income. It is a subscription service where ‘patrons’ can pay a monthly fee for exclusive access to a creator’s content. With 80 patrons, I had two tiers in 2023.

The lower-priced tier was dedicated to sharing Early Access to my YouTube videos, BTS of my general illustration work, a podcast, timelapses, and life updates. The higher tier was focused on children’s illustration; providing secret sneak peeks into current book projects, work drama, and a monthly Q&A.

To keep the Patreon sustainable, I tried to ‘repurpose’ material whenever I could. I wasn’t making new downloadables and stickers to mail out; I was sharing my thoughts on a project that I had to do for my job anyway. Or posting a full unedited video of a sped-up Tiktok process video. The time commitment was about 3-4 days of work per month.

I loved my Patreon, but sadly had to end it late last year. As a perfectionist, I felt so much pressure to give high-quality work every month and felt so worried that I was ‘wasting’ people’s money with content that wasn’t worth their payments, even though my patrons were so kind and insisted they were happy with my Patreon.

I kept trying to find ways to make the workload easier, but with my current intensive book projects, it was unmanageable and had to end it. Maybe one day I will reopen it, or maybe have a paid tier on Substack instead. I will sorely miss the income that Patreon brought, but will try to focus on Youtube as a replacement in 2024.

Misc Illustration

I haven’t been actively cold-emailing and submitting for general illustration these days, so this number is pretty low.

In 2023 I worked on a commissioned podcast album cover and a puzzle for Crocodile Creek. The puzzle has a royalty benefit, so hopefully this turns into passive income!

Youtube Adsense

This is partially passive income. Creating YouTube videos does take a huge amount of initial work, but once it is posted I can receive ongoing ad revenue from future views. However, because the Algorithm controls all, the number is dependent on how active I am and how consistently I post. The Algo loves to punish its creators :’)

On a good month, I could see up to $500 CAD (pre-tax), though these days it’s closer to $150-$200. I earned 42% less in Adsense in 2023 because I was posting videos sporadically. Hopefully, a more consistent posting schedule in 2024 will change that!

Gallery Sales

Passive Income. Although I closed my online store in 2021, I still have some online sales via a partnership with Gallery Nucleus. They sell select prints of my work, as well as original paintings. I see a percentage of the sales (I think 50% for originals and 30% for prints).

Animation Freelance

I work as a freelance character development artist, being brought in during the blue sky phase to figure out the potential character style of a TV show (usually preschool). Most people are aware that the animation industry is not in a good place right now, so work has been very limited for the past two years. In 2023, I received one costume design assignment from Disney Jr. I actually did too good of a job and we finalized the design quickly (and wrapped up much earlier than I had hoped since I was being paid hourly haha).

I’m not counting on much animation work in 2024 either.

Book Sales

For my author visits, the schools have the option to hold a book sale for personalized/signed copies. Not all schools agree to it, so the number isn’t too high, but it’s a nice low-effort income source and a replacement for my previous convention sales.

Because I get an author discount of 50% when I order a crate of books from my publisher, I get a much larger profit when selling my own books than I would from bookstore/online sales.

Affiliate Commissions

Passive income. I will include affiliate links at the bottom of my youtube videos for my favorite studio products and discount links for Domestika and Flexispot. When people purchase a product using the link, I get a tiny commission. I really slacked off on it this year (forgetting to update my links and promote them) so this was a teeny income source in 2023, about $105. However, this is where my chart came in handy!

I realized I earned $850 in commissions in 2022! I had no idea lol. Nothing to sneeze at, especially since it was 100% passive. In 2024 I’m going to focus more heavily on my affiliate links and make sure they are all active and promoted, and try to aim for an ad sponsor.

EXPENSES

Unfortunately, you have to spend money to make money. Thankfully, most of it is tax-deductible.

I already mentioned that my expenses in 2022 were enormous, almost 60% more than 2023!

1. This is largely because of my conventions. For cons, I have to pay for the table ($250-$600), the merchandise, flights (for two), hotels and uber rides.

2. My art supplies had some big expenses including a new camera, lens and tripod.

3. I was renting out a downtown studio space in 2022; at the end of the year I moved to a home office in the suburbs. I haven’t calculate my 2023 home office expenses yet so they are not included but I imagine they’d still be less than my Toronto rent haha

Let’s quickly go over my expenses in 2023

Competition Fees

Entry fees for the Society of Illustrators Original Art Show and the AOI Illustration Competition.

Car Mileage

Gas/mileage/toll fees for my school visits

Education

Anything from online classes, workshops, books, museum trips, application fees for residencies etc. This included an Indian Miniature Painting course I took in the summer.

Travel

No travel this year. I was invited to see a NASA satellite launch this past October as part of an influencer event (!!!!) but I had to cancel last minute because of scheduling conflicts. I paid partially for my flight here since I couldn’t get a full refund :(

Merch/Book Orders

The cost of buying the wholesale books from my publisher

Office Subscriptions

Adobe (I am so mad that I forgot to cancel my annual subscription renewal last week ARGHHH), Quickbooks, Google Workspace & Apple iCloud Storage

Art Supplies

All my painting supplies, notebooks, etc. Spent a decent amount this year because my books have been all traditional.

Professional Fees

Accountant, professional photographer

Home Office Fees

Not included above. I would calculate this based off of the square footage of the studio room in my house. This includes Electricity, rent and wifi.

Taxes

My quarterly corporate taxes, as well as my employee payroll tax (since I pay myself a separate smaller salary).

MY GAME PLAN FOR 2024

Whew! That was a lot of info. I hope this was somewhat insightful in what my workload and finances are like.

Some of you guys might already be aware that I am taking a hiatus in 2024; I have been continuously working with the grind mentality for years, and after saving up for a bit I feel like I need a reset. After Salt Princess wraps up in the end of January, I am not planning to take on any work projects until at least October.

I kind of want to treat this as a ‘gap year’ and focus on artistic development, and my personal life.

I plan to take classes, promote Lost Stick, develop an online course, do some traveling, focus on YouTube, experimental painting, and develop the pitches for my next picture books.

Because of this, my game plan will look quite different for this year. I will mostly focus on passive income streams.

1. School/University visits. Either full-day or virtual, to maximize my time

2. Consistently post YouTube videos with promoted affiliate links.

3. Following the above; try to get a brand deal or sponsorship!

4. Potentially develop an illustration course with the goal of passive income.

5. Local conventions only!

I would love to hear what your game plans are like for this year :)

This will be a little experimental year, but I’m so excited to see what 2024 has in store for us!

-A