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What is Made Live and how does it help children’s book authors?

Made Live is a specialized platform designed specifically to meet the needs of children’s picture book authors. Our all-in-one solution helps authors seamlessly manage the entire book creation process – from initial concept to print-ready files. You can write, collaborate with artists and illustrators, design your book layouts, and prepare professional-quality book files all in one place. Whether you’re creating your first book or your fifteenth, Made Live provides all the tools and support you need to bring your story to life.

Can I use Made Live for visual books that aren’t children’s books?

While Made Live is particular popular with children’s book authors, our platform is perfect for any visual storytelling project. Besides picture books, authors can use Made Live to create graphic novels, comic books, coffee table books, cookbooks, poetry, art books and portfolios, educational picture books for older readers, or young adult illustrated novels. Ultimately, any project where visuals and text must work together seamlessly can be brought to life with Made Live’s tools and features.

How is Made Live different from other book creation platforms?

Made Live is the only platform custom-built specifically for visual book creation, offering a complete solution that takes you from initial concept to final publication. Unlike general publishing tools, our platform understands that creating a visual book requires a unique approach where text and images work together from day one. We’ve integrated every tool you need into one seamless workspace – from visual-first writing and planning tools to professional illustration management and print preparation. Made Live Assist, our AI companion, provides project-specific guidance throughout your journey, while our expert support team offers personalized feedback at each stage. Instead of piecing together multiple platforms and hoping they work together, Made Live gives you everything you need in one place, specifically designed for visual storytelling success.

Do I need any special technical skills or software to use Made Live?

Not at all! Made Live is designed to be intuitive and user-friendly. If you can use basic word processing software, you can use Made Live. Our platform runs in your web browser – no downloads or installations are required. Plus, we provide step-by-step tutorials and personalized support to help you at every stage.

Can I try Made Live before subscribing?

Yes! We offer a 7-day free trial that gives you full access to all platform features. You can create your first project, explore our tools, and even start collaborating with illustrators – all before making any commitment. No credit card required to start.

What support will I receive as a new user?

From day one, you’ll have access to onboarding guidance, optional live chat during business hours, video tutorials, and comprehensive help documentation and guides. Plus, our dedicated support team has extensive experience in children’s book publishing ready to help with both technical and creative questions.

What kinds of books can I create with Made Live?

Made Live supports a variety of highly visual book formats and styles including picture books for all ages, graphic novels and comics, educationally-based illustrated books, art books and portfolios, cook books, coffee table books, and books of poetry. Our platform offers professional-grade tools and optional layouts to suit any visual storytelling project, allowing you to meet the industry-standard specifications required for your unique book.

How does the book creation process work?

Creating your book using Made Live follows a streamlined workflow:
* Start with your book idea and begin planning your story
* Use that plan to write and edit your amazing manuscript
* Add spread breaks and page turns, comments, and illustration notes to your manuscript for clarity
* See your story come to life visually with one-click transfer from Manuscript to Storyboard mode
* Create and customize your book formatting and page layouts to support your story
* Refine your book’s structure and page turns for more impact
* Update your manuscript text and placement alongside visual elements
* Generate custom placeholder images or choose from thousands of pre-made sketches to test visual layouts
* Collaborate with illustrators or artists and add visuals
* Design and refine your book’s visual elements
* When you’re ready, prepare your files for print or digital distribution with popular third-party distributors.

Our intuitive software platform guides you with personalized recommendations and support through each step, and our support team here to help.

How long does it take to create a book?

Project timelines vary depending on your book’s complexity, length, illustration needs, and the time you have available to commit to your project. A typical 32-page children’s picture book, created with Made Live, can be ready to publish in as little as 90 days from concept to print-ready files. Made Live helps streamline the entire process by providing personalized, project-specific guidance and support from start to finish, offering customizable and easy to use formatting tools, facilitating smoother and easier collaboration with illustrators, automating technical specifications, and simplifying the file preparation process.

Authors can complete projects even faster with tools like Made Live Assist to get custom feedback and direction on their project.

What illustration options are available for my book?

Made Live offers a versatile approach to handling illustrations in your book project.

Planning & Visualization Tools
* AI-generated placeholder images to help plan layouts and your book’s visual flow
* Storyboarding tools for planning illustration and text placement on pages and spreads
* Layout templates and guidance with industry-standard image specifications required by third-party printers and distributors
* Visual guidelines for illustration sizing and position

Working with Illustrations
* Easily upload and integrate professionally-created illustration files
* Collaborate with your chosen illustrator, with clear and comprehensive visuals to help you achieve your illustration goals
* Import artwork and illustrations in standard image file formats
* Maintain image quality and color accuracy
* Precise positioning and scaling tools

Please note: Made Live provides the option to use AI to generate placeholder images. These are intended to be help facilitate layout planning and collaboration with your illustrator and are for visualization and planning purposes only. AI-Generated images should not be used as final illustrations for your published book. This due to legal reasons, copyright limitations, and to support our goal of helping every author create the most professional-looking book illustrated book possible. For creating your book, Made Live recommends:
* working with professional illustrator, graphic designer, or artist
* using our platform’s available tools to improve communication and streamline the illustration process
* ensuring all artwork is original and human-made to support copyright claims

What design and layout tools are available?

Made Live offers professional-grade design tools that are both powerful and easy to use including drag-and-drop editing for text and illustrations, typography controls, built-in visual guides, image placement and scaling tools, trim-size specific bleed and margin guides, and interactive preview mode to view changes in real time. All tools are optimized for visual storytelling and publishing industry standards.

Can I import existing work or do I have to start from scratch?

Made Live supports the creation of books whether you’re a brand new author starting from scratch or you have a work-in-progress to finish. Simply import your existing manuscript and upload any artwork and illustrations to get started, or create a project from scratch. We do recommend all authors add information in the Planning workspace, though, as this helps the software provide better directions and guidance for your book. Made Live makes it easy for you to take the next steps in your self-publishing journey, regardless of where you start.

Can I work with my own illustrator or artist?

Absolutely! Made Live provides the option of using pre-loaded placeholder sketches or creating your own AI-Generated placeholder illustrations. This helps you visualize different text and illustration layouts, art styles, and facilitates better communication with your illustrator as you share your vision. Simply download and share PDFs of your work-in-progress with your illustrator and replace old images with new illustrations when they’re ready. Whether you’re working with a first-time illustrator or a seasoned professional, Made Live helps maintain clear and open communication for more efficient workflows.

In the future, we look forward to offering real-time teaming and collaboration features and permissions to allow you to work with your illustrator directly within the Made Live platform.

Can multiple people work on the same project?

Made Live currently allows single-user access to each individual project. This means that a single user account must be created to manage and update each project.

In the future, we look forward to offering additional collaboration features to allow multiple users to work collaboratively on the same project in real time. Sign up for our newsletter for updates and stay tuned for new releases and feature updates.

What sharing and review options are available?

Made Live’s self-publishing software allows users to download and export their projects from the Manuscript and Storyboard workspaces. This allows you to share your work-in-progress with beta readers, editors, illustrators, and anyone else collaborating on your project.

In the future, we look forward to offering more comprehensive teaming options and accounts to allow you to receive feedback in real-time within the Made Live platform. Sign up for our newsletter to stay informed of new releases and features.

Who owns the rights to my book?

When you create your book with Made Live, you retain 100% of the rights to your book. Made Live does not claim any ownership over your project, manuscript, or uploaded and original illustrations. Authors maintain complete creative control over where and how their book is published, along with ownership of all files and assets created using the Made Live platform. This provides authors with the freedom to use their work across any platform or medium, as they so choose. Made Live is simply the platform or tool authors use to create books.

What are my publishing options?

Made Live was built to guide and support aspiring authors like you to prepare professional-quality illustrated books for self-publishing. Books written, illustrated, and designed using Made Live are created from the beginning to ensure you can self-publish distribute your book with major third-party publishing platforms like IngramSpark and Amazon KDP.

Users with aspirations of traditionally publishing their stories will still benefit from Made Live’s story planning and manuscript development tools.

How do I get my book ready for printing and publishing?

We encourage authors to “start with the end in mind”. This means planning ahead to know where and how you’d like to publish from early on the process so you can avoid costly and frustrating mistakes. Made Live builds your publishing plans into the DNA of each book project and streamlines book printing and distribution with:
* automated print specification checking
* built-in color management tools
* industry-standard and printer-specific bleed and margin set up
* print-ready PDF generation

Made Live ensures your files meet professional printing standards set forth but industry partners.

Can I make changes after publishing?

Yes! When you choose to self-publish your book, you can make changes to your project at any time. Your project remains fully editable and exportable within Made Live as long as you maintain an active account and subscription.

What’s included in the free trial of the Self-Publishing Software?

Our free trial gives you full access to all core features of our Self-Publishing Software for 7 days. You can create projects, experiment with layouts, upload or generate illustrations, and experience the complete visualization tools. The only limitation is that you cannot publish or export final files until upgrading to a paid plan. No credit card is required to start your trial.

How does pricing differ between the Self-Publishing Software and the Self-Publishing Club?

The Self-Publishing Software is our standalone platform available through monthly ($29 USD) or annual subscription plans ($290 USD).

The Self-Publishing Club is our premium offering that includes 12 months of software access and our 12-week guided program with expert coaching, cohort community support, and specialized training modules, regularly priced at $797. The SPC is priced at a higher tier to reflect the personalized guidance and community aspects.

Can I upgrade from the software subscription to the Self-Publishing Club?

Absolutely! Many authors start with our software and later join the Self-Publishing Club when they’re ready for more structured guidance. Current software subscribers receive priority application consideration for the Club and can apply the value of their remaining subscription toward their Club enrollment fee.

Is there a long-term commitment required?

Our Self-Publishing Software is available as either a monthly subscription with no long-term commitment or an annual plan with a significant discount. The Self-Publishing Club is a one-time payment covering the full 12-week group program with either six- or twelve-month software access, depending on the option selected.

What payment methods do you accept?

We accept both Visa and Mastercard for software subscriptions, coaching fees, or Club enrollment.

What is your refund policy?

For the Self-Publishing Software, refunds are considered on a case-by-case basis for annual subscriptions. Monthly subscriptions can be canceled anytime but are not eligible for refunds.

For the Self-Publishing Club, we offer a 100% refund if you withdraw no later than 7 calendar days after the date of the first live session, minus a $25 processing fee. Requests submitted more than 7 calendar days after the first live session (but before the third live session) will be eligible for a 50% refund, minus a $25 process fee. No refunds will be issued for requests submitted after the third live session.

Is there a difference in pricing based on the type of illustrated book I’m creating?

No, our pricing is consistent regardless of whether you’re creating a children’s picture book, graphic novel, comic, or illustrated poetry collection. All our plans give you access to specialized templates and features for different visual book formats at no additional cost.

What if I need help?

Our goal is to empower every author who has a dream of publishing with the tools and information they need to bring their book dreams into reality. The Made Live platform integrates information about your unique book project alongside a robust knowledge base and information about publishing and self-publishing best practices to provide authors with the most robust, personalized book feedback and guidance possible. At any point in your book journey, check out Made Live Assist in the Made Live app for advice, tips and tricks, or guidance on your next steps.

We’re building and expanding available video tutorials, webinars, and additional training opportunities. Make sure to sign up for our newsletter for more information.

If you need additional support or assistance, don’t hesitate to create a support ticket right in the app or reach out to our support team at support (at) made (dot) live.