Knoxville children's book illustrator gets a shoutout on 'The Tonight Show'

As a former drummer in a local band, Daniel Wiseman could be described as someone who moves to his own beat.

But after finding his niche as a children’s book illustrator and now author, he evidently has his hand on the pulse of publishers and readers, too.

After several years of working a variety of jobs – including the not-so-inspiring ones of bartending, restaurant serving and telemarketing – he is now enjoying the very satisfying career of getting to be creative in the book world. In fact, his own story might make for a good book, too.

Besides books – including getting to illustrate the recently popular and best-selling book “The World Needs More Purple People” – the Sequoyah Hills author is also drawing some storyboard panels for the new Powell park, Angora Frog Farm.

Based on some tall tales a former property owner used to spin for family about furry frogs, Wiseman said he was approached by the Legacy Parks Foundation after a staff member was talking to the Wisemans' nanny.

“They reached out to me about a storyboard trail,” said Wiseman, who jumped at the idea in part because he loves the outdoors and it is slightly different from book illustrating. “It has been fun. I have written the story and done the panels in sketch form.”

For Wiseman, getting to this spot on his own trail has been quite a journey. After attending Karns High, he enrolled at the University of Tennessee for a semester but felt restless. He was with his band and trying to make a career of it while doing jobs when he started drawing covers for his and other bands’ albums/CDs.

“I realized I could get paid for it,” he said, adding that he was also designing web pages. “I was about 24 or 25 then.”

That led to him and a friend moving to St. Louis in 2009 for an art director’s position. While better than some of his other jobs, he soon found himself bored creating faces for credit cards and websites for clients. “It was not what I expected it to be,” he said with a laugh.

The two quit and started their own marketing agency, but soon an opportunity came to join with some other friends to start a video game company. He was making art and technology for children about the time that he and his wife, Elizabeth, a Farragut High graduate, had their first child, a son.

That naturally led into reading children’s books for his growing family, and he started taking note of the illustrations. After thinking he might like to do that, he researched and realized he needed to build a portfolio and get connected to a literary agency.

In 2016, he started sending out query emails, and within the first few messages, he heard back from a woman at Bookmark Literary.

“She signed me as a client,” he excitedly said of how everything fell into place. “And almost immediately I got a pitch from Simon and Schuster’s Little Simon.”

More pitches and work came, and with bigger advances he was able to eventually leave his video game company job after initially working 80 hours a week trying to do both.

He and his family decided to move back to Knoxville, but right before they did, he received the opportunity to illustrate “The World Needs More Purple People.” Written by Benjamin Hart and Kristen Bell, an accomplished actress who voiced Princess Anna in the Disney hit movie “Frozen,” it reached No. 1 on the New York Times bestseller list.

A highlight for Wiseman came when Bell was promoting the book on “The Tonight Show.” Host Jimmy Fallon complimented the artwork, and Wiseman heard his name mentioned.

“I don’t get to be on these shows but sometimes my name is,” he joked, adding that he draws his illustrations by tracing a stylus on a computer tablet.

His book career has also branched recently into getting to write, including working on a young reader’s graphic novel called “Lunch Buddies,” which deals with a person becoming best friends with a sandwich that comes alive.

Wiseman, who now has a family of five, admitted he is not nearly as confident in his writing as his illustrating, but is enjoying it all. He is amazed at getting to do what he enjoys after years of hard work. And he gets paid for it and gets additional perks like visiting schools to show his books.

“I feel like I’ve spent a long time crafting a career that offers me a quality of life where I don’t have anybody I have to answer to,” he said. “It’s a cool job. And I get to make things that live on after I’m gone.”

This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Knoxville children's book illustrator gets 'Tonight Show' rave