These next four illustrations I am going to show you are of hybrid animals - poems by Conrad Aiken.
Interpreting what the animals might look like and their action is ordained in the text.
The habitat was left to me. A butterfly had to appear in every one of the thirteen illustrations in the book.
I am no great colourist but trying to get the right colours is all-absorbing - to convey a mood and atmosphere and also to work out different colour combinations.
On the left we mostly have blue and orange with a bit of green at the bottom and small spots of red for the cherry (accentuated by the whiteness of the glass) on one or two fish, and a reverse question mark on the right just above one of the starfish.
On the right we mostly have green, greys and white with a bit of pinky red.
I think limiting the colour palette is often the best way to use colour.