Characters and identity

I felt that the characters I had made for this book were too flat and lacked a feel of crafting. I want the characters to be able to successfully communicate emotion in every page of the book and also be appealing and interesting visually. I have been experimenting with brushes in both Photoshop and Illustrator to try and add another dimension to my illustrations, more depth and a more hand crafted feel. The book is aimed at teaching kids about identity and a feeling of belonging so I need to make sure my illustrations are based around communicating the message in a fun and interesting way. I have been thinking about using the colours on each page to reflect the tone of the scene but the problem is some of the pages are not that clear and feature a range of emotions from different characters and could lead to confusion.

I much prefer these characters now that I have added some texture and shading to them, it seems to have animated them, made them more emotive. I am still having trouble deciding on a skin tone that contrasts with the pink background. The little girl character is supposed to seem slightly apprehensive in this image as she walks through the park with her mother but the blue might make her look sad. I could possible use different colour backgrounds for each page in a double page spread, I will have to try out this idea to see if it breaks up the composition too much. I need to get working on the rest of my pages.