While still at the RA, Palmer began teaching part-time at
Winchester School of Art, where he became a full-time tutor in 1962, and in 1966, the head of the Foundation Department. In 1967, he received his first commission, from the Folio Society, to illustrate
Three Stories by
Herman Melville, which included Palmer's first full-page illustration to
Benito Cereno of the head of Babo, the rebellious slave, on a pike in the market square. The Society commissioned him again in 1971 for
The Destruction of the Jews, by
Josephus, and in 1974 for
Moby Dick, by Melville. Similarly the short-lived Imprint Society in
Barre, Massachusetts, commissioned Palmer to illustrate
H. M. Tomlinson's
The Sea and The Jungle in 1971 and
Benito Cereno, by Melville, in 1972. The motif of the head of Babo on a pole returned, reflecting changes in Palmer's artistic style. Palmer also illustrated
Ship of Sounds,
The Gruffyground Press, 1981 (130 copies), a poem by
John Fuller. Palmer retired from Winchester School of Art in December 1986, thereafter devoting himself full-time to his art. The Old Stile Press, in
Llandogo, persuaded Palmer to return to his
boxwood blocks to illustrate
The Ballad of Reading Gaol, by
Oscar Wilde, in 1994 (225 copies). In February of the same year, Palmer took part in a major examination of art created for
Coleridge's Poem,
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. "The Mariner Imagined, Coleridge's Poem and the Artist, 1831-1994", held at
Lauderdale House,
Highgate Hill, London, also featured works by
David Scott,
Joseph Noel Paton,
Gustave Doré,
Willy Pogany,
David Jones,
Duncan Grant,
Mervyn Peake and
Patrick Procktor. The following November his work was shown in an "Exhibition of Wood Engravings used as Book Illustrations", at Oxford University Club, Halifax House,
Oxford. His next participation was in the "Society of Wood Engravers Touring Exhibition", April 1995 - January 1996. An exhibition at Garden Gallery,
Pallant House,
Chichester,
West Sussex, to mark the forthcoming publication of "LAND", by the Old Stile Press,
Llandogo, December 1995 (240 copies), featured landscape wood engraving in Palmer's "instantly recognizable style" and text by
Eric Williams and soon sold out. Palmer featured in further exhibitions at the "LINE" Gallery,
Linlithgow,
Scotland in January 1996, and Twentieth Century Word Engineering, Exeter City Museums and Art Gallery, February 1997. In November 2012, the
Society of Wood Engravers awarded its 75th Anniversary Prize to Palmer for his ''
chef d'oeuvre'', "Circular Forms", which exists in several editions. He was a
Fellow of the
Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers (retired), the
Society of Wood Engravers associate of the Royal Engravers, the
Royal Society of Painter-Etchers and Engravers (retired), and the
Royal Society of Painter-Printmakers (retired). ==Photography career==