Your initial colors look good, but I'd definitely think about what kind of atmosphere you're trying to create for this game. The current colors are very gentle and soft and peaceful. Which is cool. But from your edit it looks like you want something with more contrast. So I tried to make the colors a little more lively, without destroying the atmosphere they create.



Theres also an unfortunate amount of stray colors everywhere. I think you would have a lot better control of the palette if you merged colors that are nearly indistinguishable.

The problem I see is that you're focusing on the motion of each individual part, the legs, arms, tail, head, and torso. But you're not thinking of the thing as a whole. So while all of those look pretty good, there is a bit of a problem when you see them all together. They don't seem to effect one another. He bobs up and down a little bit, but it doesn't feel like his weight is impacting the ground, his leg never bends to accept the weight of the rest of his body. His torso turns back and forth a little bit, but it doesn't seem to affect where the pivot point of the shoulder is. Another thing, usually when we run we are falling forward and then catching ourselves. So we lean forward. Your guy has a very vertical posture. Overall, I think you're very close to having something that looks really good. Just needs a little more holistic thought.

The approach that has paid off best for me, and the one I have seen used to the greatest effect, is to get a very rough shape animated as a whole. Then, go back and add the details and refinements to it after.

Looking at previous years there's always been about ... 4 or 5 bad santas

Ha ha ha I like that. Maybe just give people who don't submit anything a "bad santa" avatar, a mark of shame. It could be a naughty looking santa and say "I've been a BAD Santa this year"

This is looking really good. Nice work.

In terms of improving it, I definitely think that Decroded is on the right track. The change in the level of detail is what I see as the most important thing. In yours, it felt a little disjointed seeing the foreground with a high amount of detail, and then everything else drops off to the smallest amount of detail, and none of it implies a light source at all. The detail he added to the one side of the river really takes it to the next level.

PypeBros also made a good point. On the whole, it looks kind of pillow shaded, except then you zoom in to see the details. I think it's because on the small scale the shading is all really good. But on the larger scale, there is no variation in the value.

Just as an exercise in shaking up your perception of the piece towards the overall picture vs. the details of it, I've grey-scaled, reduced the color depth, scaled down, and mirrored the image.



I used Decrodeds edit so you can see the difference between his background and your foreground. There is a sort of mono-value band running all along the bottom. Where in the background, there is a large change in value between the regions.

I'm not nearly as skilled as you, so take this with a grain of salt (hyuk hyuk). But you clearly have a handle on how light affects things. It is demonstrated with the log. Maybe try to apply that same process between all the objects in your scene, and not just within them.

Keep up the good work. I think overall your piece has an awesome feel to it.

I really don't recommend you use that animation of mine as reference.
It's very underdeveloped.

Sorry  But I do think there is plenty to take from it, even at this stage.