Friend was talking about big belt buckles so I decided to give her a laugh. If I put him in a fighting game he would be able to use it like captain america's shield and maybe it would have a laser beam thing going when he poses like that.

Did you mean his left hand or the hand on the left side on the pic?

his left hand. Reminds me of an urban myth about doctors amputating the wrong limb. I think they use fancy latin words for left and right side of the patients body to prevent that sort of mixup. 

it's too soon any time earlier so forget about extra shades posters and Helm's compromises, just animate.

Doh, I followed up on Helm's advice before reading your post. I realized  "I want to get better at pixel art" contradicts with "my work is good enough", so that argument is in the rubbish bin now. I don't think I did it right but I hope it's a step in the right direction. I can see a comprimise though. It would be easier to animate with block colors like the first version then make a second pass addingl the texture work.





I appreciate your advice guys.  Every so often what I thought was a 8 out of 10 turns out to be much less when I realized what else is out there.  I will be animating this, Camus, but first I'm gonna finish my entry for Adam's contest.

About the edits being too dependent on the outlines, that's my fault. The orignal line art was drawn before I learned how to build things up from simple forms like spheres and cylinders. It would be impossible to give believable shading to something that was drawn like a cut out doll to begin with. 

Thanks for the encouragement guys. Mercury, I do agree about the sprite needing a few more shades. I'm gonna start experimenting with 5 to 6 rather than only 4. It would also help out when trying to pull off the illusion of depth.  I felt so good about this one I've decided on my forum avatar.