Go back and fix mistakes to develop!

Edit,

Said that because it can get tiring to make a whole new sprite when you want to do something better. If it works for you go ahead

Also, this time do a tree or a house or something.

I'm working on this one's shading mostly, this time I scrapped the shading layers and made a small pallet. I'm having trouble making it three or four colors, though. Here is is so far, thoughts?

I might also pull out something I did at school out of boredom and rework through it; it was a forest scene.

You're still sort of relying on texture, in the sense that, in the example workflow you gave, the black color-ramp alone used like 6 colors if you include the black outlines. Try forcing yourself not to do that, working with only 3 or 4 colors and trying to achieve a cel-shaded look. Focusing just on the stomach-region of the animal, your shading seems to be almost a gradient; you're trying to shade realistically but in reality you're just picking the side of the silhouette closest to the lightsource and then generating a gradient based on what you consider the light end and dark end of the shape. Focus on form; force yourself to draw in terms of concrete lines differentiating the light sections and dark sections, instead of your current wibbly-wobbly attempts to avoid committing to discrete regions with texture and weird almost-dithering techniques.

Consider using less outlines as well. On sprites that small, an outline is a lot of space, so to speak. You can still achieve meaningful separation of regions by making them different in contrast and color, removing the need to use the blunt sledgehammer-like tool that is heavy outlining.

Generally speaking, outlines are part of the work itself, but you seem to be rendering them as if they were separate from the internal coloring- a phenomenon which seems like you're 'afraid' to touch the sacrosanct lineart. Don't be! Lineart is there to help your readability, you don't have to color 'around' the lines or anything. Consider trying some sel-out techniques or even making line-free designs.

Also, I'd recommend you not use NPA tools like luminosity or overlay layers for the moment. Practice working with pure pixel tools; by limiting your own toolset, you restrain yourself in the same way that martial artists might go about their day with training weights. When you get used to limitations, you'll suddenly find that your usage of NPA layers will go from being a crutch you leaned on to a tool that you can utilize to true effectiveness.

(Also, don't be so nervous! It's kind of obvious that you're obsessively formatting your posts and trying to look neat and professional, as if you were presenting yourself in tuxedo to some sort of highly formal event. Don't bother with that, lol. Make yourself comfortable and relax, Pixelation isn't a place with tons of in-group cliques and unspoken rules or anything like that.)

I'll leave the dithering out now, for the time being and see how it works. Do you have any tips for form, though? I will work on the "line blending" (no idea how to put that into words, lol)
I try to look more professional when I first join a site.. I get really nervous on how people will take me so... and especially on a site like this where the majority of the users are older than me.. its really daunting to some extent for me to put my work here...

Edit- Okay, so I went outside my comfort zone and got rid of the lineart and reshaded the entire thing. I'm so glad I did, thanks for the suggestions!

It looks far cleaner and crisp now, probably because I didn't attempt dithering and colored over the lines. Is the form better, just from changing the shading, or will that require redoing the lineart as well? I still think I'm using too many colors too.. but I'm not sure how I can fix that.

If you want to develop as an artist, broaden your efforts towards more than just one kind of animal. It would be best if you did even more than just animals! Do landscapes and humans and vehicles and little objects and all kinds of things.

Also, your colors could use a bit of work. The number of colors you use next to eachother creates an impression of noise, which can look worse than clear shapes. I'll try to pop you an edit when I get on my comp. 

Try focusing less on texturing, and more on form. Your latest sprites seem to be pretty heavily defined by their textures, but when you ignore the noise and look at the underlying shape a lot of it doesn't make sense. For example, the wolf next to the river has a really inconsistent lighting scheme; the torso is seemingly pillowshaded while the legs and tail are shaded as if the lightsource were coming from the left or right of the screen.

Working on pixel-fundamentals would also help. You've got a lot of jaggies in a lot of your lineart; taking the time to make sure your lines are clean and well-made before you go any further would be an extremely easy way to improve your work's quality immensely.

Also, want to show us the process by which you make your sprites? Seeing how you go about that might be helpful.

Okay, thanks! I'll keep that in mind. More consistent shading technique and style, then? I'll also practice on my lines.
I'll make a simple sprite and take screenshots of my process in a moment for you as well. ^^ Thank you!

Edit- Process with this simple guy.



Not exactly sure if that's what you meant, but that's basically my process.