I like it a lot. Good details for such a small piece while still very readable.

Well, the underbelly's good, I think, but the carapace... how can I do smooth on a pixelart this big without being too empty?

This isn't the sprite for the actual in-game, it's more the pixel art of the beast in a cut scene moments prior to fighting him. He's intended to take up a large chunk of the screen and I'll stick him in the screen size, put the character in front of him, facing him, just for some dramatic size contrast. As for vector art: I wish, at least it wouldn't have taken me an hour and a half to get his shape good to me. [I'll be honest, I sorta cheated and used the fill tool, but I like to think it's fair game] Most of the actual time was spent tweaking individual parts of the lines so I didn't get overly noticeable and nasty jags.

I'll keep looking for things to study texture from, but man oh man have I got high hopes for this beasty.

I'm not too particular about C&C here, I made it more to experiment with a different style. It's fun to make.

For one, you need to finish that trunk. Another is that your tree needs more depth variation. Outside my house are two oak trees, and they're now perfectly round and lush.