[WIP]Platformer character

[Fuzzymuzzy]

Hey there,

I am new here, and i recently started messing around with pixelart. I am a programmer by trade, and have never really done any artwork or animation myself. But seeing that i got tired of looking at colored blocks in the game prototype that i am building, i decided to finally try my hand at some art creation and animation.

It is currently still very much a WIP that is inspired by the swords n sorcery style of characters.
While I am not yet really happy with the hair and piece of clothing flopping about, i must admit i also do not really know how to improve it. I also tried to add some minor shading but i fear the overall color pallete might be to dark and brownish.

Would love to know what you think of it so far and would greatly appreciate some feedback and possible tips on how to improve on it.

[lpflicke]

I'm very new to pixel art myself so I might be wrong on a some points but I guess critiquing helps and I can also notice a few things.

The contrast on the cloak is quite low, making it hard to read the shapes and the amount of colours increases while it does not dramatically effect it. The hair also only has one shade so I would add a highlight colour to it and maybe shade his right arm(our left).the body also looks a bit split in the middle although doing it differently could be hard on this low resolution.The arm also looks like it's bending behind but its going in front of the body mostly because the arm has no shadow onto the body.As for the animation,Its quite stiff although I don't have enough knowledge to tell you how to fix it. Here is a quick edit though I may have lost the grim, dark feel of it:

[rocifier]

Hey, I think you are trying to do a lot at once here. What is the purpose of the animation?

I suggest maybe refining the character, and adding animation later for specific purposes, eg. idle, shooting magic, walking.

Maybe try analysing an existing style you like, you will discover how to improve certain aspects of the art.

[Fuzzymuzzy]

lpflicke, awesome thanks! Yeah i am still not really sure what to do with the colors, i like the as you described grim, dark look of it but i find that changing up the colors to incorporate a better contrast it quickly looses that feel again. Which is opposite of what i sort of want it to look like.  I have been messing around with adding shade to the hair and making it a larger resolution giving me more freedom with shading, hopefully preventing the cut down the middle problem. I think ill hold off on further animating it so far.
Ill see what i can do and post an update.

Rocifier, thanks! I think you are right as the animation has no real purpose other then making an animation. Ill focus on getting the character right first before going on to animations. So far i have only been looking at sword n sorcery style characters ( which i really like ), would you have any other recommendations of a similar style?