Suy?

[Indigo]

I had some extra time today...



Just a quickie.  It looked kinda similar to Helm's 'YUS!' character, so i decided this one is his confused brother.    I got lazy near the end with the background and such, but it works for what it is.  C+C is allways appreciated.

[Cow]

Hah. I just started something that looks exactly like this today too [same shape, lightsource, etc]. Except it was facing the opposite direction and wasn't supposed to look like the  bird, but I suppose it did. It's on the computers at school, I'll upload it tomorrow.

But anyways,

I really like it. It has character. Even though it is cartoony, I'd suggest bringing his left eye more towards his beak. Colors are quite nice. Dithering looks kinda... messy in certain areas... the part under his left eye stands out the most. I don't really like the dithering on the foreground[ish] leaves, I think it would be improved by leaving that a solid color. The rest of the dithering looks quite nice.

[Xion]

lol. Awesome. I was thinking of doing something like this, only with a "Naw!" But suY? is much better.
Critaqz:
The hilight on the underside of the upper beak looks wierd...like it's licking its "lips."
The yellow hilight on top of the wing (and head) is too harsh.
The way the body hits the back neck at a 45 degree angle then suddenly goes up then back to 45 makes that spot look lumpy. It wouldn't look so odd if the shadow of the feather didn't look like it was part of the back.
As you said , the bg is wonky and doesn't suit the rest of the image.
The branch gets wider as it goes away from the (trunk?)...? Not only that, but it goes up. Shouldn't the weight drag it down?
...Yus, that's it. .ti s'taht ,suY?

[Indigo]

mccow28:
i'll play around with the things you mentioned.  You certainly are right about the messy dithering in areas.  This is a result of my copy-ing and pasting large portions of dithering and not being too concerned of where it lines up to.  I'll definitely clean up those areas.  As far as the foreground leaves go, originally it was flat-shaded, but looked too plain.  Now it looks a bit too cluttered.  I'll try to find a happy median.
 
xion Night:
heh, harsh critique compared to what I'm used to.  A lot of it I don't agree with too much.  (nothing against you of course, let me explain)
 
areas you mention such as the underside of the upper beak, the wing edge highlight, and the head edge highlight don't look too harsh on my screen.  I have a two monitor setup here and looked at it on both a CRT and LCD and seems fine.  If someone else confirms your observations, I'll look into this some more.
 
you are right about the lumpy back issue.
 
and the BG overall i think compliments the piece.  I used complimentary colours (such as the red and green) to pull this piece together. Also used the background to guide the eye directly to the areas of the image I want using various contrast, line, and hue techniques.  Anyway, point being that I think it suits the piece, but it could still use some work for sure.
 
as for the branch, they are quite random in nature.  Its like saying grass is green, the sky is blue, but in reality there is much much more to them.  The human brain perceives generalities, and not actualities.  In this case, the tree branch is generally perceived how you describe, but in often cases it is not.  Check this image for example...
 

 
there are areas where the branch actually gets wider upon leaving the trunk.  Also note there are areas where the branch curves up instead of down. I'll go ahead and play around with the shape of the branch though to try to get it to flow more.
 
thanks once again guys, i'll post an update some time soonish