Ornust, stop saying "newb" or I'm giving you a strike. For serious. It's getting really, really annoying. Also, this picture doesn't even have any highlights to speak of, though it could use "more shading," but I'm not sure you could be more vague.
miscdude - How you used 57 colors on 4 color ramps is a source of wonder for me. At first glance your image appears to have no more than 12 colors and unnecessarily thick outlines. Beyond that, the construction of the character is confusing and arbitary. One arm has an elbow, the other doesn't. No fingers, cuz you got lazy. Each leg is a different thickness, each foot a different size. His eyes aren't centered on his head, and his hair is assymetrical and oddly constructed.
But back to this business of colors. Let's think about what you've got going on here. Essentially you have:
1 - skin - shadow, mid, high
2 - shirt - shadow, mid, high
3 - jeans - shadow, mid high
4 - hair/shoes - shadow, mid, high
outline
So that's 13 actual shades you're using. What are the other FOURTY FOUR colors for??? Your work actually decreased in quality from Step 3 to Step 5. Your image only got muddier and more blurry. Go back to step 3, and think about colors and hue shifting, think about contrast, think about the forms of your figure. When you've done a really bangup job at stage 3, THEN, if you want to go nutso and AA the crap out of it...be my guest. But I think you'll find that you're reluctant to put giant black blurry outlines all over your nicely shaded painting at that point!
