Welcome to pixelation!
Absolutely ignore Corsair's whole post. No wood grain would be visible at this size, that is preposterous.
Finally, as far as critique or feedback goes, it might just be because I am tired but I can hardly bring myself to type all of the same things over again, so you're gonna get the condensed version
1 - don't work on white
2 - think about the shape, the REAL shape of what you're trying to render
3 - think about how light would hit it - is it reflective? matte?
4 - don't color your outlines like its a coloring book
5 - choose an interesting viewing angle
6 - don't use angles where curves are needed
You can find all this and more in the maaaaassive tutorials thread in our general forum. It has all sorts of great stuff including pixel technique-specific things for advanced users, but also tons of general art tutorials for beginners.
Finally, I hate to be the one to break this to you, but sky pirates have been done, and done, and done, and done. They are still awesome, don't get me wrong, but sky pirates is old news!
