She's very attached to her tree

[Neev]

This started off as just a doodle of the girl and the tree, so lack of planning is partially to blame for some of the issues of composition - but don't let that stop you from ripping into them! All in all, this is mostly an experiment in terms of style (the thick linework) and coloring (tried the whole "greyscale shading, colors on top" method and WOW WHY DIDN'T I DO THAT SOONER?).

I plan to continue working on this with some deeper shadows and more rendering on the central tree, but I would love to get some feedback before I proceed.

[TinyBird]

She? I have to say that's physically a man (like there's no way that none of the shape of the breast would show from that angle, unless she's also ten years old which I seriously doubt considering the proportions). Also the forearms seem to vary in length, and I'm not sure how comfortable or plausible would that pose in a tree like that would even be.
Also the tree looks very flat and un-tree-y (more like resembling a coral of some sort), and the placement of the branches considering the character's limbs don't seem to properly combine with the way the hair strands are positioned. Overall this has a pretty unreferenced look.

EDIT: Also if you want to show how attached she is to the tree (as in, emotionally), then having other expression than scowling cross-eyed (at least to me it looks like so) might work better. And if she's attached physically, then I'd exaggerate that to drive the point better home.

[Heyriel]

Agreeing with *TinyBird, I also think that the bulge right over her right elbow (leading to the hand with which she's grabbing the branch, facing right -outside-) is too extreme. At least when I feel up my arm it's mostly bone there, and the muscle would be facing the viewer and not be as noticable (if that makes any sense at all xD ).

[Caelan]

I'm probably in the minority in this, but while I think she could be more feminine, there are plenty of individuals who are physically way more androgynous than anything, so it is up to you how you want her to read. I think if you wanted her to read as female more strongly, then shrinking her feet and hands would be the easiest solution, as well as keeping in mind to make her skin look soft (more fat distribution) more so than hard when rendering.

I think your composition could easily be improved just by changing the crop; either find a way to justify her not being smack dab in the center, or perhaps try reframing this as a vertical composition, which might serve to exaggerate the height of the trees and give a sense of being higher up.

[Neev]

Thank you all for the comments, they're very helpful! Definitely a lot of stuff to work on.

I was wondering, could anyone offer any comments/critique on the coloring and shading? I have a lot of trouble with lighting and while I know that reference is (as always) the key, it's often difficult to find reference for specific lighting conditions and things like that. Likewise, while I'm familiar with the basics of color theory, I often feel kinda lost when it comes to colors.

Also, any thoughts on the thick outline? It was a deliberate choice (normally I default to thinner lines) just as an experiment and I'm not sure how well it worked.

[TinyBird]

I was wondering, could anyone offer any comments/critique on the coloring and shading?

Well, the shading is pretty random and not very consistent, you seem to have different lightsources for the hair and the body and the main lightsource seems to be coming from above and from the side, yet some things (like the top of the character's head) are not lit at all. There's little else that you can do but work from life, get refs, even if you have to shoot them by yourself or make a little sculpey/plasticine maquette and learn the structure of what you're drawing.
Same goes for the colours, you seem to have strong yellow light and blue shadows, but the surroundings don't seem to follow the same (a random saturated light character in an otherwise foggy and gray swamp). Overall also the values are pretty middle-toned, and it's kinda hard to separate the character from the background (especially if you remove the black lineart) and though middle toned values might be reasonable for such a foggy scene, it doesn't really follow the way you have coloured the character to have saturated lights.

As for the lineart, I'd say your problem is more in the line control and the fact that the lineart is just one isolated part of the image, thus separating and flattening the character/tree from all the other trees, and it doesn't help either that the lined part is cropped so that it continues over the frame. If more things in the frontground were inked, it could make the transition to the painted background work better.