Astrid Portrait

This kinda took a long time. But, it's DONE!

This is my 3rd serious Digital Painting. I think I've improved a lot with my digital paintings.

I'm happy with how this turned out overall. I really like how smooth the colors ended up. (Though I am guilty of using the smudge tool on the hair and feathers...)
Alt+Click made everything go SO MUCH FASTER. OH MY GOSH.
Best hotkey EVER. I also like how the eyes turned out, I'm finally starting to get a hang of realistic eyes.

Though, I think I could of done more with the colors and lighting.


About the character...

Astrid is NOT a new character. I created her last year.

Name: Astrid
Species: Some sort of owl thing
Age: 18
Gender: Female
Personality: Harsh, unforgiving, rebellious, short temper.
Outfit: White tank top, torn blue jeans, brown leather belt, black boots, black gloves. (Gloves go up to her elbows.)
History: Astrid has an odd history, which no one would ever suspect. She was born into royalty, being the oldest of two sisters. Strangely, her eyes were not green. This may not seem like a big deal, but to her entire family it was. Green is the sacred color of Astrid's kingdom. A royal being born without green eyes was unheard of. To prevent the kingdom from discovering her "flaw" her mother made her wear green eye contacts, which changed the color of her eyes. Astrid is the older of two sisters. Her sister Aerial loves shopping, clothing, and gossiping. All the things "normal" teen age girls (err owls...) are supposed to enjoy.
Aerial is basically skilled in the usage of water magic. Aerial loves Astrid to death, but is jealous of Astrid for one big reason. Astrid is going to be the queen one day, which is Aerial's dream.
To add to Astrid's strangeness, she cannot use magic, which is also an unheard trait for a royal. Her parents try to hide this, telling their subjects Astrid's magic is much too powerful for her to demonstrate.
In order to get away from her pressured life, Astrid set up a plan which would let her leave her kingdom forever. After telling Aerial about her plan, she agreed to go along with it. Astrid flew away from the castle, with a gun in hand. (An idem very hard to find in her kingdom.) She shot the gun, and flew as fast as she possibly could, travelling to the UNoA. (Come on, you saw it coming.)
In the UNoA she moved out to the undeveloped desert where she bought herself a motorcycle. She could finally be who she wanted to be. A wander, a bounty hunter, free from royal stress.
Astrid is hard to come by in the vast UNoA desert, but if you know where you're looking, she can be very easy to find...


Enjoy!
Critiques would be nice!