Deloria no offence, but she looks like she's high :D. And I think you should still work on that shading, currently the bg doesnt look nearly as good as the mage. :)
You don't watch a lot of anime do you? Example: http://www.52poke.com/images/avatars/anime/james.jpg Notice how the colour is behind, yet the outer line is above. I thought that too, but I think he means the hair going under her eye, not the eyebrow.
Sorry, but this is what I got out of the eyes: The eyes she has now are just tooo-oo small. Again sorry for touching your work. And the duel arena for bg .. Didn't cross my mind, but I think you could pull it out very nice if you put some time on it. =D>
Uh, + = ? Yeah I know what you mean, just had to do that... Anyway, for bg I would add something wildernesslike, rocky waste or the suggestion you mentioned earlier, having him looking at a ruined city. But thats just my opinion.
Well now I can see it :D, some flaws I found by first sight: staff is a bit weird, strange shoulders he has, hands too long. The sleeve on the left hand is good in my opinion though.
You're supposed to clik on the thumbnail to link you to the larger image. I didn't want to take up so much space by posting the pic directly on the thread so I did a thumbnail :? . I know I'm supposed to click it, just doesnt work for me, doesn't show the big picture.
The arms are too thick at the beginning and they end up too thin. I think you tried to make them look like sleeves(hopefully you did), you need to even up the thickness throughout the arm, otherwise it's ok.
For the blank space I would try adding a carpet or a table with something on it. Other than that great job so far, I'm looking forward to seeing the finished product. :thumbsup: