I'm fairly new to pixel art.
I've been working on these 16x16 tiles for the past few days.
The setting is supposed to be 1930s city dock.

Any help would be appreciated.

Emphasize the 3d aspect of the 'blocks' that these shapes are made out of by separating the sides of the 'blocks' by contrasting light and dark values.

Simply put, try making the red bricks darker and the grey concrete on top of it lighter to show that the light hits these two sides of the object differently because they are 90 degrees apart. showing that 90-degree angle in tiles is hard work, but pays off enormously when you get the hang of it.

Ugh, I felt like I didn't explain that very well. Lemme try again, and maybe I can choose my words better:



This is a crude edit of what I mean (I only edited the brick wall and the surrounding grey). Do you see how when I up the contrast, where horizontal pieces are lighter and vertical pieces are darker, it makes them appear more 3d and less flat? This is because of the way light hits these boxy objects, where much light bounces off of horizontal planes and little light touches the vertical planes (well, at least under these specific lighting circumstances). Also take note that I increased the saturation of darker colors to set them apart even more.