Very solid portrail of volume here. I see what the others mean about the 1x1 dither pattern but, honestly, I think it works just fine at 1x. I've grown very used to looking at all my pieces at the very least at 2x now, and sometimes I apply the same logic to other work, but this piece shines at it's best at the original resolution I think.

Yeah. Looks really good if I squint, but zoom in and it's like a chessboard.

Cool palette and the face is well done, though!

I don't think dithering is the problem, it's just the overuse of checkerboard dithering in a small canvas. Tons of pixel artists who make great portraits make use of dithering, they may also use different dithering patterns or adjust the amount of checkerboard dithering based on how big the piece is. Try and experiment :D

thank you for your input. I use stippling often in my paintings and it is a habit that has made the jump into other media. I will be working on better blending moving forward.

Looks very lifelike, but the overuse of checkerboard dithering doesn't work very  well imo