@bBcadren: You're definitely right about the lightbulb being hard to read. It's harder to read than I even realized before submitting, so good catch. Probably needs to be lighter to read as a lightbulb? With the shading as-is, it probably doesn't look like transparent glass at the moment, which probably contributes to the eye/egg first reading.

If I do a later revision, I'll definitely make it a bit wider, too...the claws make it 128 pixels wide at the moment haha, so they definitely are straining to stay in the border. And they are a bit asymmetrical, I was trying to make the bot a bit "silly"/whimsical but it ends up just making the piece worse I think. Maybe if I had made the outside of the bot even more comically stylied, as you say? But what it is at the moment doesn't work for sure.

For the rest of the interior of the bot: I wanted the brain-split to be very pronounced because along with the pink/purple, I think it's one of the few things that makes it read as a brain at all (instead of just a "blob thing.") I am glad that it comes across as two foreheads rather than just two heads, to be (EXTREMELY: WARNING, NO SELF-AWARENESS AHEAD) pretentious, I was sort of going for a vibe similar to the main image on the wiki page for major depressive disorder, IIRC it's a Van Gogh painting, but it's this great image of a man with his hands on his temples, with his forehead in view.

I'm sort of surprised you didn't have harsher to say about the interior shading/dithering, I have almost zero experience with any sort of realistic lighting, and my light sources are usually just nebulous "from the upper-left...somewhere." Especially the specular plain yellow spots, I wasn't sure if they even worked at all. Still, I'm sort of glad it brings the mood of the piece lower, so if it does have that effect, thanks.

I really appreciate the feedback, by the way. I can tell you took your time with it, and it's the only way I'll improve. Much thanks. :)

@Splurge: Thanks man, that's the sort of vibe I wanted ideally, nice to hear it from someone else. :D

Grungy. Suitably drab with a hidden bubbly personality.

There's so much I could point out as wrong and/or difficult to read in this piece. Since I know it's unfinished I'll try not to sound too harsh.

The lightbulb's shading is such that you have to look at it for a bit to realize it's a lightbulb and not a weird yellow eye or an egg. Weird yellow eye + lightbulb combo on purpose could work well with the theme though.

The brain kind of looks like two dude's heads (hand on each forehead).

The left hand's fingers are thicker than the rights and that reads odd.

The claw/pincer things look like they are straining to stay in the border...if you do a later revision...I'd recommend not following the original parameters and letting the arms stretch out... the 'restricted to paper size' look just doesn't work for this. (It might if the it was more comically styled).

The dithering and plain just yellow spots in the wall's specular make the piece look rather...dirty. This isn't necessarily bad, but it brings the mood of the piece even lower, into 'depressing' state.

@Volrak_Rutra: Thanks! And you're right, the claws I could never get to look satisfactory, after the competition I'm thinking of swapping them out for more simple pincers or maybe normal humanoid hands, something less distracting. I tried them because I wanted something superficially silly and toy-robot-like in contrast with the inside of the bot, hence the goofy head/legs.

And the background color is there because transparency woud be my 12th color, and the competition only allows for 11, and I don't want to zap any of my greys or blues. :( Maybe after the competition, I'll do a transparent version.

lovely piece, nice framing and emotion. i don't appreciate the tangents of the claws, and why not remove the background colour altogether?