looking so great!!

Thanks for posting a WIP, this is always interesting to see. I'd like to know, is the BW shot in the upper left corner a preparatory work to set the lights, or is it like a live B&W rendering ? it seems too detailed to be a rough preparatory work

So, it's the only reason why I'm still using photoshop even though I'm really upset with a lot of what they're doing lately - it's a full live window that has accurate grayscale that I use to double check that everything reads correctly!

In photoshop:
Window > Arrange > new window for "file name here"
Click on the new window
View > Proof Setup > custom > Grayscale dot gain 20%

Once it's set up, you then just need to click "proof colors" instead of going through all the custom set up, but then I just zoom out and drag the window into the top left (I'm right handed) so I can have something to check and make sure it all makes sense!

Actually making a few changes to this because I took time last night to look at the grayscale image - the clothing was getting lost when looking at their fur color so darkening it, along with a few other edits.

I see!! this looks indeed very useful!
Thanks for writing the way to set it up, I'll definitely try it ^^

I'm ooking forward seeing the finished version! Keep up the good work ;)