I'm brand new to inkscape and mostly new to creating any kind of art. Just messing around and I thought this turned out kinda cool.

Hi.

It's always a bit risky to come up with a worthwhile response on a finished work, but in this case I feel some suggestion may help you improve on it.

Observing from a practical side, what is the main part of your image?
Next question, does it come out as your intention in it's fullness with the tools you are using?


This case it seems the main focus is to be at the branch with the gradient.
Do the rest help it pop?
In my humble opinion the gradient makes the shape unbalanced, and is not in right contrast with the background as they are about the same tone value.
The diagonals don't help it either, and as fancy as the frame came out with filtering, it just brings away the attention with the too many detail.
If it's the branch you want to bring the attention to, a simplistic style can work quite well.

I think that the curves and shapes you used for the plant are really elegant. It seems that you were testing out all the tools and filters on inkscape - It feels that the border is out of place... But I kinda like it. Looks like an image from a majong computer game :3

Hi. Sorry for the late reply. Is there no way for this forum to send me emails when I get replies on posts? I can't seem to make it work....?

Lazur, thank you very much for the feedback. As Artemis said, I was mostly just learning the tools and playing with filters on the frame, so I didn't have much of a goal in mind when I made this. I started with the branch just learning how to make interesting paths and edit them into cool shapes and trying out the gradient with some colors I like. I then added the background gray with diagonals and some light gradients, and then the frame and tried some filters til I got one I liked. As I got into making the background, I started thinking this looked like one of those cool embossed(etched? not sure exactly how they're made. I think some are just painted on) mirrors, so I actually kind of like that the tones were similar. It reminded me of a mirror I used to own. So the similar tones I actually left that way on purpose to be more like a styled mirror rather than a framed piece of art, if that makes sense. But overall, it was just experimentation. I'll definitely take your advice for stuff I do in the future, but I don't really plan to make this particular piece into anything special.

And for me personally, don't ever worry about whether your response is risky. As long as your intention isn't to be mean, I welcome any critque or suggestions.

Artemis, thanks for the compliment on the lines. That's what I liked when I first started with Inkscape recently is the ability to make such nice, elegant, curves and shapes so easily. I mostly agree about the frame. It's actually a bit... gaudy?... but it reminds me of... well not just one, but kind of a combination of some framed mirrors I used to have as I mentioned above, so I just went with it. But yeah, mostly I was just experimenting with tools and filters as you said.