Skeleton Knight Process

Sometimes you just wanna paint skeleton knights. I thought it was interesting (though not necessarily good) how this painting evolved from a state where his pauldron spikes were not poking him in the eyes. I find I have to throw away the linework or the painting gets very comic booky but then it goes off in directions I don't expect. Which can lead to happy accidents. Or it can lead to your skeleton knight being poked in the eye.

Also I lost all the definition on the chainmail and it turned into a mush. But every time I tried to define it more it brought too much focus to that area. Well there will be other Skeleton Knights.