Oh I was actually closer than I thought. Person and wings. nice work.
I gotta ask since fabrication blows my mind... how did you get started? I can look at an image on a page and break it down fine, but trying to move to 3D just puts wasps in my brain. Are there mental tricks or shortcuts or what? Enlighten usssssss! 
P.S. This turned out to be a rather large text wall, but you did ask for enlightening ;p
Get started in terms of... what exactly? Like, building stuff in general? I started when I was really young, tinkering with old bits n' pieces of whatever. My uncle and grandfather were both contractors, their garages were heavens for making stuff. 50-odd years of collected tools, materials, and other stuff. Spent days in there building things.
Practice, practice, practice. I involved myself with everything I could get my hands on. Metalworking & welding, woodcrafting, and later on, CNC equipment of all sorts. I was in robotics programs throughout middle and high school. Those helped. I tend to believe that I'm not a super-super-good craftsman, but I have such a huge range of experience with materials & methods that I can make just about anything. It's something that one builds up over time.
A stunning feel for spatial relationships[1] helps.
Mental tricks... I think the biggest one is forethought. Mental prototyping. (I'm particularly good at this one thanks to some a good range of mental illness & what has been described as 'savantism'; my head is just one big prototyping simulator - I'm always thinking about stuff whether I want to or not.). It takes time to build up a sense of what works and what doesn't, but when making something that hasn't ever been made before (i.e. all the custom work I do), it's necessary.
Also, you are only as good a craftsman as your quality tolerance. At one point, if something didn't come together perfectly square or level, I'd shrug it off and keep working. But now, I'd do it again. And again, until it's right. When I was painting the staff head, one side was a tiny bit rough. It could be fine, but it wasn't. I filled it and smoothed it with a layer of spackle, and painted over it again.
I hope some of that helps. If you ever need advice on a specific project or anything, feel free to ping me.
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Topic: Random Things you drew/shopped/made/etc. (Read 1348111 times)