Thanks guys, very kind.
One thing I will say is that the sculpt helped me a lot - it's like a caricature and has a lot of great character built in.
The other thing is that I've started treating mins like a painting and I tend to put the colour and light where I think it will look good, not necessarily where the rules of layering say I should. That means it's not an even highlight, I usually go towards a point of light (the shoulder, the top of the forehead) and it's just the natural light at my desk that gives me the hint as to how the light will fall - I just exaggerate that.
As for the skin tones, I just use a 5 stage 'European Flesh' colour and then at the end I add a little red/pink with inks or watered down maroon paint, literally just brushing a little on here and there on the nose/cheeks and maybe hands.