Let's take care of the Q's in bullet form, shall we? Red thing: Cloak, with a large, shiny, opal stone as the clasp. Pose: The weight is on the balls of his feet and as the cloth suggests, he's kind of fighting back a wind. Background: Very arbitrary stuff. It wasn't meant to be special, just contrasty-ish...stuff...you know, to help make Jerrick stand out.
Stay tuned for Jerrick in 3D in the semi-near future!
It's looking good so far, Al. Is the red thing a cloak or a scarf? After looking at it a while I think cloak, but at first I thought it was a Shinobi-esque scarf. Anyway, sorry for the very belated comments. I like the boots and the overall design...the colors look pretty good, but that purply background does nothing for them. I think with the proper shading and background this could look quite nice. I do have to ask about the pose though....it looks like he's about to fall over; the weight distribution is rather odd. I know he's standing on a rock on the original sketch, but it still looked like he was floating or something. Is he just doing something monkish? Oddities aside, I think you have something good going that's worth finishing, if you haven't already ^_^