Its ok but if i were you id work on leaving the joints there.
Just a suggestion
For standard avatars, you may want to work with a 1:1 width to height ratio, you get more work space that way
I really like it. I haven't seen this kind of avatars lately.
The text is too small to be seen in the avatar size (100x100 at max unless you have toriprime and VIP)
The gradient gives a nice effect to it. I would have added the gradient to the other shoulder join also.
Overall it's a very fine piece of art. Especially for your first.