Fern Base - WIP

Yes, the shading still looks very plastic-ey, but this IS a work in progress. All of the textures and meshes were made from scratch, and I'm working to optimize it as a particle system for future projects.
For those of you who actually live with ferns nearby (everywhere I've moved to has been arid and cold,) let me know what exactly I'm doing wrong and how to fix it in the comments below, just to get out of that "Unconcious Incompetence" pit.

Rendered in Blender, Textured in Photoshop