I felt like making a 3D version of Hatty Hattington (from BattleBlock Theater) yesterday, thought it would take like 30 mins, and it ended up taking me about 5 hours. It's surprisingly incredibly hi-poly. Pay no attention to the lighting, angle, etc... I just kinda threw them together at the last minute.
Now create your own 3D renderer (without OpenGL/Direct3D) and render this with the same lighting and shading techniques.