I followed ianscott888's instructions (above) to make my pawn.
Went to Ortho view for the first time and used a background image* as a model sheet. Wireframe view was helpful here as I could 'trace' the pawn image as I model without the model itself blocking what I needed to see.
Render view with the textured* pawn on a plane with a checker texture applied.
*Pawn Texture ("Wood Grain"): http://www.tangentusa.com/surfaces.html
The lighting is kind of messed up compared to the Render view in Blender expecially the lighting around the pawn. I think it might have been the sharp edges on the pawn itself that caused the weird lighting in Sketchfab.
