I never got a chance to work on panda, but this technique works great for this design.
So, some people asked me what I look for when I do film studies. Try pausing a Disney film and drawing the character like this. I would recommend starting with Mulan because it's really easy to understand. With some films, it's too hard to see under all the details. Also, any of the 1950's mickey mouse and goofy shorts are good as well.
Here is some more information on shapes. This stuff is much harder to do. It fights every natural tendency we have as humans to evenly space things and make them the same size.