Spartan Sketches

So to prove I've actually been producing some artwork... here's two female Spartans I sketched up while bored between battles in Reach. each character takes up the majority of the pages I drew them on, noteably larger then my fallout character sketches.

The right Spartan is based on my own character, though obviously heavily embellished. Off the top of my head, she wears the Hazop helm (with CNM and Operator camera attachments) and shoulder pieces. the latter of which hang from the bottom of a pair of Grenadier pauldrons. the spartan has both a UGPS and a TacPad one attached to each forearm (overkill I know). The torso features the triple mag pouch (what mags can fit in those any how?) of the Tactical/LRP chest, the ass pack from the Assualt/Commando, a compound collar with parts from the Grenadier UA (x2) and Breacher pieces. The thighs play home to a pair of Tactical/Soft Cases. A compound knee-guard comprised of FJ/PARA and Gungnir knee options and elbow guards comprised of a second set of Gungnir guards finish the massive amount of up armoring. (because exposed joints isn't good) ....for some reason I gave her high heels...

(takes a breath)

the left Spartan is a little less over the top but still impossible to make in the game. She wears a EVA helm w/ the HUL[3] attachment, A CQC left pauldron, FJ/PARA Knee-guards, a robotic arm, the Tactical/LRP triple mag atop a Tactical/Patrol torso. A pair of Soft cases (I've got a love for those big arsed bags alright?) and a pair of hip attached small mag pouches based on parts from the Tactical/Commando. She's equipped with a sniper rifle and a silenced SMG.

In this sniper's case she's using a robotic prosthesis with the patrol scarf extending over the shoulder as something of a half-cape (which is meant to hearken back to the early concept art of Jun where the scarf was more gillied-up and covered his shoulders). an interesting note is after looking at the Tactical/Patrol Chest I've come to belive the scarf covers a water bladder as there's little need for the chest harness and is the only way I could make sense out of the seemingly random tube extending from under the scarf.

The EVA helm, which I've always liked (the reach added chin extension on the helm is retarded), offers a very large field of vision for it's wearer at the cost of being more visible. In this combination its meant to tell something of the spartan with the EVA helm being a recent addition after she lost her arm. How did she lose it? didn't watch her motion tracker while sniping. one could appreciate the idea of a sniper loosing their trigger arm would be devastating.
So some general "little" comments.

The Assault Spartan is suppose to be carrying around Reach's MA37 assault rifle with a under-barrel smart-linked scope in place of the never used over-sized flashlight module. why? because I've killed with the gun more then once at mid-range and have for a long time thought the halo assault rifle could have been much improved with a tighter reticle (which Reach gave it) and a weak range scope similar to what they did with the SMG in ODST.

The Marksman on the other hand is equipped with Reach's Sniper Rifle (which I love over the previous games rifles) and a silenced SMG. She stores the SMG on her ass plate by the way(similar to various mobile suits). the SMG is actually not identical to the one featured in ODST as it's lacking the reflex sight (unneeded since Spartans use HUD linked targeting systems). Reach's omission of the SMG is a sore spot with me. I was a fan of the gun and while I recognize that without the dual wielding system the SMG was of little use as is, the gun could have been brought over is a silenced, non-scoped version with close range power slightly exceeding the assault rifle. That of course assumes the assault rifle had its mid range ability enhanced (see above)

As I mentioned a moment ago the pouches (almost all of them) are generally identical to modern ammo pouches yet the guns in Halo use very different magazines. For example the Assault rifle's 32 round capacity magazine is suppose to be stuffed with 7.62x51mm rounds (a round used today by anti-infantry long rifles and machine guns ) yet is half the length of a modern STANAG magazine (read: Clip of Holding). Bungie is usually detail oriented and this seems like something they would have noticed.