Tuesday, 29 May 2012

Underground experiment FAQ

As promised in my last post: Underground experiment.

Q: How did they get all that huge stuff through such narrow corridors?
A:         1) They built it piece by piece
            2) They built the base, then buried it underground

Q: Where does the reactor waste go?
A: It’s advanced tech. it doesn’t produce waist!

Q: How is the base supplied? Food, ammo, fuel, machinery,…
A: Through the entrance?

Q: Why are the corridors so narrow?
A: Budget cuts. The guards are also selected by height so it doesn’t bother them much.

Q: How can the “mutants” live and breed in the fuel storage room undisturbed?
A: It’s a known problem. No one wants to go in there and kill them. Would you? They’re just hoping they will die eventually.

Q: Why do the intruders attack from three entry points?
A: Shock and awe!

Q: Why do the intruders place two small explosives, only to nuke the entire facility later on?
A: Redundancy. If the nuke fails, they still take out the reactor and the lab, which will also destroy the entire base.

Q: Is there no emergency exit?
A: no, do you see one?




Spread the wars.
HardAtWork

Monday, 28 May 2012

Underground experiment

I'm back with a classroom classic: the underground paint stick war!
Everyone, and I mean everyone who drew stick wars back in school, eventually took it underground. It's just common sense really. Wars need bases, bases need cover, best cover is underground. Now I know this is a step back from The Siege and Gang vs. Cops from a technical point of view, but if I was to draw this scene in 3D, it would just give me a massive headache! 
I realise there are some  fundamental flaws in the base design. I don't really plan out these things properly, I just draw stuff. I'll be posting a list of flaws and impossibilities concerning the base and the drawing in general, FYA of course.
Enjoy!

Underground base assault.


This is a desert base, so it's reasonably well camouflaged from an aerial point of view. It also has a SAM-site for taking down those nosy UAV's and recon aircraft.

Going down from the bunker on the left, we see some sticks accessing the underground base. the blue thing is some sort of airlock. 
In the sleeping quarters, some sticks are just getting up and arming themselves. The guns are designed for CQB (and to be extremely easy to draw in Paint!).

Next we have the reactor room. This room is being hit hard by the intruders as you can see, and the defenders don't really stand a chance here. Remember, they are being completely surprised by this attack. The undertrained, never-before-seen-action guards of this facility are just not prepared. The intruders  clearly have superior technology, shooting purple lasers and all... There's a guy accessing one of the computers to steal data and some guys are carrying in what looks like a nuke!

Right below the reactor room is the fuel storage for the reactor. As you can see, some mutants (loosely based on Aliens) have taken up residence there, munching on the reactor fuel! Sadly for some intruders, these mutants don't take too kindly to the noisy laserblasting invading kind!

The largest room of the base, is the place where the experiments take place. Essential for any selfrespecting underground base is the laser testing site! Don't know where I picked up the idea, but I think it was Half-life or Deus Ex or something like that...

It seems the base is primarily focussing it's recourses on mutant experiments. "Why?" you ask? "It looks cool" I say. This room is also being heavily invaded. The mounted turret is doing it's job tho, but it can't hold them back forever. And even if it could, 2 bombs are already being placed amidst all the chaos. Can you spot them?
There's also a coward, point out that lame ass excuse for a soldier!

The base is pretty much screwed. Successfully mounting a multiple entry point surprise attack, the invaders succeed in planting two small bombs, stealing data and probably will succeed in blowing up half the desert by detonating the nuke!

Just goes to show: always defend your underground base with steel walls and motion mines!

(I promise more dead guys next time!)

Spread the wars.
HardAtWork



Thursday, 24 May 2012

Preview

Here's a preview of something I'm working on.
I don't have a title yet, but it will be finished in a week or so.

Just look at him go, all focused 'n shit.

Firing an AK 47

Spread the Wars.
HardAtWork

Monday, 21 May 2012

The Siege


I might have pushed it a bit too far this time, but here it is: the result of playing too much AOE II, combined with watching too many 90’s action adventure movies starring Sean Connery, Kevin Costner, Richard Gere and Mel Gibson.
This truly is a Paint Stick War in every sense of the word. I got a little carried away with the depth of the scene tho, resulting in two empty strips of land. But hey it’s still perfectly realistic…
It’s basically a base assault, or rather a castle siege (hence the title “The Siege”, not to be confused with a totally non-related movie)
The scene is really detailed, so you might want to zoom in from time to time (CTRL + scroll). 
Technically this one doesn’t differ much from Gang vs. cops, except that it has much more depth in it, so there’s a lot more going on.
I like the result but after I did the awesome catapult, I just got bored and decided not to draw 50 more sticks.
Enjoy!

The fields will run red today...


Starting from the left, you see the southern tower. The towers both have small catapults on them for delivering long range mayhem. What’s that you say? Where are the ropes and pulley systems for the catapults?! They’re inside the tower, deal with it. The southern tower is also damaged as you can see. (realism +1)

The ramparts are manned by stick archers firing flaming arrows. You can see one of them trying to light his arrow.
Some stick archers are running up the stairs to join in on the killing. It must be fun up there with a complete lack of returning fire, just like shooting ducks in a barrel!

Down on the battlefield I used my extensive movie knowledge to incorporate some classic sword fighting moves! Let’s go over them, starting from the top.

There’s the epic face-to-face power struggle. You need both hands for this shit, so the stick men wisely threw down their shields. You can actually hear the steel grinding. (no you can't)

Next we have some stick guys charging on the defenders, nothing special really.

The epic sword-in-the-air-die-move! This guy is dying and he’s not afraid to show it, probably yelling something in his crazy native tongue.

My personal favorite: the stab-‘n-stick. When stabbing an opponent, there is no cooler way to draw back your sword then by holding the victim down with your bloodstained boot and just pulling back your blade. This badass move is usually executed by the “bad guy”.

The head slicer. Only highly skilled stick knights can execute this awesome move. It takes years of training, excellent timing and the strength of a bear to decapitate the opponent’s head in one swing. Lots of blood!

A standard sword thrust catches one of the attackers off guard. Drop your guard just once and before you can say “What is this I don’t even…” your guts are on the floor!

The berserker I just had to draw, wielding two swords, no armor, this ego tripping maniac is ready to kick some ass! Standing safely behind his fellow knights…

In the middle some attackers are dealing with the constant barrage of fiery arrows, each one in their own special way.

When attempting to take a stronghold, some things are just vital for success. There’s the low tech, yet effective, siege ladder. It can make or break the siege as we saw in numerous movies. Once the attackers are able to take control of the ramparts and the gate, the battle is lost, and the looting and raping begins.

The siege ram and catapult took me right back to Age of Empires II. You can see the siege ram is covered by animal skin (yeah, that’s what that is). The arrows don’t really do any damage, but the tower mounted catapult does. It just missed by a few feet, only to annihilate some poor bystander… (these guys are hardcore! Just standing by while their brother-in-arms dies a horrible death…)

The catapult, now there’s a work to be proud of! Doesn’t it look mind numbingly awesome? The guards, the stick turning the wheel thingy, the “watcher” ready to light the projectiles, the poor stick loading the 50 pound projectiles. They’re trying to take out the southern tower by the way.

There’s also a king… whatever.

Can you spot them?
There’s a stick smoking somewhere…
There’s a spy somewhere…



Well that’s it! My money’s on the defenders for this one.
The defending knights will fall or retreat after doing some damage. The archers will probably wipe out the attacking knights, while the towers take out the siege engines.
Perhaps the spy can even take out the king. He might have a blowgun or something, who knows…


Spread the wars.
HardAtWork

Thursday, 17 May 2012

Preview

Here's a preview of the next Paint Stick War: The siege!
I'll be going medieval on your ass!

You never saw that one coming, did you?



Spread the wars.
HardAtWork

Gang vs. Cops


One of my latest drawings. Unlike previous scenes, this one features extensive background work and some 3D perspective, side-scrolling game style. The cityscape took up a lot of time, so much so, that I got a bit tired of it when it came to the actual stick war! Nevertheless, it looks awesome. It’s a great scene with cool stick men. The stick gang has their Tec9’s, AK 47’s and pimp wagons (check the rims), the stick cops have their snipers ‘n shit. The gang side also has some graffiti, burning barrel etc… In this drawing I finally figured out how to draw the fire without resorting to the dreaded spray can effect. The guns also pop out shells which adds to the 'reality'. I would have liked to draw more stick cops, but hey, I do this shit at work!

Just another day in Stick City.


The left side of the scene is obviously gang controlled. It’s a bit more run down. There’s a guy with an AK reaching in the trunk of his car. Probably to get  more ammo, guns or even an RPG. Who knows?

The bulk of the stick gang is taking cover behind one of their cars, firing away wildly. You can tell these people haven’t had proper weapons training. However what they do know is how to make Molotov cocktails! Just look at the fire and chaos, It’s glorious!

Sadly for the stick gangbangers, the stick cops have had excellent weapons training. As you can see the snipers are taking them out one by one (one on the bridge and one in the abandoned building).POP! POP! Those guys never knew what hit them...

One of the stick cops is taking an AK round in the gut tho… It’s his own fault, would have stood there on that spot? He's probably having an off day or something. 
He just got married,  has two kids and one on the way. 
That's life.

Considering the stick gang isn’t really dug in and probably high on crack, the stick cops will prevail. You just can’t beat the law when it comes to a gunfight in the middle of the city.

By the way I’m sorry the stick gang is black and the stick cops are white. It's just the way it is.
I don’t think one white guy in a black gang would have made any sense. And if I had put a black guy in the police force, his partners just wouldn’t have trusted him...

Share if you lol'ed!


Spread the wars.
HardAtWork

Wednesday, 16 May 2012

Monday, 14 May 2012

Preview

Here's a preview of the next Paint Stick War: Gang vs. cops.
It'll blow your mind.

Some cops firing away


HardAtWork

Supertank vs. army


This was one of those drawings I did in a few hours. I went back to basics and kept it strictly 2D. I experimented with the smoke and complemented it with the spray can. It's just awesome.  
I still haven’t figured out how the muzzle flash of the tank should look like. In RL it’s more dust and less fire, I know…
It’s a desert scene in which the supertank is being attacked by various aggressors. I used to draw a lot of these kinds of scenes back in school. 
Almost everything in this drawing is level (gun barrels, helicopters,…). Reason? I lazy. Oh yeah, and there’s a robot in it. I love robots, but they’re hard to draw in MS Paint. It is what it is.

Supertank being attacked by a small army.

From the left side there’s light attack vehicle coming in. Notice the dust around the wheels. It fires some kind of automatic RPG at the supertank. It also has a gun for close range defense. Completely useless here.

In the middle you can see a black guy about to fire a rocket of his own. You would think these combined attacks are enough to disable or destroy the supertank. You would be wrong. Do you really think a supertank that carries a flying robot has no shield? You just can’t see it yet, but it’s there, trust me.

Anyway the brave stick soldier in the middle might not even get enough time to fire his device of destruction… Actually in about 0.0002 seconds he’ll die, knowing he will have done all he could.

The light attack vehicle is also about to be destroyed by the supertank’s main gun. Hey, it had to shoot something!

The air is where the real danger is for our beloved supertank. Two advanced attack helicopters coming in hard. Full rocketpods ready to unleash hell. Agile as fuck, but will they be able to shake the tank’s AA-missiles? 

Of course not! They’re also doomed!!! 

They might release a few rockets, but who’s to say they would do any damage?

And if all else fails, having a flying attack robot always comes in handy. Especially one with Gatling guns for arms. Notice the shells raining down? Epic.


So there you have it! The supertank will be victorious. It’s called a supertank for a reason, otherwise it would just be a big tank which is basically a big slow target.


HardAtWork

Thursday, 10 May 2012

Real Transformer

They did it, they finally did it!
A fully functioning transformer toy! Imagine what these toys will look like in 10 years...



Wednesday, 9 May 2012

Vietnam jungle warfare


A battle, or rather gunfight, based on numerous Vietnam movies. 
I put “a lot” more effort in the scenery in this one. There’s actually a background, and yes, color! The foliage was quite labor intensive, but it really adds reality to the scene (as far as reality goes in MS Paint). This is quite a zoomed in scene, so I thought it would be cool to give the stickmen more body… by which I mean backpacks! I hope you can make out the two different sides by the telltale M16 and AK47. The supposed Vietnam army’s appearance isn’t really true to reality. I know they look more like a Chinese army, but hey what do you want? It’s just a stick war.



On the western side you can see a stick guy radioing for backup. Which arrives instantly… (of course) in the form of a Vietnam war icon: the Huey. At the time I had no internet access, so please excuse any mistakes I may have made in the model. Also I’m well aware that the top rotor doesn’t seem to do anything. In MS paint sometimes you have to compromise. It was either a Huey flying level, which I really didn’t like or this. Notice the M60 raining down suppressive fire? Classic. The stick guys in the Huey even have headsets!

Down in the jungle there’s a sniper lying hidden, firing at the other side. The sniper misses his target (weird huh?) and his buddy jumps up from behind the cover to take out the target. Dumb move stick… He’s setting himself up to receive a cloud of 7.62x39mm shells! The tree catches some too tho.

Over on the right side there’s a stick guy taking cover, trying to see what all the fuss is about (the jungle’s dense you know…).

To counter the incoming Huey, I gave the eastern side an RPG guy. Chances of him taking out the Huey aren’t that great, but hey, it’s something right! I couldn’t go and give him a stinger or something like that now could I?

I also dropped the spray can tool for smoke and muzzle flash, I like it much better this way.

The “Contact” I just had to add for extra awesomeness! (Also: Predator I – CONTACT!!!)


I think the west has got this one covered with the Huey and all…
Feel free to comment or make suggestions!


HardAtWork

Tuesday, 8 May 2012

War 2.0


This was one of my first stick war drawings. A classic 2D scene, mostly black & white with some special effects. The things I struggled most with were the fire and smoke. I don’t really like how they turned out. The mechanized army is somewhat based on units from Total Annihilation (1997). You may recognize the Thud (artillery) and … (infantry). If you are too young to remember TA (can’t believe I’m saying this), you probably do know Supreme Commander. SupCom wasn’t really a sequel to TA but it was created by the same guy (Chris Taylor) and had very similar features.

War 2.0

The battle itself doesn’t need much explaining I think. It’s basically just a base assault. 

The wall/ gate is being hammered by the high powered laser fired by the main mech.

A gunner atop the wall is firing at the first infantry mech.

An armored vehicle is being dispatched from the base to try and take out the main mech, which is shielded of course.

Some defenders are trying to keep themselves from being fried. (Why they are in front of the armored vehicle, I still don’t know…)

The artillery in the back is firing at the base, obviously. Which will result in… Total Annihilation!

There is also a gunship taking of from the base. The battle was too unbalanced, so I added it later. Not really pleased with the result tho…

Also I added some air defense to the main mech. I completely forgot the air defense and couldn’t stand it being destroyed by a mere gunship! 

I’d put my money on the mechanized army for this one!
Let me know what you think!


HardAtWork

Welcome!

Who didn't draw stick wars back in school?
I know I did! In fact, I still do today, only not in school.

Nothing like full blown, all out warfare to detach one from reality (and escape boredom).
I started doing this in MS Paint (I have limited resources...) and decided to blog my drawings accompanied by some "funny" comments.
Trust me, you'll lol.


Enjoy the battles! I'll keep 'em coming!
Suggestions and ideas always welcome.


Spread the Wars.
HardAtWork