You can really feel the emotions of this one. Of course, they've survived this time, but WWI had a way of making even miraculous survivals last for not nearly long enough.

And then there were the times where the dead were the lucky ones.

And yet WWI was the war everyone would rather forget and its sequel was the one everyone focuses on. They were both really brutal wars and there was no real clear winner from the first one. At least, that's my opinion. I mean, if there HAD been a winner, would we really have gone and had a second one 2 decades later? I don't think so.

It was a combination of factors that caused WWII. Nationalism, the aftereffects of the treaty that ended WWI, the Great Depression...it was a big mess. Almost as big as the clusterfuck of alliances that dragged everyone into WWI.

Of course. I'm not saying WWI was the only direct cause. I'm just saying that while Germany and Austria-Hungary may have been aggressors during that war, it was the allies who aggressively punished them. In the end nobody was really justified in their actions, even though they all thought they were at the time. It's really a great time of history to study.

Indeed. A very different time from even a few decades later.

And yet still quite relevant to the world today. Like how there remain many unexploded land mines out there. Also the politics of that war led directly to the politics of today (France and Britain and US all being allies and such). In so many ways, it was every bit as important as WWII and yet is only fractionally mentioned in media as often.

And Germany!

Germany was defined as a matter of law to have started WWI, but everyone had wanted in on that action. Everyone wanted to be part of a nice fast glorious in-and-out military campaign. All those intricate railroad timetables that could not be stopped once put into action, all those young men flooding the recruitment centers on all sides. They changed their minds after a few months.

Your point about WWI not being mentioned as often is well-taken. What we now call Veterans Day was originally Armistice Day, the end of that war. Changing the name of something is a good way to forget it.

All of this is very true. I don't consider myself a fanatic over these things, of course, but I do think if Germany and Austria had won that war, the Nazis would not have risen from where they did. Though that is speculation, of course.

It would be interesting to speculate where Germany and Austria would have gone as victors in that war. It would still have been expensive, but without the industrial and economic burden of the Treaty of Versailles, Germany would have been economically better off during the '20s and the Great Depression. There would still have been Communists, but had the Nazis arisen they would not have had such an easy foothold on the German psyche. A huge deal would depend on what form Germany's basic law would take after the war. Where on the spectrum of republic to monarchy would it lie?

Stalinist Russia would still have had designs on Europe and Japan would still have wanted to take over the Pacific. WWII might still have been fought, but very differently. Maybe a Russian invasion of Europe could have been fought off by a different alliance. Hey, let's get a big map of Europe and work out the possibilities. Then one of us will become a novelist and … Oh.

My parents might still have gone to college and then met as employees in some industry. But would they have emigrated? I might have grown up a pervy German boy in Frankfurt.

Haha, you sure let your imagination run ahead of you. And don't worry about the novelist thing, I already have that part covered on my end. As for pervy German boys, well that might be interesting to see but it's highly doubtful. Emigration is always still a chance, regardless of how things turned out.

"Emigration is always still a chance, regardless of how things turned out."
Looking at the aftermath of WWII, emigration is not always a possibility.

When I said that, I meant simply that the chance to leave is always an option. It may not be an easy one, but it is still there if you are determined enough to do so.

Haha that sounds almost like the plot of Command & Conquer Red Alert - where Albert Einstein goes back in time using his chronosphere to prevent World War II and in doing so causes the Soviet Union to invade Western Europe.

Hungary did not want to enter the World War, but back in that time, Austria and Germany were on pretty friendly terms - as far as I know - and since we were pretty much dependent on Austria, we had no choice. The Austro-Hungarian Monarchy may have looked like some sort of 'alliance' on the surface, but in reality, Austria dictated almost everything.

And don't forget the whole monarchy was ready to collapse. That was their main reason for jumping into the war.

Indeed, and our defeat in WWI only cemented that fate, really. And we also lost some 2/3 of our lands.

It really IS a shame to forget all about WWI. In many ways, the Second was just Act 2 of the Great War - since if Germany hadn't been devastated economically by the Treaty of Versailles the political climate in Germany would never have supported Hitler's rise to power. At least we learned from our mistake the second time around and had the Marshall Plan - you can't leave people in a war-torn state of desperation or they'll make a deal with the Devil.

I think the reason we forget is because very few living people have had any experience with people who lived in that time period. My father's grandfather fought in the Trenches for the USA (survived mustard gas) - but I've never met the man. All I have to remember him by is his trench shovel (I keep it as an heirloom) and the stories of his violin playing. Now I've met WWII veterans to beat the band - I've heard their stories and seen the movies so it sticks in my mind more - but I'd never have the understanding of the Second World War conflict without understanding WWI.

...I guess there's "All Quiet on the Western Front", but that's not required reading anymore

Or Johnny Got His Gun, but that's been controversial too for quite a long while.

Here's the modern version of All Quiet on the Western Front.

It's just a crying shame. There's really no place (outside, say, Daschau or Bataan) in recent memory that had such misery and hell-on-earth traditions, even if Japan topped them in terms of immediate atrocities during the thirties and forties. Fact, I can say it's probably the most crushing shock of an event in the last several hundred years. Why?
I mean, if you're a prisoner-of-war or an oppressed minority group, you can steel yourself for the atrocities to follow - but WWI, thousands of young men marched off with visions of glory and patriotism and "Play up and play the game!" and expected themselves to thrash the racially inferior and come back after two months having won the world. AFTER that was the unholy mire of machines evolving faster than strategy, machine-guns and mustard-gas and no-man's-lands and famine and brutality, hell-on-earth and all that comes with it.
Though my relatives on the American Dutch side managed to dodge the draft, some of my family was in the Netherlands for the duration and housed and tended the veterans on both sides with the rest of the town... according to their journals, the horrifying thing was how broken the soldiers were - they felt betrayed. They'd been promised glory and triumph and came out with their eyeballs dissolved and lungs blackened and wounds eaten by maggots and souls rendered numb. Betrayal was the first thing on their minds... It was traitorous. No other generation was lied to with such consequences since the crusades.

My great-uncle, Pete Van der Hoeg, Grand Rapids Dutch, was one of about four carpenters who landed at D-Day. The bit that stuck in his mind was that he built Dwight Eisenhower the general's outhouse seat. War has a weird way of making funny comrades... he was a drinking buddy with the surviving carpenter for the rest of his life, even though they were three states/one province and a state away. I can vouch for the accuracy of the sentiment here, if not the post-victorian ominousness and oddly unmuddy clothes.
(Fascism was a very practicable solution to the problem WWI presented - if war was going to be brutal slayings and muddy trenches and dealings of death, then it paid to have the most weapons and throw the first punch.)
And one of my favorite books. ^^

Very nice work, miss!

Well, seems like they are laughing out of happyness that they survived something.

Maybe a enemy charge at their trench or a artillery chelling.

Hehe yeah they're laughing - in a super relieved, just-been-scared-shitless-but-it's-over way XD And thanks!

This is fantastic work! Love the expressions done here :D
And yes, props to the environment and clothing detail :D

Very nice :)

Awesome picture! I need to get Base commissioned like that. Great work.

So this is digital! Your art is so good I've been having a hard time figuring out if they were digital or traditional.

Thank you! ^.^ That's what I've been trying to achieve in my digital paintings for some time now, though I'm still nowhere near where I'd like to be >.< I'm so jealous of artists who can just do a quick speedpainting digitally and have it look like traditional media, I love how that looks.

And then, suddenly Daleks.

I think the mud looks fantastic. :3 but this is indeed a amazing piece, i love the uniforms as well, very detailed!

This... THIS is epic, my friend.

*sidenote* this year is the 100th Anniversary of the start of WW1 (aka "The Great War").

They passed WWI? Well I'm sure the shepard isn't white enough to pass WWII.

War...war never changes

Amazing work. Love the weapon detail. :)

Superb work here.

Lovey piece. I see eclipse as being in pain.

I can see your frustration in the mud. What I think is happening is that your "canvas" is flat but the surfaces that you're trying to apply the mud to are curved and wrinkled. The spots are all brush-shaped (round). I'm going to shut up now: the rest of this image is amazing and I don't think I am qualified to critique it.

No no, please do! I think you're right - the texture of a real canvas adds an element of randomization to each brush stroke, whereas on a digital canvas there is nothing to vary the solid round brush shape. And that's where I need to practice my Photoshop skills and *create* something to perform that function :3

On a lot of your textures you got the radial (up, down, left, right) direction right, but in some places the texture itself needs foreshortening. Frodoshop has some cool warping effects I bet you could use. For spots like mud it might work, but for fur it's harder.

I like your work on the mud.

So you're saying you need to go play in the mud more. Those are dirty thoughts. ahem.

But seriously, this is a very different piece for you, and it shows how much work you've put into it. Eclipse has the laugh of the near-crazy kind, that it's that or scream in madness. His companion seems about ready for the madness, himself. Laughing because you weren't killed? sounds about right for any war, but this one distorted reason a bit more than those before.

The brushes at the top of the trench on the upper right corner are particularly excellent!

Yay for artists pushing themselves in new direction!

I like that style! :D

The clothing is spot on nice job! Loving it.

oh wow.. you entered the "Exclusive club of Very Few artists who draw something WW 1 related"

They looks prussians, but their uniforms are a little strange.

They're supposed to be German uniforms, I just looked them up on Google so they're probably not totally historically accurate :P

This is fantastic work.

Awesome stuff - as I'm a history nut I question some of the details (i.e. why no ammo pouches) but hell that's all nitpicking :D love it

Yeah, I definitely didn't pay attention to my high school history (I was too busy drawing animals in class, LOL), so all my references just came off Google XD

Your art has grown up so much .3. I love it!~

Hehe thank you! ^.^

I think the mud actually looks pretty decent!

I can agree with you on the difficulty of painting, though, and how it's probably easier in acrylics since you can layer your highlights a bit more easily (at least in my experience).

I see what you mean about the mud. Can't really tell it's mud. Best of luck figuring that one out in the future!
The details on the body/furr/anatomy/clothes/expression/mechanisms... all gorgeous.

Lighting is pretty excellent, although there are some weird highlights on the edges of foreground components. Looks like you were trying to help them stand out in the absence of contrast?


The leather belt of the friend's rifle is spectacular. I've never seen worn leather straps done so perfectly.

Thank you! ^.^ Yeah, I pushed the envelope of realism vs. made-up a little, especially where the colors and highlights are concerned X3 It's still more on the side of cartoon than realism I think, but oh well.

very awesome drawing good work :D the uniforms and weapons look spot on

Very nice me likes

Beautiful texture work on their fur and the surrounding ground. Trench warfare, a real horror.

Awseome work like always !!
We can feel emotion of carachters !


So Amazing !!

I can imagine silent night playing in the background.

Oh how do you do, young Willy McBride
Do you mind if I sit here down by your graveside
And rest for a while in the warm summer sun
I've been walking all day, and I'm nearly done
And I see by your gravestone you were only nineteen
When you joined the great fallen in 1916
Well I hope you died quick
And I hope you died clean
Or Willy McBride, was is it slow and obscene

Did they beat the drums slowly
Did they play the fife lowly
Did they sound the death march as they lowered you down
Did the band play the last post and chorus
Did the pipes play the flowers of the forest

And did you leave a wife or a sweetheart behind
In some loyal heart is your memory enshrined
And though you died back in 1916
To that loyal heart you're forever nineteen
Or are you a stranger without even a name
Forever enshrined behind some old glass pane
In an old photograph torn, tattered, and stained
And faded to yellow in a brown leather frame

Did they beat the drums slowly
Did they play the fife lowly
Did they sound the death march as they lowered you down
Did the band play the last post and chorus
Did the pipes play the flowers of the forest

The sun shining down on these green fields of France
The warm wind blows gently and the red poppies dance
The trenches have vanished long under the plow
No gas, no barbed wire, no guns firing now
But here in this graveyard that's still no mans land
The countless white crosses in mute witness stand
To man's blind indifference to his fellow man
And a whole generation were butchered and damned

Did they beat the drums slowly
Did they play the fife lowly
Did they sound the death march as they lowered you down
Did the band play the last post and chorus
Did the pipes play the flowers of the forest

And I can't help but wonder oh Willy McBride
Do all those who lie here know why they died
Did you really believe them when they told you the cause
Did you really believe that this war would end wars
Well the suffering, the sorrow, the glory, the shame
The killing and dying it was all done in vain
Oh Willy McBride it all happened again
And again, and again, and again, and again

Did they beat the drums slowly
Did they play the fife lowly
Did they sound the death march as they lowered you down
Did the band play the last post and chorus
Did the pipes play the flowers of the forest