A overview of awards, medals, badges and overall uniform design.
Qualification Badges and Ratings
On the right breast of the uniform, is the gold Spartan qualification badge. In the US Navy, a qualification badge is what is says on the box, that this sailor has received the necessary training to be qualified to serve in their assigned position/rating. Seen here are two examples being Navy EOD, and Navy aviator badges.
The Spartan badge design is based on a modified version of the Spartan operations logo. Though in universe, the reverse is more likely true, with the Spartan Ops logo being based upon the Spartan qualification badge, ala the US Navy Special Warfare Command insignia and the US Navy SEAL qualification badge.
A Navy rating serves as signifier of the sailor's operational field or position that they are assigned to. The rating's insignia can be seen within the rating badges displayed on their arms, just above their rank insignia. For the Spartan ratings, this insignia consists of two important symbols for Spartans, the fistful of arrows, and the lightning bolt which have both featured on many Spartan program symbols. Rating insignia are generally simplified variations of the associated qualification badges.
Rank insignia for enlisted rates is displayed on two locations, the collar devices and the rating badges. The ranks insignia for Petty Officer, First class and Petty Officer, Second class are drawn from their US Navy equivalents but modified with the UNSC eagle.
Shown here is comparison between the rank insignia for US Navy and UNSC Navy petty officer, second class. The US Navy PO2 is serving ins boatswain's mate rating, while the UNSC Navy PO2 is serving in a Spartan rating. In both insignias, gold color signifies more than twelve years of service with the navy.
Sidenote on ranks, I'm surprised more Spartan-IIs or IIIs aren't warrant officers. Warrant officer ranks are generally used for high skilled/specialized personal who occasionally need command authority over units, which fits a Spartan's role very well. The only ones that I can recall are, Jun, Jorge and Emile.
Ribbons were used over full medals in this case, for the simple reason that with how many medals Spartan's are likely awarded it would look ridiculous. These ribbons are arranged by order of precedence and will also be detailed as such in this post. Shown below is Linda's ribbon bar for reference.
The ribbons can generally divide into four distinct categories, individual distinctions, unit distinctions, service/deployment awards, and a misc. category. The medals used are generally based on two sources, the official list of US Navy medals/awards, and a wonderful article on the Halo Fannon wiki of the UNSC's medal/awards
Starting with the first category, Linda uniquely has a Legion of Honor award. While Individual awards that all three Spartans have include, the Colonial Cross, the Navy Cross, the Silver Star, the Navy/Marine Corps medal, the Bronze Star, the Purple Heart, the Navy/Marine Corps Commendation medal, Navy/Marine Corps Achievement medal, and the Navy/Marine Corps Combat action medal. The only other major difference in the awards of each Spartan is the number of times award, signified the by the star devices, with Linda generally having more awards due to her longer service record. I didn't specially calculate the number of awards for each medal as that felt like quiet the arduous task, but I would be interested in hearing other thoughts on them.
Unit awards are awarded to the whole unit of which a sailor is a part of, as such these awards are the exact same for all three Spartans as they all serve in Blue Team. These include the Presidential Unit Citation, Navy Unit Commendation, Navy Meritorious Unit Commendation, and the Navy E (Efficiency) Ribbon.
Next category is the service/deployment awards, given for serving for certain time periods or in certain theaters of combat. First is Navy Good Conduct ribbon, which is awarded for every three years of service. Next is Navy Expeditionary award, this is then followed by the campaign awards which signify specific campaigns a sailor has served in. Linda has five of these, begin the Sol System Campaign, Inner Colonies campaign, Outer Colonies campaign, the Covenant Sphere campaign, and the Counter-insurgency campaign. Lucy and Tom are missing the Sol System and Counter-insurgency campaign awards as they did not serve in these campaigns. These are then followed by the Human-Covenant War Victory medal. This is finally followed by the Navy Sea Service Medal. The star devices signify additional awards for each section operation/section of the campaign which they served in.
Finally, the misc. category consists of the Navy Training Service medal, held by Tom and Lucy for their time serving as instructors for the Spartan-III program's Gamma Company. Then finally there are the Navy Pistol and Rifle Marksmanship Medals, with E (Expert) devices.
This category of awards is for Linda's marksmanship competition badges which are worn below her ribbons. These consist of the Distinguished International Shooter Badge, Distinguished Rifleman Badge and Distinguished Pistol Shot Badge. Finally, on her shoulder is a HIGHCOM's Hundred brassard award for the top one hundred marksmen in the UNSC.
Finally, the overall uniform design is based on a combination of a pallet swapped version of the uniforms seen in Halo 2, the black uniforms seen in some of the game trailers, the black dress uniforms described in the books, and the winter dress uniforms of the modern US Navy.
Overall, hope you enjoyed the art and the long form dive into some of my thoughts on this commission.
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