Midships and aft deckhouses done, now only the platforms on the Wigwam to go. I've been experimenting some with textures for the painted steel decks (blue gray bits) but the pattern is too fine to see unless I'm down on the deck itself, which isn't happening too often I think. The lighter of the two neutral grays is where the real ships have planked decks, and I don't have any idea at all what to do with those bits...
Finally worked out how to do lights and glass that exports properly to Maxwell. Took most of the evening, too. Plus 45 minutes of rendertime, so enjoy because I'm not doing one again for a while...
In other news, I'm back on an unrestricted traffic plan, which was not a moment too soon. I have four months worth of anime to catch up on after having been on 128kbit, then nothing, and then 5 gigs monthly (half of which I swear Windows and my other software slurped away doing auto-updates...) Updates may be a little sporadic until I get caught up. Or bored.
Thanks for the nice comments! Making nice renders in Maxwell is pretty easy, or at least daylight renders are. I still need to either find or create a decent space environment to do exo-atmospheric renders though. And I really want to keep using Maxwell even for that due to the lovely way it renders lights and shadows...
About the nose of the ships, the big gun-like thing, according to my current thinking, is actually the navigational deflector. Of course, the difference between an energy shield and an energy blade is a question of focal distance, and that can be changed rather significantly on these ships. :-)
Finally, to make up for the lack of renders today, here's a link to one of my primary inspirations and sources for the BB-61-class mesh - bear in mind this is 1/700 scale, and the model is less than 40 cm long overall:
First, the CB-1 (Alaska)-class, which has been totally redone. Haven't added all the AA platforms and guns yet, but they're coming soon:
Next, the CA-134 (Des Moines)-class. Also a more or less total rebuild. Note the new bridge structure in particular, even if the windows for it aren't installed yet, and the enlarged turrets:
Next up, the CL-106 (Fargo)-class, updated to reflect the actual ship a bit better. The O-1 level has been reshaped, and the broadside secondary turrets have been lowered by one (double) deck, as on the real thing. Still not happy with the bridge itself, can't seem to figure out a decent look for it... I've also made the turrets bigger, like on the CA-134.
Last but not least, the CL-55 (Cleveland)-class. The biggest change here is the new turrets (same as on the CL-106), and the addition of the hull number (reused the number from North Carolina...).
Somehow, I've always found it a hassle to set things up in Maxwell, especially if your scene is already set up for Vray... it's a whole different world, those two.
Anyways, Nice lineups for the ships, mate. Say, isn't it about time to start on the textures? ^^
Textures? Gak. 2D graphics and me mix kind of like oil and water - I barely managed to do the hull numbers. Also, I'm still actively working on the major parts of the meshes here - I don't know how many iterations each superstructure has gone through, but there's been lots. I keep finding stuff that has me rebuilding large parts in order to get the geometry just so.
When I'm satisfied with the basic models, I'll see if I can find someone to help walk me through it...
Anyway, here's today's updates, so far:
Iowa, with platforms on her spotting tower and larger secondary turrets (old ones were a bit small). Behind the first pair there's a cutout to allow them to rotate freely. (Detail from the real thing). Also, on the fantail there's one of my attempts at retroreflective paint. This stuff is weird, and a pain in the rear to set up correctly (I found a huge thread of complaints about how difficult it is, but no one was sharing how they did it...:mad:).
Alaska, with the same new secondaries, the spotting tower leaning in the proper direction, and all of her medium AA platforms added (though not the mounts, since I'm redoing them soonish.) The Alaska-class had aviation facilities amidships, rather than aft as on all the other 1940's cruisers, and I'm still trying to come up with some equivalent. Right now I'm seriously considering going with unmanned drones on catapults like the ones on the real thing. (One of the other options is to replace the aviation stuff with more secondary turrets, directors for same, and extra AA, as someone did with his Alaska-class model kit to show what she *should* have looked like.)
Des Moines, Oregon City, and Baltimore, also with new secondaries. I've also done a lot of material assignment work, including getting all the lights working in Maxwell and changing the color of the engine pods to match those on the battleships. The plan is to add some detail to the main turrets of these ships today, and make some hull number textures.
Fargo and Cleveland, updated as above. I need to make some rotation cutouts for the secondaries on these, that's another job scheduled for today.
Finally, the Atlanta. New turrets as above, plus I've stripped off the deck lights for now and reshaped her bow to make it a little blunter. I still need to build the torpedo launchers (they're mounted just ahead of the side turrets), and install the radar on the mast - or build a completely new mast set. Dunno which yet. Once that's done, it's a really quick job to make two followup classes, Oakland and Juneau. (Oakland traded the wing turrets for AA mounts, Juneau bettered that by lowering the B, C, X, and Y turrets by one deck. Both changes were done to make the ships less top-heavy, which was a major problem on pretty much all US warships of the era).
Montana, South Dakota and North Carolina don't get pictures today. Montana needs a completely different set of secondary turrets compared to the others, South Dakota *had* been updated but my computer crashed before I'd saved the changes, and North Carolina needs a major overhaul to get the larger secondaries to fit. Maybe next update.
Well, whenever you're ready for the textures, just tap on me shoulder and I'll guide you through the workflow.
These ships don't deserve to be left naked and even some basic textures with a nice specular can go a loooong way. And besides the ships don't look like too complex shapes.
Thanks for the offer! It's still a bit early, though. I have a bunch more to build before even one of these ships is ready for prime time, such as a decent set of wings for each type, airlocks, new light and medium AA guns, aviation facilities, and all the greebles for the masts and bridge structures. But first of all, I have to get the general arrangement stuff to the point where I can declare them *done*, and not find myself tweaking things just a bit here and there, thereby screwing up the texture alignments and whatever. Iowa is probably closest to that point right now, but she still needs work on her wings and new masts, and a couple more platforms that I haven't added yet, before she's finished. But I'll get there eventually. :-)
One of the new heavy cruiser turrets, for the Baltimore and Oregon City (as well as the preceding class, IIRC, which I'll get around to eventually). The various bits other than the rangefinders were reused from the battleship turrets, but I've improved them a little. I'm not quite satisfied with the gun pivots, but I don't know what to do with them just yet. The real things had soft canvas bags covering the mechanism, which would be painful to replicate. I'm holding off on making the holes in the turret glacis until I figure that part out. :-) I'm also having a flatness issue with the aft part of the side, making the ladder rest unevenly on the surface. Grr.
Woke up this morning to find that my primary monitor (a Samsung 20" LCD unit) had finally given up completely. It's not too bad, though, I still have an old 17" CRT so I'm not completely deprived, and the LCD unit had a month left on its warranty so Samsung is shipping me a replacement monitor due either friday or monday. I was kind of tempted to ask them to send me the other one back too once it's repaired, but I don't think they'd go for it... pity, because I like 4:3 monitors, and no one makes those anymore, seems like.
Anyway, I'll get back to work on the ships now. Gotta work on those turrets... :-)
I need to build a new set of rangefinders for these things, as the present ones are ugly. I've moved the sighting hoods (the square boxes forward of the ladder) on the heavy cruiser turret to match these, but I forgot to save the render I made afterwards. Only one main turret type left, which is that for the Alaska-class. Cheers for now.
Started a bit on the aviation end of things yesterday evening, and continued this morning. This here is the tail end of a heavy cruiser, showing off the pair of catapults and the armored hangar hatch:
Except for the rails the sliding hatch rests on, most of this is just provisional detail for now. I decided to do it the same way as the original ships mainly for the reason that topside facilities are easy enough to replace, but letting a stray blast get inside the hull through an open bay could end the ship completely. With shields protecting the topside equipment from micrometeorites and stuff anyways, and the scout craft being pilotless, I figured this was the better solution... Besides, it helps with the WWII look. :-)
Here's a much better-looking version of the catapults that I just finished (well, for now at least. much detailing remains):
I've also enlarged the hatch and moved it a bit further back, to match my reference image. The hatch is huge, thirty meters long and twenty wide. I haven't made the opening that goes beneath it yet, but that's the easy part. The idea is that the hangar is used for maintenance, storage of spare recon drones, and receiving shuttles; while prepped drones are stored on the catapults. There'll be one or two cranes, depending on the exact ship, similar to the ones I used previously on the Montana, to help place the recon drones on the catapults.
I've been disappointed with the Fargo/Oregon City meshes for a while, and decided to give them a major revamp... I started with the Fargo, and stripped her of her entire superstructure and started over. Here's a pic of her before the modifications:
And after:
I've still got a couple of more platforms to add, and I'm going to (finally) redo the foundations for the large AA platforms (they're supposed to be square pedestals with a round platform on top). I'll also need to sit down and redo the AA turrets.
The Oregon City class had more or less the same superstructure, so adapting it won't be a huge job. I'll try to finish this one first, though. :-)
Updated the CA-122 as well, and tried something silly with it:
I found a set of wood plank textures, including spec and bump maps, and decided to try them out. Looks neat, though it may not be too practical... I tried the same textures on the BB-61 as well:
That looks a lot more like the real thing now, doesn't it? :-)
Ohhh, things're getting steampunked... :flippy:
Just kidding, I like the idea of giving the spaceship (made of metal) a wood-looking painting. At leas the nostalgics will love it.
I also find it quite intriguing
Oh, that does look nice in the old layout. Hehe so what's it going to be? Is the wood painted on, is it some high-tech material that's made to look like wood or are you going to make it really decadent and have it be real precious wood, made from the last of the trees of the last of the Amazon rain forest,
I'll go the semi-decadent route, I think, if I'm keeping the texture - the wood is real, but it's not directly from the Amazon, but rather grown on one of the colonies - expressly for this purpose. Wood has some funny properties relating to shock and noise absorbtion, which is why they stuck with it on the battleships when they were reactivated. Plus, it just looks plain nice. :-)
Here's another anachronism I've been working on:
You'll have to look carefully, even with "Render Outlines" in the material properties, the objects in question are barely visible... :-)
The decks of the real ships were actually steel, with the wood laying on top of in raft-like panel sections. The reason, beyond providing better footing than the steel deck and looking good, was to diffuse the overpressure from firing the ship's guns.
Anyway, the only reason I used the wood texture in the first place was to see what it looked like, since I may end up doing the actual WWII versions of these ships at some point. It looks good up close, and from a long distance, but I didn't really like what it looked like from medium distance - the tiling was too apparent, so I went back to the painted deck.
Will post some renders when I have them - just woke up...
SP
Edit: Mostly done with the rigging on the first battleship.
Three more battleships and six cruisers to go... :-)
Posts
Midships and aft deckhouses done, now only the platforms on the Wigwam to go. I've been experimenting some with textures for the painted steel decks (blue gray bits) but the pattern is too fine to see unless I'm down on the deck itself, which isn't happening too often I think. The lighter of the two neutral grays is where the real ships have planked decks, and I don't have any idea at all what to do with those bits...
Cheers,
SP
Nice update.
In other news, I'm back on an unrestricted traffic plan, which was not a moment too soon. I have four months worth of anime to catch up on after having been on 128kbit, then nothing, and then 5 gigs monthly (half of which I swear Windows and my other software slurped away doing auto-updates...) Updates may be a little sporadic until I get caught up. Or bored.
SP
Happy to hear you're back on the (virtual) tracks.
About the nose of the ships, the big gun-like thing, according to my current thinking, is actually the navigational deflector. Of course, the difference between an energy shield and an energy blade is a question of focal distance, and that can be changed rather significantly on these ships. :-)
Finally, to make up for the lack of renders today, here's a link to one of my primary inspirations and sources for the BB-61-class mesh - bear in mind this is 1/700 scale, and the model is less than 40 cm long overall:
M o d e l W a r s h i p s . c o m - G a l l e r y
There are lots of other nice things to see at the same site, none of which were built by me (I wish...)
SP
First, the CB-1 (Alaska)-class, which has been totally redone. Haven't added all the AA platforms and guns yet, but they're coming soon:
Next, the CA-134 (Des Moines)-class. Also a more or less total rebuild. Note the new bridge structure in particular, even if the windows for it aren't installed yet, and the enlarged turrets:
Next up, the CL-106 (Fargo)-class, updated to reflect the actual ship a bit better. The O-1 level has been reshaped, and the broadside secondary turrets have been lowered by one (double) deck, as on the real thing. Still not happy with the bridge itself, can't seem to figure out a decent look for it...
Last but not least, the CL-55 (Cleveland)-class. The biggest change here is the new turrets (same as on the CL-106), and the addition of the hull number (reused the number from North Carolina...).
That's about it for now, thanks for looking. :-)
Cheers,
SP
Anyways, Nice lineups for the ships, mate. Say, isn't it about time to start on the textures? ^^
When I'm satisfied with the basic models, I'll see if I can find someone to help walk me through it...
Anyway, here's today's updates, so far:
Iowa, with platforms on her spotting tower and larger secondary turrets (old ones were a bit small). Behind the first pair there's a cutout to allow them to rotate freely. (Detail from the real thing). Also, on the fantail there's one of my attempts at retroreflective paint. This stuff is weird, and a pain in the rear to set up correctly (I found a huge thread of complaints about how difficult it is, but no one was sharing how they did it...:mad:).
Alaska, with the same new secondaries, the spotting tower leaning in the proper direction, and all of her medium AA platforms added (though not the mounts, since I'm redoing them soonish.) The Alaska-class had aviation facilities amidships, rather than aft as on all the other 1940's cruisers, and I'm still trying to come up with some equivalent. Right now I'm seriously considering going with unmanned drones on catapults like the ones on the real thing. (One of the other options is to replace the aviation stuff with more secondary turrets, directors for same, and extra AA, as someone did with his Alaska-class model kit to show what she *should* have looked like.)
Des Moines, Oregon City, and Baltimore, also with new secondaries. I've also done a lot of material assignment work, including getting all the lights working in Maxwell and changing the color of the engine pods to match those on the battleships. The plan is to add some detail to the main turrets of these ships today, and make some hull number textures.
Fargo and Cleveland, updated as above. I need to make some rotation cutouts for the secondaries on these, that's another job scheduled for today.
Finally, the Atlanta. New turrets as above, plus I've stripped off the deck lights for now and reshaped her bow to make it a little blunter. I still need to build the torpedo launchers (they're mounted just ahead of the side turrets), and install the radar on the mast - or build a completely new mast set. Dunno which yet. Once that's done, it's a really quick job to make two followup classes, Oakland and Juneau. (Oakland traded the wing turrets for AA mounts, Juneau bettered that by lowering the B, C, X, and Y turrets by one deck. Both changes were done to make the ships less top-heavy, which was a major problem on pretty much all US warships of the era).
Montana, South Dakota and North Carolina don't get pictures today. Montana needs a completely different set of secondary turrets compared to the others, South Dakota *had* been updated but my computer crashed before I'd saved the changes, and North Carolina needs a major overhaul to get the larger secondaries to fit. Maybe next update.
Cheers,
SP
These ships don't deserve to be left naked and even some basic textures with a nice specular can go a loooong way. And besides the ships don't look like too complex shapes.
Cheers,
SP
One of the new heavy cruiser turrets, for the Baltimore and Oregon City (as well as the preceding class, IIRC, which I'll get around to eventually). The various bits other than the rangefinders were reused from the battleship turrets, but I've improved them a little. I'm not quite satisfied with the gun pivots, but I don't know what to do with them just yet. The real things had soft canvas bags covering the mechanism, which would be painful to replicate. I'm holding off on making the holes in the turret glacis until I figure that part out. :-) I'm also having a flatness issue with the aft part of the side, making the ladder rest unevenly on the surface. Grr.
Doing the light cruiser turret next. Cheers,
SP
Anyway, I'll get back to work on the ships now. Gotta work on those turrets... :-)
SP
I need to build a new set of rangefinders for these things, as the present ones are ugly. I've moved the sighting hoods (the square boxes forward of the ladder) on the heavy cruiser turret to match these, but I forgot to save the render I made afterwards. Only one main turret type left, which is that for the Alaska-class. Cheers for now.
SP
Started a bit on the aviation end of things yesterday evening, and continued this morning. This here is the tail end of a heavy cruiser, showing off the pair of catapults and the armored hangar hatch:
Except for the rails the sliding hatch rests on, most of this is just provisional detail for now. I decided to do it the same way as the original ships mainly for the reason that topside facilities are easy enough to replace, but letting a stray blast get inside the hull through an open bay could end the ship completely. With shields protecting the topside equipment from micrometeorites and stuff anyways, and the scout craft being pilotless, I figured this was the better solution... Besides, it helps with the WWII look. :-)
We'll see how this goes from here...
Cheers,
SP
I've also enlarged the hatch and moved it a bit further back, to match my reference image. The hatch is huge, thirty meters long and twenty wide. I haven't made the opening that goes beneath it yet, but that's the easy part. The idea is that the hangar is used for maintenance, storage of spare recon drones, and receiving shuttles; while prepped drones are stored on the catapults. There'll be one or two cranes, depending on the exact ship, similar to the ones I used previously on the Montana, to help place the recon drones on the catapults.
Cheers,
SP
And after:
I've still got a couple of more platforms to add, and I'm going to (finally) redo the foundations for the large AA platforms (they're supposed to be square pedestals with a round platform on top). I'll also need to sit down and redo the AA turrets.
The Oregon City class had more or less the same superstructure, so adapting it won't be a huge job. I'll try to finish this one first, though. :-)
SP
I found a set of wood plank textures, including spec and bump maps, and decided to try them out. Looks neat, though it may not be too practical... I tried the same textures on the BB-61 as well:
That looks a lot more like the real thing now, doesn't it? :-)
Cheers,
SP
Just kidding, I like the idea of giving the spaceship (made of metal) a wood-looking painting. At leas the nostalgics will love it.
I also find it quite intriguing
Here's another anachronism I've been working on:
You'll have to look carefully, even with "Render Outlines" in the material properties, the objects in question are barely visible... :-)
Cheers,
SP
SP
Anyway, the only reason I used the wood texture in the first place was to see what it looked like, since I may end up doing the actual WWII versions of these ships at some point. It looks good up close, and from a long distance, but I didn't really like what it looked like from medium distance - the tiling was too apparent, so I went back to the painted deck.
Will post some renders when I have them - just woke up...
SP
Edit: Mostly done with the rigging on the first battleship.
Three more battleships and six cruisers to go... :-)