3Dthunderchild

teknomancer2008

right. things werent going well with the older version, so re attempted things to more be in alignment with what i had originally intended. starting with the saucer and working through the rest of the ship, me and my brother are working together on this project for the forseeable future. (we will be doing this on two separate models, and incorporating the ideas we both like on each into one mesh for the complete model) as a result, this model is to be completely re-designed, and the old one re-used for another project later. please bear with us as things go from bad to worse!

Pearse

The best thing to do is probably some quick sketches just to get a feel for how you want it to end up looking before you continue, otherwise you could spend a lot of time modeling only to realise the result isn't really what you were aiming for.

teknomancer2008

good idea, thanks i'll try that. any thoughts of engine style that would look good for this?

JWWright

It looks like a futuristic hot dog in a bun... in space!

Have you first sketched out a design to model from?

Pearse is spot on. Sometimes, if you just start modelling without a plan, you end up with some funky looking stuff...

Even simple sketches, to work out rough proportions, profile and elevation views, etc... can save you alot of wasted time.

Grab a pencil and paper, and hash some curves out, post 'em here, too.

As far as "engine style" goes, spend some time to look at trendy industrial design, you'll find nearly endless inspiration:

industrial design blogs search

biotech

Looks Klingon to me, possibly Romulan.

teknomancer2008

you're all riight, of course. have sketched a new version and am working on the nacelles, saw some good stuff recently, trying to incorporate this into my design, having trouble with the top half of the model because it describes such a delicate curve! am almost ready to post the sketches, and will do so when they are done. thanks again for the advice, am taking it i assure you! just looked at the stuff you came up with, good ideas so far, and am not even finished yet! cool idea, thanks!

JWWright wrote: »

It looks like a futuristic hot dog in a bun... in space!

Have you first sketched out a design to model from?

Pearse is spot on. Sometimes, if you just start modelling without a plan, you end up with some funky looking stuff...

Even simple sketches, to work out rough proportions, profile and elevation views, etc... can save you alot of wasted time.

Grab a pencil and paper, and hash some curves out, post 'em here, too.

As far as "engine style" goes, spend some time to look at trendy industrial design, you'll find nearly endless inspiration:

industrial design blogs search

teknomancer2008

biotech wrote: »

Looks Klingon to me, possibly Romulan.

there was originally a touch of rumulan in the design ideas, bearing in mind that this ship was designed with the dominion wars in mind. and is set to be used in a massive battle against the Borg soon, so i agree. the sausage shape was unintended. it came about by accident. the kind of happy accident that makes you wish you hadn't started in the first place. i have a new version coming which does not have that spine piece, and will post it asap. thanks! oh, btw, the idea is for this ship to be about a mile long, half a mile wide, and a third of a mile high. although this may change when the actual model is finished, as the physical dimension may not work as well as i would like. (as was the case with jj abrams enterprise model, the scale is wrong for the intended purposes it was designed for!)

JWWright

I cant wait to see how this develops, looks promising!

teknomancer2008

well, it took me some time, but i finally made it! here is the new version in a render against the earth, even has much internal stuff, too!

Freak

Looks like a intresting ship.

^ There no pic form the last post.

Hellsgate

U.S.S. Perverted Love Toy?

teknomancer2008

Freak wrote: »

Looks like a intresting ship.

^ There no pic form the last post.

sorry, tried to add it to the message and when it wouldnt let me i had to add it to the first post on the forum. couldnt change the previous message afterwards as i was having trouble with IE*, it was being a right dick brain and not leting me do anything!:mad:

teknomancer2008

as an aside, have been working on the interior of the ship, and have now added a bridge, ready room, conference lounge, engineering, warp core, and plasma relays, as well as the deuterium tank! whew! the rest is yet to come (if my computers memory can handle it, that is! lol

publiusr

I actually rather like the 3/4 view. It reminds me of a 24th Century restart of the DY-Series ships, with the conning tower--the Leif Erikson motif.

teknomancer2008

thank you. i do appreciate that. its rare i get such lol

teknomancer2008

the similarity is unintended, but the ideas may easily be the same, never seen the types you are referring to. could you give a reference please?

teknomancer2008

right. finally getting the hang of texturing (thanks to my brother!) however, he lives 30 miles away and contact with him is sporadic to say the least.this is where i hope you guys can help. as you can see by the render attached, there is a "dark patch" in the texture. it seems to be a problem with the facings of the mesh, but as soon as i try to correct it, the texture dissappears! god only knows what, if anything, i have done, but could you guys take a look and see if you can help please? i need to use this angle for a couple of shots, and this would be a terrible scar on the texture for me, thanks to anyone who tries, even if the ideas lead nowhere. i'll try anything.

teknomancer2008

okay, pausing to get this done. mr wright, here are the raw mesh renders for your perusal. hope they are useful to you in decyphering where i went wrong.

Freak

I am liking the shape of this.

teknomancer2008

thanks. its been twenty seven years in the making. started out as a huge ten sheet drawing when i was about sixteen. lost that, then started again. last year i discovered max, and havent looked back!this is now the fourth version ive done! the first looked like a cross between the entd and a klingon ship from tos! now, its coming together, and im enjoying it.

teknomancer2008

here are some more for your perusal, if you have any further ideas, let me know. i have tried re-setting the smoothing groups, and even re-building the mesh on that side from scratch, but all to no avail. really am stumped. what is causing this? by the way, also added by mistake is another wip of something i whipped up while chatting to a friend online last night. sorry, wasnt intending to add it, it just crept in there.

Freak

Have you tried to use Subd that might help?

teknomancer2008

Freak wrote: »

Have you tried to use Subd that might help?

thanks freak. i seem to have solved the problem now, mate. it was the self illumination! lol anyway, here are some of the new renders. enjoy!

Freak

self illumination, caused it to look like it was unsmooth? intresting.

anyway looks good but the front is a bit to blocky. try and bevel it. that sound give it a rounded looks and would be more realistic.

teknomancer2008

Freak wrote: »

self illumination, caused it to look like it was unsmooth? intresting.

anyway looks good but the front is a bit to blocky. try and bevel it. that sound give it a rounded looks and would be more realistic.

right, will try it out, see if it helps.

teknomancer2008

Freak wrote: »

self illumination, caused it to look like it was unsmooth? intresting.

anyway looks good but the front is a bit to blocky. try and bevel it. that sound give it a rounded looks and would be more realistic.

ok, tried my best. heres the latest. hope this is better. the dish area is a lot better, but cant do anything about the straight edges at the sides of the neck, its just the way it appears from the front. wish i had done more polys in there, now. its pretty inflexible. in order to keep the polys low, i literally built the sides out of huge flat polys. makes it very hard to modify that section.

Freak

yeah that looks better.

teknomancer2008

thanks, it did help to try that. i had been worried how to do that for ages. the blockiness had me perplexed. lol. one day i will be finished. one day. oh how we struggle for our fun! lol.:D
been thinking of a re-design of the tail end, maybe make it wider and flatter. any ideas anyone?

bearing in mind that it has to be able to allow for another starship to be situated between the nacelles, i am currently of the idea that the strength of the hull might not be enough for a more rounded approach. i will try both ideas out on a copy of the mesh, and post piccies asap. let me know what you think of each. thanks for the help so far, guys, its been invaluable.

teknomancer2008

first attempt doesnt look too good in my view. not sure if this is gonna work.....:rolleyes:

as an aside, i thought id add some escape hatches. this model is done to full scale, at 1500 metres by 500 metres by 750 metres. these pods are 3x3x3m exactly. you can see by this render the true scale of the ship in all its glory!

when you imagine that the thunderchild can accomodate about 5000 crew, im gonna need about 250 escape pods. by the way, they're not gonna be square, just placed these to show you guys just how massive she really is! when complete, i hope to place almost every detail inside a spare model for the uses needed in my film, but for now, im just focussing on the essentials. first things first, eh? lol

teknomancer2008

ok. now here we go with the latest wip from the thunderchild saga,lol. am beginning to really like this mesh now, theres still a long way to go before its fininshed, but getting there has been fun!

hagar2007

Hi dave. Just checking on your progress. In max there is a tesselate function that allows you to increase the number of vertices in a polygon. You could try that on a copy of the neck bits and any bits you think are too blocky, then try rounding them off. Just a thought.

Oh and that chat we had the other day about forward hangar decks? Forget what I said. Forward hangar decks are fine. The problems I thought might happen wouldn't.

She's looking good with the textures. I'm a just thinking. With the main dish, if you wanted to make it a little rounder, you could add a chamfer to the sides around the edge and that would round it a bit. You could probably do that for the rest of the blocky bits too instead of tesselate. Could be worth a try.